The Escape Game

Chapter 31 Carter

Carter

Carter didn’t really believe they’d made it until the four of them were back in their villa, dazed from the emotional roller coaster.

They were still in the game, at least for another week.

And they were meeting Louis Augustus Russell.

Tonight.

“I have to go. Team stuff,” she said, faking a smile as she blew a kiss at the phone screen. Her dad jokingly shoved her mom out of the way to “catch” it.

“We love you!” her mom said, pushing her way back into the frame. “Try to get some rest. They’re working you too—”

“Okay, I will. I love you too. Bye!” She hung up, guilt gnawing at her. It was getting harder to talk to them. Harder to find safe subjects. The rooms? The elimination rounds? Fine. Literally everything else? No way.

She walked out to the living room and crammed a handful of Beck’s Doritos into her mouth. She was stress-eating, she knew, but who could blame her? She gazed around at the rest of her team.

Her . . . friends?

It was what she had hoped for. That she would find her people— puzzle lovers and passionate nerds. People who understood her. People she could be herself around. Not Kick It Carter but the real her.

Team Helsing wasn’t exactly what she’d had in mind, but now that she thought about it, they were the ones she trusted most to back her up against the Game Master.

Adi was strung across the opposite sofa, staring at the ceiling, his gaze unfocused. He’d been like that since seeing Alicia’s cryptic note yesterday. Beck said Adi hadn’t touched a book since, not even before bed.

Sierra was in one of the tufted chairs, hunched over her phone. Carter assumed she was studying the clues on the Domain’s forum again, but a glimpse of the screen revealed what looked like an online art store.

Beck was practicing a viral dance. Under his breath, he occasionally whispered things like, “Find the light from number four villa. Find the light from hashtag four villa. Find a-strike-through-the light? Strike-through, why the strike-through?”

Carter brushed chip dust from her fingers and leaned over Alicia’s note still spread out on the coffee table.

She ignored the part about Louis to focus on the mention of the clue from episode two. Piano, sheet music, sounds.

What are you trying to tell us, Alicia?

“Hey.”

It took Carter a moment to realize Sierra was talking to her. She tore her gaze from the note as Sierra put down her phone. “I should probably apologize. You know. For making a big deal about you and Fitzy.”

Beck stopped dancing.

“I was wrong,” Sierra said. “So . . . yeah. Sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Carter said. “You were trying to protect me.”

Beck wriggled his eyebrows. “Does this mean you and Fitzy are a thing?”

Adi shifted to look at Carter, too. She flushed under everyone’s expectant stares. “Of course not. It isn’t like that.” When they seemed unconvinced, Carter added, “He’s not my type.”

“Oh, sure,” said Beck. “No one likes the hot, popular ones. And that accent? Total turnoff.”

Carter’s flush deepened. “Even if I were . . . a little interested . . . he obviously wouldn’t be interested in . . .” She gestured at herself.

Adi rolled his eyes and picked up his phone.

“I don’t know,” said Beck. “We saw the studio tour video. There was tons of chemistry.”

“Oh, please. He was just being . . .” Friendly.

Nice.

Flirty?

She shook her head. “Honestly, it doesn’t even matter. There’s a strict clause in the contract that says the host isn’t allowed to date any contestants.”

“Won’t be a problem for much longer,” Adi muttered.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Sierra said.

“Nothing.” Adi rolled onto his back again and continued to stare at the ceiling. “It means nothing.”

True to his word, Louis sent a car for Carter just before eight, and if the driver was confused why four teenagers piled in instead of one, he didn’t say anything.

Louis had sent another text—the number “522”—and Carter had thought maybe it was a puzzle to solve.

But when the car pulled up to a hotel, she realized it was actually a room number.

“This doesn’t feel like an illicit affair at all,” Adi drawled.

“Shut up,” Carter snapped. Disgust and dread rolled through her as they all slinked through the lobby, which was lush with plants and fountains.

Beck hummed the Mission Impossible theme song as they entered the elevator.

This was a terrible idea. They should have gone to the police. Carter said as much out loud, her voice trembling. It wasn’t too late. They could still leave—

“Steady, girl,” Sierra murmured, squeezing Carter’s arm. “The cops have already screwed this case up. And they don’t trust anything I say. We need hard evidence, or Louis’s never going to be convicted.”

