No escape, p.1
No Escape, page 1
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Text copyright © 2022 by Maren Stoffels
Cover art used under license from Shutterstock.com
Translation copyright © 2024 by Laura Watkinson
All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Delacorte Press, an imprint of Random House Children’s Books, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York. Originally published in paperback by Leopold, Amsterdam, in 2022.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.
ISBN 9780593708774 (pbk.) — ebook ISBN 9780593708781
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Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
This is Where the Teams are Formed
Lexi
Beau
Lexi
Beau
This is When the Door Won't Open
Lexi
Beau
Lexi
This is Where the Game Begins
Beau
Lexi
Beau
Lexi
This is When it Goes Next-Level
Beau
Lexi
Beau
Lexi
This is When Death Approaches
Beau
Lexi
Beau
Lexi
Lexi
This is the Way Out
Tess
Beau
This is Two Months Later
Beau
Lexi
Red
Author's Note
Acknowledgments
_146644694_
For all my readers worldwide who were so enthusiastic about my book Escape Room. You urged me to go on a new adventure in an extreme escape room. Thank you.
And also for Eva, who is just as much a fan of escape rooms as I am.
I think we’re friends. ;)
CASE nr. 1999-5
E. Shepherd—psychiatrist
OBSERVATION:
What immediately strikes me is that the girl looks completely feral. Her nails are black. There are bloodstains on her fingers and clothes. Her hair hangs limply around her face. Her eyes are darting back and forth.
She’s constantly fiddling with her black necklace.
When the police officer asks her if she might like to change her clothes and holds out a hand to her, the girl completely freaks out.
She is making animal noises.
When I’m allowed to talk to the girl, after an hour and a half, she’s sitting on the floor in a corner of the room. She appears to have calmed down.
The girl doesn’t respond when I ask her if she knows who I am and what I’m doing there. When I ask her what her name is, she just stares at her hands.
I introduce myself to her, tell her I’m a psychiatrist and that she can call me Edward Shepherd.
I decide to take a gamble and ask her what she was doing in that isolated place.
The girl just presses her back against the wall.
I tell her I understand that it’s hard to talk about the situation, but it’s important that she does.
This time, much to my surprise, the girl says something.
“Sorry, but you’ll never understand. No one knows what it was like in there.”
LEXI
The train emerges from the darkness.
There are no crossing gates here, just a fence to keep people off the tracks. But I searched around and found a spot where I could get through.
I’m standing with the toes of my sneakers against the steel track. If I concentrate, I can feel the vibration in my body. The train is approaching.
I close my eyes and, for a moment, everything is sharp.
The cry of an owl somewhere nearby, the scent of the pine trees alongside the railroad tracks, the taste of tonight’s spaghetti still in my mouth. I can even follow the path my blood is taking through my body.
The vibration is getting stronger.
Less than thirty seconds to go.
Less than ten seconds.
I can see the driver, but can he see me too? It’s so dark here.
What if he doesn’t notice me?
Finally—there’s the horn.
It’s so loud that it’s like someone is holding a megaphone next to my ear.
I take a big step back.
Less than five seconds later, I feel the blast of the train. It doesn’t push me away, but it sucks me in, as if the train is still going to devour me after all.
I tense all my muscles, bracing myself. One by one, the train cars thunder by, like a pounding headache.
I don’t open my eyes again until the last car has gone by.
The train’s red taillights are swiftly disappearing into the distance.
I laugh. I can’t help myself. Out loud, as if someone just told a really good joke.
I felt that.
I felt all of it.
With a sigh of relief, I turn and walk back to the fence.
When I’ve squeezed through the gap, I carefully put the wire back in place.
I climb up to the overpass, where my bike is leaning against a lamppost. And that’s when I notice someone standing beside it.
Startled, I still. What’s going on? There’s never anyone else here—that’s exactly why I chose this spot.
