Page 9 of Make Your Play

Whipping my head to the side, I look over at Carson as he opens the box and pulls out a small piece of paper. He reads off the next clue which sounds like a damn riddle.

“What the hell does that even mean?” Lincoln questions us from where he’s standing by Caleb. The two of them are trying to decode something written on the wall behind a painting. I’m not sure where the hell they even got the code to decipher what it says.

“I think we are supposed to figure out which letters coincide with the different numbers to figure out the code,” Rowan cuts in as he walks over to Carson. Carson hands the paper to him and starts to rummage through one of the other boxes with numbers on the small table.

An escape room was today’s little team building activity. The entire team was divided into groups of five and each group was given a different room. Since we’re all competitive by nature, everyone agreed we should do it at the same time and whichever team gets done first gets dinner and a night of drinks paid for by the losing teams.

“Listen,” Caleb cuts through Rowan and Carson’s conversation. “I am not about to lose to any of the other teams, so we need to hurry up and figure this shit out. We have forty minutes left, boys.” Caleb glances over at me. “Simmons, see if you can figure out how to open the lock on that door.”

Lincoln jumps up, everyone directing their attention to him. “I got it. It spells bone.” Carson quickly walks around the table, heading over to the desk where there’s a drawer. He moves the letters around on the lock until it ends up popping open.

“Yes!” He opens the drawer, pulling out a notebook that’s filled with different notes and poems. “Goddammit. I’m not good at any of this shit.”

Rowan laughs, taking the notebook from him as Lincoln and Caleb walk over to them. Carson leaves the three of them to figure it out as he walks over to where I am. I’m halfway through figuring out what letters correspond to which numbers when Carson peers over my shoulder to look at what I’m doing.

“How was Christmas?” he asks as he takes the code from me. We had a few days off after Christmas, but Coach insisted we do this activity to end the year on a good note. I don’t think he knew what the hell he was signing us all up for when he picked an escape room as our exercise.

“It was pretty good,” I tell him, shrugging as he hands the code back and takes the pen from me to try and figure part of it out. “We went to my dad’s and Riley came along with us since she wasn’t able to go see her family.”

Carson raises an eyebrow at me. We haven’t spoken about her since he found me with her at the gala all those months ago. He didn’t even question me that night about what was going on because he didn’t need to. He may not have caught us in the act, but it was evident we were up to something.

“How did that go?”

I let out a sigh, frowning at the memory of that night. I haven’t talked to anyone about what Riley told me.

“As well as it could.”

Carson’s eyebrows tug together and he gives me a suspicious look. “Did something happen?”

“If I tell you something, you cannot repeat any of this, do you understand?”

He snorts, rolling his eyes. “I keep all your secrets,” he reminds me, his voice low as he glances at Lincoln and then back to me. “Remember?”

I cut my eyes at him, not commenting on that. I glance over at the other guys and they’re still distracted, so I quickly divulge Riley’s situation to him. I don’t tell him the specifics or anything about her health. The only thing I tell him is about her insurance being terrible and needing to find a solution to help her out.

Carson frowns as he looks back at the code and figures out the next number. There’s only one left now. “Do you remember my cousin Greyson?”

“The one who used to play for the Wolves? What about him?”

“When he was engaged to his wife, she ended up getting a new job and needed insurance because she had some issues going on, so they just got married instead. It wasn’t ideal, butthey did it on paper for insurance purposes and then just had their wedding after the fact.”

Holding the pen against the paper, I lift my head and turn to look at him. “Your solution is for me to marry Riley?”

Carson shrugs, giving me a strange look, like it’s not the most out-of-left-field suggestion ever. “I mean, it’s not the dumbest idea. We have excellent insurance and it’s covered by the team, so she wouldn’t even have to pay. It’s not like it would be a real marriage.”

I chew over his words, handing him the pen again as he figures out the last number. “So, we get married on paper so she gets my insurance and then after the baby is born, we just get it annulled?”

“Yeah,” Carson agrees as he unlocks the lock. “It’s actually a brilliant idea… if you can get her to agree to it.”

“It’s not like it would be a real marriage,” I repeat the same words to him as I try to warm up to the idea. “It seems simple enough, right?”

He nods eagerly. “Right. You just get married, get her on your policy, and then everything is covered. You can figure out what happens later, but it seems like she needs a temporary solution, and that’s the easiest one.”

“Did you guys get that lock opened?” Rowan asks as he suddenly steps up behind us.

Caleb is right there with him. “Are you two seriously just sitting here wasting time gossiping?”

“No, we literally just unlocked it,” Carson argues back, narrowing his eyes on his brother. The two of them are really close and get along well, but in typical sibling fashion, it doesn’t take much for them to be at each other’s throats. “Did you figure out what that notebook is for?”

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