Sheryl’s face dropped. “That’s it?”
“Were you expecting something else?”
“Well, yeah,” Sheryl said, sounding thrown. “Ten Hidden Library escape rooms in five countries, and my husband and I are one-half of the first team to ever beat it. Shouldn’t we be on CNN? TMZ? Oprah?”
“It’s possible Persephone might find herself on the news.” Leah’s permasmile deepened, though her flawless skin showed no creases or wrinkles, as if the shiny red lips were merely painted on the canvas of her skin. “Her victory today might—”
“‘Her victory’?” Sheryl said, eyes wide with shock. “You mean ‘our victory.’”
Leah was having none of it, and her tone, while firm, was dismissive. “Persey is the one who figured out every single clue and put them together for the final puzzle.”
“But we’re a team,” Sheryl whined. “We were in this together.”
Kevin laughed. “Like five minutes ago, weren’t you threatening to ask for your money back because she was ‘hogging’ the challenges?”
“I didn’t mean it like that.”
Persey cocked her head. Seriously? “How did you mean it?” She should have let the comment go—there was no reason to argue with this woman—but for some reason, Sheryl rubbed her all kinds of wrong.
“How do you know it was all her?” Sheryl pressed. “How do you know my husband and I weren’t instrumental in—”
“We were regulating the game,” Leah said, intervening before the argument could escalate further. “Via hidden cameras. All Escape-Capades rooms are monitored this way. That’s how we know exactly what happened here today, and might I just add that we were all really impressed with your problem-solving ability, Persephone.”
Persey’s eyes dropped to the floor. She was unaccustomed to praise of any kind.
“So while the prize money will be split four ways,” Leah continued, “we do have something special just for you.”
“Special?” the professor asked.
Leah folded her arms across her chest. “I’m sure you’re aware of the Escape-Capades All-Star Competition taking place next month in Las Vegas?”
The lime-green posse’s energy exploded as soon as Leah mentioned the all-star competition. As the Escape-Capades employees’ whispers and fidgeting doubled, Persey caught stray phrases like “last spots” and “totally secret.”
“Never heard of it,” Professor Rohner answered, even though Persey was pretty (totally) sure the question had been meant for her. “Is it a new escape room?”
Leah’s eyes were cold as she turned to him. “Perhaps you don’t frequent the online communities where we promote this kind of information. Geektacle definitely caters to a…younger crowd.”
“I’ve heard of Geektacle,” Sheryl snapped.
No, you haven’t.
Leah sighed, resigning herself to an explanation. “Positions in the All-Stars are only offered to the best and brightest in the escape room community. And beating the unbeatable? That scores you an invitation.”
“Oh,” Persey began, “I don’t—”
“The All-Stars?” Professor Rohner said, leaning forward in excitement. “Us?”
Sheryl grabbed his arm. “We’re in!”
“I’m terribly sorry,” Leah said. Her voice was smooth and even, and dripped with sincerity even though Persey suspected (knew) she felt none. “But I only have two slots left for the All-Stars and I’m offering one of them to Persey.”
“Me?”
Kevin snorted again. “No, the other puzzle-solving genius in the room.”
Genius was possibly (definitely) the least likely word to be used to describe Persey. “Failure” or “lazy” would have been her dad’s choices. But genius? No way.
It wasn’t that she was necessarily stupid—she knew, deep down, that she wasn’t—but tests in school were so long. Excruciating. It was difficult (impossible) to focus on the questions, the letters and words swirling together before her eyes, so even though she usually knew the material backward and forward, she’d never finished an exam in her entire life.
“What do you say, Persephone?” Leah prompted.
Persey’s head snapped up from where her eyes had unconsciously drifted to the floor. The guy with the camera had it pointed directly at her face. There was nowhere to hide, no time to turn away, and she flinched when she heard the shutter sound effect indicating that he’d taken her picture at close range.
“I…” I don’t want to do this.
“You’re not really going to say no, are you?” Kevin said. “I mean, you’re here because you wanted this, right?”
Persey pressed her lips together. “I guess.”
