Page 51 of Wicked Games

“It was me.” Courteney put her hand up. “He’s not lying when he says it was only one time. It really was. We were going home from our study group, and we—”

“You?” April cut her off, eyes widening with incredulity. “Oh my god. Of course it was! You two have been all over each other ever since we got to this place!”

“That’s not true.”

“It is. You know, I actually thought it was cute at first. I was glad that Zach was finally able to move on and have feelings for someone else. I thought he deserved it.” April’s lips twisted into a sneer. “But the whole time…”

She trailed off, and Courteney began to cry. “I swear, it only happened once,” she said in a choked voice. “Nothing since then. We both felt too guilty.”

“Oh,sure.”

“Next question is for Hudson,” Rhys said, raising his voice to drown out Courteney’s sniffling. He gave a sidewards glance to April. “Sorry, but you only asked for a minute, and I actually gave you two for that little outburst. Clock’s ticking.”

Hudson rolled his eyes. “Shoot.”

“How many girls have you sexually violated or attempted to violate?” Rhys asked. I noticed he’d lowered his voice again, ostensibly trying to defend his best friend by ensuring half the room wouldn’t hear the question.

Hudson’s eyes widened. “What the fuck?”

“He asked how many girls you’ve tried to force yourself on,” Maverick said, loud enough for everyone to hear over Courteney’s cries, which had turned from sniffles into plaintive sobs. “Answer the question.”

“None.” Hudson shrugged. “I don’t know why that’s even a question for me.”

“Bullshit,” Maverick said, eyes narrowing. “One of those girls is in the room with us right now. I won’t say who to protect her identity. But I know it happened.”

My brows rose. I never actually told Maverick what happened between me and Hudson after he rescued me that day in the hallway. He must have guessed based on the interaction he witnessed before he stepped in.

Or… perhaps he knew because he was the Game Master, meaning he already knew the answer to every single secret in this game.

Hudson shot me a sideways glance and smirked. Clearly, he knew hardly anyone in the room would believe me if I told them what he’d done to me.

“I didn’t do shit,” he said, turning back to face Maverick. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“You’re a fucking liar.”

“Rhys, put zero in the answer box. Then everyone will see.”

“Don’t!” Brooke shouted. “We’ll lose a minute!”

“But that could really be the answer,” Kiara said. “Like, it could be a trick question. Right?”

Rhys entered ‘0’ in the answer box, and a familiar red popup appeared. “Shit,” he muttered. “We just losttwominutes.”

“So it’s not just one minute we lose for every wrong answer. It doubles every time you put in a wrong answer,” Tate said, eyes widening.

“Maybe it’s the word ‘zero’ rather than the number,” Rhys murmured, fingers flying over the keyboard.

“Don’t!” I shouted, trying to snatch the laptop from him. He was too fast, and he pressed enter before I could get hold of it. The red dialog box popped up again, informing us that we’d lost four minutes this time.

“We’re down to six minutes now,” I said, shooting a helpless look at Maverick.

He stood and wrenched the laptop out of Rhys’s grip. “You can’t be trusted with this,” he said. “Hudson, answer the fucking question, or we’ll all die.”

“I… I’m starting to feel a little lightheaded,” Courteney mumbled.

“That’s because the room is filling with gas, and we just got a massive new hit of it, thanks to Rhys losing us six whole minutes of time,” Maverick said.

Hudson looked down at the table. His hands were splayed out in front of him. “I didn’t do anything,” he muttered.

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