Player and his fucking games…
But I’d known he was going to strike again, hadn’t I? I’d been suspecting that my sister or mother would be the next target, which was why I banned Chloe from going out alone or attending any parties. Especially the kind thrown by older boys she didn’t know who could have posed a threat to her. But I hadn’t anticipated that her best friend would catch Luke’s eye. The Krew went to any party we wanted and brought whoever we wanted along, with or without an invitation. As Luke’s girl, Madison had an all-access pass to any party she wanted, and she’d talked Chloe into going along with her.
“Shape probably means geometric shape, right?” Alyssa noted from the back seat, where she sat next to Logan, and I surfaced from the maelstrom of my thoughts. Xavier took another drag off his cigarette and grunted thoughtfully.
“What about the color part? And magic?” I muttered anxiously, trying not to lose my cool or my clear head.
“Well, color…could maybe mean a colored object?” Alyssa answered doubtfully, provoking a scornful laugh from Xavier.
“Ah, beauty and brains. How interesting,” he cut in, making her uncomfortable. Obviously he didn’t give a shit about the gravity of the situation. I’d decided to bring him along with us because I knew I might need someone as fast and strong as I was. Xavier had grown up on the streets and was used to dealing with all sorts of shit. All you had to do was push him a little and he turned into the worst kind of beast, which was exactly why we got along so well. Fundamentally, we were similar people, though it was difficult for me to admit it. Still, I hadn’t considered just how much my friend loved to fuck with Logan and how that might create serious problems for us.
“Neil, either shut him up or throw him out of the car!” Logan said loudly, but Xavier just laughed. I shot a look at my brother through the rearview window.
“Give it a rest,” I told both of them and sighed as I went back to thinking over the puzzle.
Shape. Color. Magic.
What did all these things have in common?
And then, all of a sudden, it hit me: a Rubik’s cube. I used to play with them all the time when I was a kid and eventually I got to where I could solve it in no time, turning each side to a uniform color.
“A Rubik’s cube,” I said loudly, interrupting Xavier and Logan’s pissing match.
“Okay, so…a toy store?” Xavier suggested.
“A game shop?” Logan countered.
“Wait… There’s this skeezy motel outside of town that’s, like, eighties themed, and their big thing is that they have this giant Rubik’s cube at the front desk, and if you can solve it before they check you in, your room is free,” Alyssa said breathlessly, and I smiled. Maybe we were finally getting the hang of this.
“That covers all the clues,” said Logan. “Shape for the cube, color for how you solve it, and magic because its original name was The Magic Cube… But what about the GYR9391?” Logan wondered.
“Sounds like a license plate number. Alyssa, do you know the addressof that motel?” I asked, and she relayed it to me. I flipped a U and raced toward the dive motel. I drove like a maniac, consumed with thoughts of what might be happening to Chloe in a place like that, and I only got more and more on edge.
“Watch out, tight curve coming up,” Xavier warned me, but I kept my foot flat on the accelerator, ignoring the speedometer bouncing around crazily.
“Neil, slow down,” Logan cautioned me as well, but instead of listening to him, I clenched my hands around the wheel even tighter and breathed deep so I could concentrate and wouldn’t crash. The dangerously tight curve did force me to decelerate and downshift rapidly, though.
“Neil!” Logan yelled, but I managed not to go into a skid. The back wheels squealed noisily against the asphalt as the car slid sideways into a drift. But I was in control the entire time, and at the end of the turn, I spun the steering wheel back the other way, and with a flutter of the gas pedal, I accelerated again. I heaved a sigh of relief.
“You almost just killed us!” Alyssa exclaimed with a hand on her chest. Xavier just cackled and kept smoking with a casual air.
“The princesses back there aren’t used to the way you drive,” he told me drily.
I slammed on the brakes, making everyone jolt. I pulled into the motel’s isolated parking lot and took note of the sign, which barely had enough juice to light up the pavement and peeling walls of the buildings, which looked old and worn down. I turned off the engine.
The more I looked at the place, the more it looked like a front for a prostitution ring.
And, indeed, the minute I stepped out of the car, I spotted a scantily clad woman swaying toward the entrance, accompanied by a much older man. He had a long beard, a belly that stuck out under his white T-shirt, and a generally creepy aura.
“Ugh, it’s worse than I thought,” Alyssa said, horrified, and just the thought of my sister being there was making me crazy.
I tried to keep a clear head. I remembered that the riddle had also included what was probably a license plate number—GYR9391—andI began to look around for a car that might have such a plate. The only vehicles I spotted, though, were an old truck and a black motorcycle. My attention was drawn back to Xavier, however, when he opened my trunk (without permission, of course) and took out a baseball bat.
“What are you doing?” I asked, watching him turn it over in his hands before he sauntered over to me.
“I knew you had one of these back there. Luke and I carry them, too, remember?” He flashed me an evil grin, tapping the end of the bat against the palm of his other hand.
“That’s insane! What are you going to do with that?” Logan demanded, sounding disturbed, but Xavier didn’t deign to answer him. We’d used bats or metal bars plenty of times before when necessary, so it was pretty much business as usual for us.