“You guess?” Kevin snorted again. “So it’s just about the money, huh?”
Persey flinched again. The camera was still fixed on her, as were the eyes of everyone in the room, and she desperately wanted to crawl into a cave, pull a giant boulder across the opening, and hide from the entire world. “I really appreciate the offer,” she began, “but—”
“Are you insane?” Sheryl said, eyes wide while the lime-green brigade gasped in unison. “This is like the greatest honor. Ever.”
Persey was tired of the Rohners interrupting her. “I can’t.”
“Can’t?” Kevin said. “Or won’t?”
That was inappropriate. “What are you, my dad?”
“Ouch.” Kevin cringed. “Maybe, like, an older brother or something.”
“I already have one of those.”
“Yeah?” Kevin laughed, but Persey could tell it was forced. “I bet he’s a cool dude.”
He’s definitely cold. “You’re a lot like him.”
“Handsome?” Kevin smiled. “Wicked smart? Life of the party?”
“Smug,” Persey replied, matching his grin.
Sheryl cleared her throat. “Get a room, you two.”
Ew. “I should be getting home.” Yeah, like you have a home anymore…
“Hold on, Persephone,” Leah said, stepping in front of her as Persey started for the secret door. “You haven’t even heard what the grand prize is.”
Persey sighed. I don’t want to do this. “Yeah, okay. What is it?”
“The grand winner will receive a cash prize of ten million dollars.”
Kevin’s jaw dropped. “Holy shit.”
“That’s ten times what they offered for the Prison Break escape room last year,” Sheryl said. “And that bankrupted the company.” She side-eyed Leah. “Do you even have that kind of money anymore? The Hidden Library hasn’t been that popular.”
Leah stiffened. Clearly Persey wasn’t the only one who was weary of the Rohners. “Escape-Capades has rebounded nicely since the tragic events of last year, due to our new private investors….”
Professor Rohner cleared his throat. “Two spots left,” he said, directing Leah back to her offer. “If she doesn’t want one of them, my wife and I would be more than happy to fill out your roster.”
Leah caught her breath, as if she’d just had a brilliant, groundbreaking idea. “Actually…Persephone—”
“Persey.” The nickname was easier.
“Persey, what if I offered you both of the last two spots?”
“Both?”
Leah nodded, casting her eyes at Kevin. “One for you and one for your friend.”
“Oh, we’re not friends,” Kevin said quickly. “At least not yet.”
Ugh.
“I’m in,” Kevin said, extending his hand to Leah. “All in.”
“That’s nice,” Leah said, “but you’re only in if Persey is too.”
“Oh, so he gets special treatment but we don’t?” Sheryl huffed, then grabbed her husband’s arm. “That’s it. CNN is going to hear about this!”
Persey eyed the Rohners as they stormed out through the bookcase door, but Leah ignored them. She was focused on Persey. “Well?”
Persey sighed. Ten million dollars. She’d never have to worry about where she’d sle
ep or how she’d feed herself. She could get her own place or…Persey pressed her lips together to keep them from quivering. I could disappear.
Unconsciously, her eyes drifted to Kevin’s face. His blond hair flopped over one eye and his hazel eyes practically twinkled as he beamed at her, willing an answer.
“I really don’t want to do this,” she said softly, finally voicing the refrain that had been running endlessly through her mind all day.
“Please?” Kevin took a step toward her, a devil’s grin on his face. “I mean, who the hell turns down a chance to win ten million bucks, huh? You’ll never get this opportunity again.”
Ugh, again. “Fine.”
“Wonderful!” Leah cried. Behind her, the gathered Escape-Capades employees burst into cheers and applause. Persey wished she could share their enthusiasm.
Kevin held his hand up for a high five, which Persey half-heartedly returned. “Sweet! This is going to be so awesome! You’re the best, Perse.”
The best. Persey seriously doubted it.
