Page 35 of Wicked Games

“Level two,” said the voice.

The right blue square lit up, followed by the yellow square below. I waited for the beep and tapped my foot again. Blue right, yellow down.

“We all got the same squares, right?” Zach called out to the group. “Blue and yellow?”

There was a resounding chorus of ‘yes’, and my shoulders sagged with relief. At least we all had the same sequence to follow. The game would be much more confusing if we didn’t.

“Level three.”

This time, the new addition to the sequence was green left. Everyone passed easily, but the tension in the room had thickened. We were all worried about the upper levels, where we’d have to remember many more squares in the pattern.

“This is such bullshit,” Evan said. “Seriously, guys, nothing will happen if we step on the wrong square.”

Okay, I was wrong. We weren’tallworried about the game.

“Do it, then,” Hudson muttered. “See what happens.”

“I will,” Evan said as the robotic voice announced level four. “You’ll see in a few seconds. Nothing will happen to me, and Kiara will have to admit she arranged all this shit for views and followers.”

The new addition to the sequence was another blue square. After the following beep, I carefully tapped my foot in the correctorder—blue, yellow, green, blue. At the same time, I watched Evan’s feet out of the corner of my eye. He chose to tap on the red square first, followed by blue, yellow, and red again.

A loud beep resounded through the gaming room, and the robotic voice spoke again. “Player six is out. Remaining players, please stand by.”

Evan grinned. “See? Nothing’s happening to me,” he said, lifting his palms. “Tate was right. This is all Kiar—”

His smug speech was abruptly cut off by a sudden mechanical hiss. A metal rod shot out of the pipe above his head, shaft slicing through the air with lethal precision. In an instant, it found its mark, impaling Evan through the skull with a sickening crunch.

Time seemed to slow down as the horror unfolded. Evan’s eyes widened in shock as the steel brutally drove through bone and tissue, and a spray of crimson erupted, splattering the squares surrounding him. He let out a strangled gurgle as the rod retracted with a metallic clang, and his body convulsed in a futile struggle before falling limp on the square below.

I stared at the grisly spectacle with bulging eyes, reeling with a mix of shock and disbelief. Adrenaline surged through my veins, pushing me to run, but that urge was paralyzed by the sheer terror of the moment, leaving me frozen in place and unable to tear my gaze from Evan’s body.

The stunned silence in the room was broken by a wailing scream. Jasmine’s spot was next to Evan’s, so she had the worst view of all, and some of his blood was seeping into her square. She fell to her knees and covered her eyes, strangled shrieks escaping her lips between gasped words. “I… I can’t. Can’t do this. Can’t…”

Her cries blended with a cacophony of shrieks and gasps from the others in the room as the crushing reality finally sank in.

Thatreallyhappened. Evan wasreallydead.

“Oh god. Ohgodohgodohgod,” I said in a ragged whisper, whole body racked with tremors.

The bone-chilling screams around me made my stomach lurch, and I fell to my knees on my square, suddenly too weak to remain upright. The realization that we were all minutes away from meeting the same fate as Evan if we failed a single step was constricting my chest in a suffocating grip, leaving me unable to breathe properly.

“Get up,” April said, voice thick with emotion. “Carey, Jasmine… get up. You have to. Please.”

I couldn’t reply. Still couldn’t breathe.

Someone hauled me to my feet and held my left arm in a firm grip until I stopped wobbling. It was only when he stepped away that I realized it was Maverick. “Get it together, Saracen,” he muttered.

“Level five,” the robot voice announced.

I could feel Maverick’s eyes lingering on me as the next level proceeded in a blur of colored lights. “Blue, yellow, green, blue, red,” he called out to everyone. “Come on, guys. We can do it.”

I followed his instructions, not even knowing if they were right. It felt like my head had been scraped clean from the shock of what I’d just witnessed, and it was almost impossible to formulate a single thought. Thankfully, I passed, along with the ten other remaining players, and a collective sigh of relief went through the room.

“I can’t believe it,” Jasmine choked out. She was still on the floor, but she’d used her hands to tap the squares around her. “He’s really dead.”

“I know.” April reached over and laid a hand on her shoulder. “You should get up. Just in case. C’mon, I’ll help you.”

Zach joined April in helping Jasmine to her feet. At the same time, Kiara started shrieking all over again. “Do you fuckersbelieve me now?” she shouted, whirling around to look at Tate through bloodshot eyes. “Can you see it’s all fucking real?”

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