What if they saw me and called the police? Then I’m probably going to get a load of questions. They’ll have the completely wrong idea.
But the woman by my bike doesn’t appear to have seen me. She’s taking something out of her pocket and leaning over my handlebars.
“Hey!” I yell. “What are you doing?”
The woman looks up, startled, but then her bright red lips form a small smile, as if she recognizes me.
Who is she? I’m sure I’ve never seen her before.
Before I can react, she runs off, her high heels tapping along the overpass.
For a moment, I think about going after her, and then I notice something sticking out of my bell. It’s a white business card.
I take the card and look up. The woman has already reached the other end of the overpass. She gets into a car and drives away.
On one side of the card, there’s a telephone number, and on the other side, written in bloodred letters, it says: TIME FOR A LITTLE ESCAPE?
I look in the direction the woman went. Does she think I want to buy drugs? Because this has to be some kind of direct line to a dealer. What else could it be?
She couldn’t have chosen a worse candidate. Ever since Tess’s diagnosis, I’ve hated pills of every kind.
I take my phone from my pocket and key in the number. It rings three times and then someone picks up.
“Hello?” says a stranger’s voice.
“You left your business card,” I say. “I’m not a junkie. Okay? And I don’t know what you think you just saw, but I wasn’t trying to kill myself.”
For a moment I think about Kelly. She must have been so scared.
“I’m not desperate. So leave me alone.”
“Say your name.”
Huh? My name?
“Lexi,” I say hesitantly.
“Hello, Lexi. Who’s your best friend?”
The voice sounds strange, nothing like a woman’s voice. But not like a man’s voice either. More like a robot, as if I’m talking to a computer.
“My best friend?”
I pause, maybe because so much has changed between Tess and me. Since Kelly’s death, our friendship has been on shaky ground, like it could collapse at any moment.
But I still know there’s only one answer to this question.
“My best friend’s name is Tess,” I say, clearly picturing my cousin. Her green eyes, which suddenly seemed as dark as night after Kelly’s suicide. Tess’s eyes were like ringing crossing gates, warning that the Shadow was coming.
Why didn’t I see it?
But I thought Tess was mourning the girl who lived next door.
My aunt thought the same. We didn’t see the Shadow until it was almost too late.
“Lexi and Tess. You will be expected at Escape Room 2.0 on Saturday, March thirteenth, at two p.m. The address is two-sixty-two Industry Road. Wishing you a pleasant escape!”
And the line goes dead.
BEAU
“So you’re telling me some complete stranger spoke to you on Thursday after the concert? And she gave you a business card?”
Zora and I are cycling to Industry Road. There’s a strong wind, and I’m struggling to keep up with her.
I nod. “You’ve asked me that three times now. Red just suddenly turned up behind Club 7.”
The alley behind the concert hall was the only place where I could catch my breath. There were no fans there, and Benji didn’t know where to look for me.
But then that woman suddenly showed up. In my mind, she’s called Red, because she was dressed head to toe in that color.
“But that’s really bizarre, isn’t it?” Zora glances across at me. “What else did this Red say to you?”
“Not much. She just said it was a special kind of escape room.”
“And you have no idea who she is?” Zora doesn’t seem to be bothered by the wind. She’s pedaling away like it’s no effort at all.
“No,” I say. “Not a clue.”
“It’s not some deranged fan, is it?”
I shake my head. “She didn’t look the type.”
I picture Red, with her lipstick and those red high heels. At first, I thought she was a scout from a modeling agency, but then she started talking about the escape room. She said it was completely different than other escape rooms. This is Escape Room 2.0, and it’s “no ordinary escape room,” whatever that’s supposed to mean.
“I can’t believe Benji just let you leave today.” Zora stands up on her pedals. “Your studio time is sacred.”
“I’m going into the studio tomorrow.”
I think about the phone conversation I just had. I was surprised that Benji agreed to my time off too, but then he told me the big news.
Los Angeles.