PERSEY WATCHED HER DAD’S FACE AS HE READ THE PIECE OF paper on the dining table. His fingers were in constant motion, spinning his ornate wedding ring over and over on his finger as he processed what he was reading. She could almost pinpoint the moment his temper went from slow roll to out-of-control freight train, all by the color of his face. His pale skin was like the worst poker tell ever: a flush of pink when his anger sparked, then a deep rose as it grew, and finally a purplish red like an angry zit as he crossed the point of no return.
“WHAT THE FUCK?”
She should apologize. Say she was sorry. Try to believe it. That’s what her twelve-year-old self would have done, but she was thirteen now, and knew better than to try and argue with her father. It only made things worse. Instead, she just stared defensively (tactically) at the floor.
“A sixty-one percent on your algebra test? How is it even possible that you could be this stupid?”
She wasn’t sure why she thought high school would be any different from middle school, where her bad grades had always been a surefire way of igniting her dad’s rage. Especially since he’d insisted she attend the same fancy prep school as her brother, even paying someone smarter than her to take the entry exam on her behalf. But once she was admitted to the Allen Academy, Persey was way out of her league, and only two months into freshman year, her academic situation already had her teetering on the brink of expulsion.
“Absolutely UN. AC. CEP. TA. BLE.” He pounded his flattened palm on the table with each syllable, as if he needed to make his point any clearer. Then he waited, staring at her, unblinking.
What did he want her to say? She’d never been good at math, and the anxiety she’d feel creeping up from somewhere deep in her stomach as she sat down to take each and every exam certainly didn’t help.
“Well?”
“I thought I knew the answers,” she began, carefully choosing her words. “But…but then I panicked. I just…Tests just aren’t my strong point, Dad.”
His steely eyes burned into hers. “That implies you’re good at something. That you have a strong point. Which you don’t,” he added before Persey could answer.
That’s not true. Okay, so tests and reading were a struggle. But she wasn’t lying when she said she knew the answers beforehand. She’d listened to an audiobook that covered all the material on the exam. She could have recited every formula verbatim if the teacher had asked her, but once she saw the questions on the page, it was as if her mind went blank.
Persey was savvy enough to know that her difficulty might actually be a form of learning disability and that there was probably medication that could help her, but her father didn’t believe in learning disabilities. Or mental health maintenance. Or weakness of any kind.
Which didn’t stop her from bringing it up again.
“Dad, I think I have, like, an actual learning disability. Maybe if I saw a doctor or—”
“Laziness isn’t a learning disability,” he said, cutting her off. Like a king issuing a decree.
“I’m not lazy,” she protested, unable to stop herself.
“Read my lips.” He rocketed to his feet. “Lay. Zee. And no child of mine is lazy, get it? You’ve got two, three years tops to get your shit together before no college in the world will touch you. No child of mine doesn’t go to college. No child of mine doesn’t try.”
“I did try!”
“A D-minus is trying? Are you kidding me?” He wrinkled his nose and angled his face away from her, as if his daughter smelled like rotting flesh. “This is basic algebra. A third grader should be able to get a D-minus on this exam. Or were you trying to get this grade?”
“N-no, sir.”
“Three x minus five equals seven,” he said, reading from the page. “Solve for x. How did you come up with seven? Literally, seven is part of the equation. It’s not even a factor of three!”
“Four.” She didn’t even hesitate. Standing there in front of her father, picturing the numbers and letter in her mind, she knew the answer. Quickly. Easily. But in a classroom with a ticking clock and numbers on a stark-white page staring up her at her? Panic. Mistakes. It was as if her brain couldn’t function normally in such circumstances. Everything fell apart.
“Honey…” Persey’s mom’s voice drawled from the living room, where she sat on the sofa, scrolling through her phone. There was a pause, which usually meant she was taking a sip from her wineglass, then a gentle clank as she placed it (temporarily) on the coffee table and leaned back so she could see her husband and daughter. “Honey, why don’t we get her a tutor?”
“No!” her dad snapped. “We tried that once, and it did nothing. Just an embarrassing waste of money. She has to learn to do this on her own.”
