Their Vicious Games(71)

I look along both ends of the green corridor. No sign of Penthesilea yet.

“Let me stick with you. Three on three. We’ll run the opposite way of them,” Hawthorne insists. She slowly bends forward, reaching for her crossbow. I tense more, but I don’t pull back the safety. Not yet. “No one else has to get hurt during this. I haven’t hurt you yet, have I? I’ve had the chance.”

This is a lie. I know the truth. People have to die.

But I let the pistol drop, just the tiniest bit. I square my shoulders. “Fine, you run with us. But don’t think we trust you.”

Hawthorne nods her agreement, and then we’re marching through the green maze. With every step, the hedges rustle around us. Saint takes the lead, scoping out the next turn, and Hawthorne covers her while I keep an eye on our tail and Hawthorne, making sure she doesn’t aim a bolt at the nape of Saint’s neck.

The longer we wander, with the heat beating over us, the more I realize that the elements are part of this test. The constant terror that makes every rustle of a breeze a gunshot is the threat. Confirming our theory, each right we make toward the edges forces us to turn back inward at some point, until eventually we’re nearing the beating heart of the maze. My pulse thunders in my ears, a dull roar outpaced only by my breathing.

Our path converges with three others in the center of the maze, and my eyes are drawn to the pedestal right in the middle. It’s unassuming, made of smooth white stone, with a steel plate on its center. There is a small black box atop it. As promised.

“You’ve got to be shitting me,” I whisper, looking closer. It’s a jewelry box.

“How did we get here first?” Saint asks.

Hawthorne frowns, eyes darting around. “Who says we have?” She looks over at me. “Are you going to take it?”

“Why me? Are you?” I say with more than enough snark.

Hawthorne’s lips pull into that weird thin smile again, the unhinged one. “Maybe.”

Rolling my eyes, I walk up to it, never breaking my stride. The opportunity is in front of me; it’d be stupid not to at least peek into it. I open it, careful to keep it on the platform, and look down at the mysterious prize. A startled yelp of a laugh escapes my throat, and Saint cranes her neck to look while still watching my back.

“A ring,” she says flatly. “They are so—”

She doesn’t get a chance to finish her sentence before they descend.

Hannah G comes up from the left lane while Jacqueline barrels down the center, both of them beelining toward us. Hannah G’s nose is a mess of cakey blood, drying dark and crooked in her otherwise perfect California face. I can already see the dark smudges of bruises beginning to develop under her eyes. Blood streams down Jacqueline’s chin and she turns to spit frothy pink. I can just see the hollow darkness of missing teeth.

And then Esme comes in from the right, still pristine.

I take a step back, my shoulder colliding with a bird-bone chest and I look back at Hawthorne blocking my exit from the way we came. Damn.

“Adina Walker, welcome to my party,” Esme crows.

I glower at Hawthorne. “You’re so full of shit.”

Esme’s lips curl into a Cheshire smile, and she lifts her hunting knife, but then she falters. “Hawthorne. Standing a little far from me, aren’t you?”

“No, I’m right where I need to be,” Hawthorne says, her voice tight. She lifts her crossbow and aims it at Jacqueline, just to Esme’s left. I rear back. “Esme, we don’t have to do this. The prize is right there. Let’s just grab it and get out.”

“It’s called the Raid for a reason, Hawthorne,” Esme says stubbornly.

“It was a meta—” I start, just to be a little shit.

“It wasn’t a fucking metaphor, Walker,” Esme interrupts, and she takes a step forward. “Between Walker and me, one of us is not getting out of here alive. And, Thorny, my love, I’m not dying.”

“What if it was me?” Hawthorne demands. “You’d kill me?”

“Never,” Esme swears. “But that’s because you get it. You understand that I need to win. That I deserve this more than anyone. You’re not standing in my way.”

I can see now the flaw in Esme’s plan. There’s a chink in the armor of her faction. My hand tightens around the black box, and I look at Hannah G and Jacqueline, both of them staring at Esme now with unblinking contempt.

“You deserve this?” I repeat, loud and mocking, dragging their attention to me as I hold up the ring I’ve pulled from the box. I smile at Esme, wide. “Your way? Then what about these two? Do they ‘get it’? Only one can survive at the end. None of us is making it out alive except one, because he can only have one of us, Esme. If I remember correctly, polygamy is illegal in Massachusetts.”

My manipulation is too direct, but I can feel the crawl of time, the moment of escape slipping further and further away. The fractures in the alliance need to turn to a chasm, now.

“What about us?” Hannah G finally speaks up, sounding frantic, turning to look at Esme suspiciously. Esme raises a dark eyebrow. “I deserve to win just as much as you do. I want to be a Remington. I’d be practically a princess. Maybe you’re both getting in my way.”

Jacqueline opens her mouth, as if to agree, and then she closes it again, remembering that she has two missing front teeth. It doesn’t stop her from shooting a nasty look at Esme, which Esme rolls her eyes at.