Page 77 of Wicked Games

“I don’t think he’d let us all know about a sociopathy diagnosis if he’s actually the Game Master,” Zach said smoothly, lifting a palm. “It’s just the same old shit. The real Game Master is trying to turn us all against each other.”

“I agree,” Brooke replied. “Also, that file said 2022, and the school psychologist was fired for being a pedophile that same year, so I don’t know if anything he said about his patients is accurate. I mean, someone like that isn’t exactly trustworthy, are they?”

“Just because the psych was a pedo doesn’t mean he was bad at his job,” Hudson said, glaring at Maverick.

“Oh, of courseyou’redefending pedos now,” Brooke shot back. “What else would we expect from a predator?”

The Game Master’s robotic voice suddenly piped up again. “Okay, everyone! Here’s the pairings. April versus Zach at table one, Jasmine versus Kiara at table two, Hudson versus Courteney at table three, and Carey versus Maverick at table four. Good luck!”

My eyes shot straight back to Maverick. He dipped his chin in a curt nod and stepped over to me. “Let’s go,” he said, gesturing toward the table at the end.

“Maverick,” I whispered. “I don’t want to pl—”

He put an index finger against his lips to signal for me to be quiet. Then he took another step closer. “We have to play each other,” he muttered. “Let’s just get it over and done with, okay?”

I swallowed hard and nodded, knowing he was right. If we refused to play the game, we’d die. The Game Master had made that very clear on our first day here. Also, we couldn’t agree to draw with each other by sinking zero balls each, because then we’dbothrisk death by poisoning.

I stepped over to the other side of our table and picked up a ball, heart sinking as I looked over at Maverick’s Solo cups. I wasn’t bad at aiming, but I wasn’t particularly good, either, and my hands were shaking like crazy. I’d probably lose this game.

Honestly, part of mewantedto lose. I didn’t want to die, but I didn’t want to lose Maverick, either. All I could really hope for was that whichever of us ended up losing just so happened to pick a cup without poison. As April said earlier, it all came down to luck.

“You can go first,” Maverick said, eyeing me from across the table.

I nodded and took a deep breath before narrowing my gaze on his top cup. Then I sent the ball over with a flick of the wrist. It bounced off the edge of the cup and landed on the floor.

“Close,” Maverick said, giving me an encouraging smile. He picked up a ball, threw it, and missed my top cup by half an inch. As the ball fell to the floor, he shrugged. “First round jitters, huh?”

“I guess so.” I smiled tightly and picked up another ball. With another flick of the wrist, I sent it sailing toward his top cup. This time, it went straight in.

“Perfect.” Maverick grinned. “My turn.”

He tossed another ball. This time, it missed by several inches.

“Maverick,” I hissed. “You aren’t even trying.”

“I don’t need to. You got one in. That makes you the winner, as long as I don’t get any in at all.”

“That’s not fair,” I said, heart pounding. “On you, I mean.”

He shrugged again. “I told you I wouldn’t let anything happen to you.”

I snapped my head to the right to see if any of the others had heard him say that. Fortunately, they were all too focused on their own games to be paying attention to our table.

“Please give yourself a chance,” I said, turning my attention back to Maverick. “I want this to be a fair game for both of us. It’s the right thing to do, and you know it.”

His eyes locked right on mine, and he smiled. “Just take your next turn, Carey.”

With a heavy sigh, I tossed another ball at his side of the table, purposely missing by an inch. “Your turn.”

“I know you did that on purpose, but it doesn’t matter,” he said, lifting a brow. “As long as I keep missing, you’ll still win.”

“You’re a real asshole sometimes, you know that?” I muttered.

He grinned. “If it keeps you safe, then I’m willing to be an asshole for as long as it takes.”

The game went exactly as he planned after that, with me winning 1-0.

I watched with bated breath as Maverick carefully removed his cups from the pyramid formation and placed them in a line. I had no idea how many of them were poisoned, but if I had to guess, I’d say half. The Game Master wasn’t nice enough to give us ten-to-one odds.

---