“But you have this same argument every time she brings a test home,” her mom persisted. Which was a rare occurrence. Usually her defense of her daughter was withdrawn as soon as her husband swatted her opinions down. “Maybe it’s time to try something else?”
“Yes,” her dad said, catching them both off guard. Was he really going to agree with his wife? “Yes, she needs to pay attention in class for a change.”
Persey knew it was futile to try to reason with him—he was the kind of man who always got his way, either through coercion, force, or the large amounts of money he’d throw at a problem—but she was thirteen now. Not a child anymore. She should be allowed to advocate for her own needs.
“I can’t focus,” she said, staring at the packet of pages on the table in front of her dad, the “D-minus” in red ink jabbing at her insides. “When I’m taking a test, it’s like I can’t remember anything.”
Her dad arched an eyebrow. “Can’t or won’t?”
Did he really think she was getting mediocre grades on purpose?
“I…”
His phone vibrated against the table, mercifully interrupting the conversation, and the screen lit up with a photo. It was a familiar one—a young guy with unkempt hair holding up the MVP trophy from last year’s varsity regionals soccer championships. Her older brother.
“You’re on speakerphone,” he said, answering the call.
“Hey, Dad. Everything okay?” Their father was so predictable: Persey’s brother knew from just three words that Dad was in a mood.
“It’s nothing.”
Just another Tuesday night of Dad tearing me to pieces.
“Ooooh-kay.”
“What can I do you for, Boss?” He always called her bother “Boss.” Grooming him to take over the family business.
“Just wanted to let you and Mom know that I won’t be home for dinner. I’ve got study group after practice, and it may go late.” In the background, Persey could clearly hear a girl giggling. Anatomy study group, apparently.
“Is that my beautiful boy?” Persey’s mom called from the living room.
“Hi, Mom! How’s that chardonnay I recommended?”
“The butteriest!” she cooed, as if wine suggest
ions from your seventeen-year-old son were the most normal and delightful things in the world.
“Knew you’d love it!”
Her mom raised a glass, silently toasting the phone, and Persey fought to keep from rolling her eyes.
“Anyway,” he continued, his voice more serious. It was the tone he took when addressing their dad, as if matching the gravity of Dad’s tone would make him take his son more seriously. And it seemed to work. “I might miss curfew tonight. Might. I’ll do everything I can not to, but tomorrow’s exam—”
“Don’t worry about it, Boss,” her dad said. “Do what you need to do. Senior year, after all! I’ll have Esme leave a plate of food out for you.”
“Thanks, Dad. You’re the best!”
Her dad stared at the phone until the portrait of her brother blipped off the screen. “I wish you were more like him,” he said without looking up.
Of course you do.
He was perfect; she was a mess. He got straight A’s; she struggled not to flunk. He was senior-class president; she was a nobody.
That’s what her parents saw, what they believed to be true.
But they didn’t know their son at all.
PERSEY’S INTESTINAL TRACT HAD TWISTED ITSELF INTO SOME kind of Eagle-Scout-merit-badge-worthy knot during her flight to Las Vegas. She didn’t love flying—she’d watched one too many runway disaster shows on the Weather Channel late at night when she couldn’t sleep to make air travel a totally relaxing experience—but that wasn’t the real reason for her anxiety. She was less stressed about the flying than about what she was flying toward.
Escape-Capades World Headquarters.
Why did I agree to do this?
It was a stupid question to ask, since she knew the answer already. All ten million of them. When you’re seventeen with no money and no future ahead of you, ten million dollars can make you do a lot of things. Even things you really, really don’t want to do.
It’s going to be fine.
Fine. Right. Sure.
The commuter jet bounced gently as the wheels screeched against the runway, signaling their arrival in Sin City, and while Persey’s stomach troubles should have escalated as the aircraft taxied to its gate, she instead felt a wave of relief wash over her. She was here. The decision had been made. This was happening. Her body unclenched, the dampness on the back of her neck began to evaporate, and Persey practically smiled as she watched the gleaming towers of Las Vegas casinos pass her small window.
#NoEscape (Volume 3) (#MurderTrending) Page 2