“I still don’t understand why Ranielle covered for him,” Adi said, watching the elevator numbers rise.

“Do not trust the Russells,” Beck whispered, quoting Alicia’s note.

The elevator dinged and they stepped out, creeping down the empty corridor. When they got to the right door, Carter gestured for the others to leave.

“I’ll call for you when his guard is down.”

“Are you sure about this?” Adi said.

Carter looked at Sierra. This was for her. And Alicia. And all the other girls Louis had preyed on—or the girls he would prey on, if he wasn’t put away.

“I’m sure.”

Adi must’ve seen the conviction in her eyes, because he gave a short nod and left. Beck threw up two thumbs, walking backward down the hall.

“Thank you,” Sierra whispered. “We won’t be far.”

When she’d disappeared around the corner with the boys, Carter faced the door and rubbed her sweating palms on her jeans. She was so scared she could hardly breathe.

She knocked, but the door nudged open under her knuckles. She hadn’t realized it was already ajar.

There was a moment when she stood there, unsure whether Louis was going to swing it open all the way. When nothing happened, she poked the door with her finger.

“Hello?”

She took a tentative step inside. Ensconced lights illuminated plump white couches, vase-bound peacock feathers, and gilded picture frames. City lights sparkled beyond the windows. The room was so bright. So silent.

And it stank.

She wrinkled her nose. “Louis?” Maybe he was in the bathroom. It sort of smelled like that’s where he was.

The television was on, muted, playing an old episode of The Escape Game.

“Louis? I’m here for our interview.”

She tiptoed farther in to find the bathroom door open. Empty.

An open bottle of wine had been taken out of the minibar. The glass was slick with condensation, forming a wet ring on the counter.

Carter stared at the water slipping down the bottle. A dim thought registered in her mind. Something bothered her about this. A partially empty bottle of wine, covered in condensation . . .

The back of her neck prickled, as if someone was watching her. She spun around to find the room as empty as before. On the television, Elijah was doing a post-round interview, his mouth forming unheard words. He looked out of the screen as if staring right at her.

A sickening doom settled in her stomach. The smell was starting to make her ill.

Her instincts thrummed. She needed to get out of here.

Her path to the door took her back past the lounge suite, with a sofa and a coffee table and . . .

A person. On the floor.

Louis Augustus Russell, mouth foamy, eyes wide and unblinking.

Carter screamed. She ran for him and dropped to her knees, shaking his shoulders.

“Can you hear me? Louis! Louis!”

Behind her came a shout and swearing. There was a thunder of footsteps. Hands grabbed her waist.

“Away, away from him. Carter! Get back!”

Sierra pulled her to her feet and spun her from the scene.

Carter tried to get a handle on her racing thoughts. She couldn’t breathe. “We—we have to call an ambulance.”

“Did you touch him?”

“What?”

“Carter.” Sierra’s eyes were wide. Frightened. “Did you touch him?”

“I—I—” Her brain barely registered the question. “I shook his shoulders.”

“You didn’t try giving him CPR?”

“No—I only just found him—”

Sierra wrenched out her phone. “I’m calling 911.”

Adi and Beck gaped down at the scene as Sierra dialed with trembling fingers.

“Hi, there’s—there’s a body. We found a body.”

A body.

Carter turned to look again at Louis. It was so unnatural, the way he stared at the ceiling.

Louis Augustus Russell was dead.

“Oh my god,” she said, no longer able to see through her burning tears. “Oh my god.”

She fell forward into Adi. After a brief hesitation, his arms came around her, tight and protective.

In the muddled background, Sierra was giving details of the hotel.

“I’m gonna hurl,” Beck said, running to the bathroom.

It was the smell—Louis had soiled himself, and it was visceral and foul and awful—

“Get me out,” she said into Adi’s shoulder. “Get me out of here.”

He led her past Sierra, back into the hallway, where the air was clearer. She sucked in fresh breaths, trying to regain herself.

Adi drew away. “I’m going back in.”

“No, don’t—”

“There’s a note. On the coffee table. I want to see what it says.”

