Pain. Gigi was vaguely aware of the world around her trying to go black, but she was more aware of the fact that her team hadn’t made it to the dock yet. She hadn’t. Gigi scrambled to her feet—or she tried to, anyway, but then she wobbled and went down again.
Suddenly, Knox was kneeling beside her. “You okay, Happy?”
Knox. Gigi looked for Brady, but she didn’t see him. She blinked. “It was just a little boulder. It’s just a little head wound. I’m fine!”
Fuzzy Knox—he was only a little bit fuzzy—did not seem to believe her. He slipped an arm under hers, and the next thing Gigi knew, Knox was carrying her and walking slowly toward the dock.
Knox. Not Brady. Brady hadn’t come back for her. Gigi thought about Savannah telling her that no one in this competition was her friend, that no one could be trusted.
Knox had said the exact same thing.
And that was when Gigi belatedly realized: Slowly? Knox was walking slowly toward the dock. Toward the other teams. Toward Avery, Jameson, Xander, and Nash, who stood at the edge of the dock in a line.
Slowly. Gigi looked back to the eastern horizon and saw the sun. Dawn.
Her throat tightened. We didn’t make it. They’d been so close.
If she’d been faster with the puzzle box… If she hadn’t fallen…
If she was smarter and coordinated and better, if she was more like
Savannah—
If, if, if. “I’m sorry,” she told Knox.
Don’t be. That was what Brady had said to her the last time she’d apologized for being herself. For being too much. My brain likes A Lot.
“Yeah, Happy,” Knox said, stepping past the game makers and onto the dock. “Me, too.”
Gigi saw Brady then. He was holding the longsword. She’d forgotten about the sword.
“Brady,” Gigi said, remembering what was at stake for him, berating herself for being selfish enough to wonder why he’d run for the dock instead of coming back for her. “Your mom. I promise—”
“It’s okay,” Brady told her quietly. “My mama’s fine.”
Gigi went very still in Knox’s arms. “Fine?” Gigi couldn’t make that make sense. “She doesn’t have cancer?”
He lied to us? Brady lied.
“Put her down, Knox,” Brady said.
“You weren’t entirely lying.” Knox didn’t put Gigi down. “I would have known. So who does have cancer?”
“Severin,” Brady said after a long moment, “had cancer.” Knox stared at Brady, hard. “Had?”
“Pancreatic. It was quick. And, like I said, he sends his regards.”
He’s dead? Their mentor… Gigi tried to make sense of that, too, but the next thing she knew, Grayson was stepping right up to Knox and repeating Brady’s suggestion—except coming from Grayson, it wasn’t a suggestion.
“Put her down.”
This time, a stone-faced Knox complied.
“You’re injured, Gigi.” Grayson’s tone made it clear: That was unacceptable.
“Who among us is not occasionally concussed?” Gigi replied, the response—and her smile—automatic, no matter the thoughts dogging her brain.
Brady lied. Severin’s dead. Knox is not okay.
“Our team is out of the game.” Knox turned toward Avery Grambs. “Go ahead. Say it. We’ve been eliminated.”
Avery ignored Knox in favor of coming to stand next to Grayson. She took Gigi’s hand. “Are you okay?”
Gigi couldn’t help feeling like Avery was asking about more than her head.
I’m not. I’m really, really not. Gigi couldn’t beat back that thought, no matter how hard she smiled.
Avery had tried to give her a ticket to this game, but Gigi had won her own way. She’d wanted to prove something. She’d wanted to be smart and capable and strong.
Gigi looked past Avery and Grayson, past Brady and Knox, to Savannah.
The sight of her twin’s hair—jagged and shorn—took Gigi’s breath away.
Savannah didn’t look like Savannah anymore.
Avery squeezed Gigi’s hand, then took a step back, Xander, Nash, and Jameson falling in around her. Grayson stayed right where he was, an arm wrapping protectively around Gigi’s shoulders.
“Diamonds and Hearts,” Avery said. “You’re on to the next phase of the game. Clubs… there’s always next year.”
“Once a player, always a player,” Jameson said, addressing those words directly to Gigi.
She couldn’t bring herself to look at Brady or Knox. Instead, Gigi looked out at the horizon. I should tell Avery and the others about the bug. I should tell them that Code Name Mimosas is here.
I’m going to tell them. Right now.
There was no reason not to tell them anymore. But what came out of Gigi’s mouth was: “Do we have to leave the island immediately?”
Gigi couldn’t keep her thoughts from drifting to the thorny brush where she’d found that bag.
“You can take some time to say your good-byes,” Avery told her. “Get some rest, if you need it. The boat for the mainland leaves at noon.”
“I’ll fix you up, kid,” Nash told Gigi, an offer and an order both, as he displaced Grayson at her side, the way only Grayson’s older brother could.
Gigi brought her hand to the throbbing knot on her forehead. There was only a little blood.
“What about the rest of us?” That was Savannah, her voice piercing the morning air, and Gigi couldn’t help thinking that every other time she’d ever ended up probably concussed, her twin had been the one checking her over, fixing her up.
But not now.
Right now, Savannah was wearing her game face. “What’s next for those of us who successfully made it to the dock by dawn?”