Adi went into the hotel room. Carter hugged herself, shivering from the sudden cold. The smell was starting to waft out.

She didn’t want to be alone. After a hesitant moment, she went back inside, holding her breath.

Sierra was still talking to the emergency services. Adi was on the other side of the coffee table, bent over a piece of hotel paper.

Carter pressed her wrist to her nose and inched closer so she could see what it said, doing her best to keep her gaze away from the body.

Louis’s penmanship had been shaky when he wrote it, but Carter recognized the handwriting from countless thank-you notes and autographs posted to the Domain over the years, unmistakable with its elaborate capital letters and flourishing script.

I killed A licia. Can’t live with the guilt anymore. P lease apologise to my fans and everyone I’ve hurt. Tell Rani I love her.

Carter shuddered. Adi took a photo of the letter with his phone. The camera’s quiet click startled her out of her shock. She scanned the room, needing to look at anything but the body, anything but that horrible confession.

There was a fancy charcuterie board on the coffee table along with two wineglasses—one empty and waiting to be filled, another with the last dregs of wine pooling at the bottom.

A confession. This was a suicide note and a confession and . . . Louis had killed Alicia. The murder was solved.

But she felt no sense of victory.

An entire lifetime passed before she finally heard sirens. The night shredded into disjointed images. Hotel guests peering from their rooms. An investigator placing a sticky note next to the wineglasses. A white sheet draped over the body.

Carter and the others were separated. She sat in some back room behind the hotel’s check-in desk, trying her best to answer questions.

What had she been doing in Mr. Russell’s room?

What was the state of the body when she found it?

Had she noticed anything unusual about the room when she entered?

Had the door been locked when she arrived?

Finally, a detective told her they would reach out tomorrow morning with follow-up questions. But she couldn’t leave yet, because one of the investigators was still talking to Sierra. They interviewed her a lot longer than the others.

Carter could now see why Sierra hadn’t wanted to take Alicia’s note to the police. It was clear that they were deeply mistrustful of her, especially since this was the second suspicious death she’d been connected to.

Finding Louis had been hard, but what had it been like to discover her sister in that coffin? Carter hadn’t really comprehended the horror before, not on this level.

It was well past midnight by the time Sierra emerged, and Carter was relieved to see that she hadn’t been put into handcuffs.

No one spoke on the ride back to the complex. Louis had confessed to killing Alicia, and now he was dead.

Carter wondered if she should contact Ranielle. She tried to imagine how she’d break it to the executive producer that her husband—and the single most important part of the show—was gone. Somehow, Carter had a feeling Ranielle would be more upset about losing the show than her spouse.

It wasn’t until they were back in the villa, after everyone had done their best to shower away the smell of death, after they’d made their way, zombielike, to the living room couches, that Beck finally broke the silence.

“Should we answer that post on the Domain? From the Real Game Master? Tell them we found the lie?”

Carter swallowed, wanting so badly to deny it, to go on believing the brilliant Game Master was still the same man she’d believed him to be.

I killed Alicia. Can’t live with the guilt anymore.

“No way,” said Sierra. “Why would we?”

Beck shrugged. “They suspected Louis from the start and wanted someone to prove it. They must be dying for an answer. Um. No pun intended.”

“They can find out with the rest of the population,” Sierra said with a growl.

“The police will be going after Ranielle.” Adi frowned. “Lying about Louis’s alibi might be a criminal offense.”

Carter sank deeper into the couch cushions, bone tired. She pinched the bridge of her nose, listening to the clock tick on the wall.

“Why do you think Louis did it?” Beck whispered. “Killed Alicia, I mean.”

“Lover’s spat?” suggested Adi. “Maybe she wanted to end it and he got angry. That would explain the words carved inside the coffin lid.”

“We get what we deserve,” Sierra murmured.

“It could’ve been revenge for her leaving,” Adi said.

Carter drew a steadying breath. “I’m going to have to call my parents. Oh god, they’re going to pull me from the show.”

Adi smiled bitterly. “What show?”

“What do you mean, what show? The show! We’re supposed to film the semifinal on Monday!”

Beck, Sierra, and Adi exchanged glances.

“Carter,” Beck said gently. “The Game Master is dead. Without him, there is no show.”