LA wants me.
My armpits start sweating. My family is going to flip when they hear about this.
Grandpa always said that one day I’d play New York’s Madison Square Garden, one of the most famous venues in the world.
When we visited him there last year, he bought basketball tickets, and we sat way up at the very top.
I felt so tiny and huge at the same time. Just the thought that I might get to sing there one day…wow!
When I got back home, I really went for it. I did even more interviews, performances, and meet-and-greets.
And just now, Benji told me that it all paid off. Next month we’re flying to LA to meet with a real-life label and sign a contract.
I glance across at Zora. Why haven’t I told her yet?
Because then I’d have to tell her about all my doubts.
And then I’d have to explain why.
For a moment, I’m back at the intersection.
Mariposa.
Her name was stuck to the inside of my head, like a sticky note. Mariposa. The Spanish word for butterfly.
That moment in September, my singing instantly faded into the background.
For months, I refused to perform. I couldn’t even sing in the shower.
How could I sing?
Thursday was my first performance in months, but it felt too soon. Way too soon.
“Is this really it?” Zora asks as we take a left turn.
The wind suddenly blasts right into our faces. My skin feels like a pincushion, stinging with the cold.
“This is Industry Road,” I say. We’re only at number one. Looks like we have a way to go yet.
A car drives past. Then brakes. The passenger window goes down.
“Hey, Beau!” A guy is looking at me. “You’re Beau!”
My heart skips a beat. Even here, in the middle of nowhere, people recognize me.
“Beauuuuu!” comes the cry from the back seat. The way they say my name is so hysterical that they sound like a bunch of preschoolers. But it’s three guys crammed in next to each other. They’re all doing my captain’s salute. I did that at a photo shoot once, tapping an invisible cap with my first two fingers. Benji loved it—and it became my trademark.
“ ‘Love is nothing but trouble, nothing but pain. Hope I’ll see you…,’ ” the guy in the front sings, holding out an imaginary microphone to me.
“ ‘Never again,’ ” I sing back reluctantly.
“Good job, dude!” The boy sticks his thumb up.
“Your songs are junk, but they’re catchy. My girlfriend is totally in love with you.”
“That’s nice,” I say, pedaling faster.
But he’s not done yet. The car is still driving alongside me.
“Okay if I take a quick picture of you?” Without waiting for an answer, he leans out of the open window and takes a selfie. I don’t even have time to look into the camera.
“Hey, what are you actually doing out here, bro?”
Dude. Bro. People always act like they know me, but they don’t. They just recognize me—and that’s something else entirely.
“We’re going to an escape room,” Zora says when I don’t reply.
“Oh, sweet.” He looks back at his friends. “They got one out here?”
“Just down the road,” I say. “It’s called Escape Room 2.0.”
“Sounds good. We’ll check it out. Have fun, bro!” He raises the window again.
Just before they speed off around the corner, they give me a blast of their horn.
When they’re out of sight, I hear Zora chuckle to herself.
“My girlfriend is totally in love with you….” She sounds exactly like the guy we just spoke to.
“Shut up.”
“Oh, come on. That was hilarious, wasn’t it?” Zora says, hitting her handlebars. “And what did you say? ‘That’s nice.’ ”
She can imitate even my deep voice perfectly. I remember this one time when Zora phoned a girl for me because I was too chicken. She said she’d get me a date—and she did.
A moment later, I squeeze my brakes. “This is it.” We’d almost gone past the gray building, but I saw the number just in time: 262.
We lock up our bikes and walk to the two doors, which are right next to each other. There are red lights above them. Is this the entrance? But which of the two doors is the right one?
I point at the sign beside the door on the right. Written in the same bloodred letters as on the business card: ESCAPE ROOM 2.0.
But when Zora tries to open the door, it won’t budge. The other door is locked too.
This is a bit weird, isn’t it? I check my phone—but I got the time right.
“Maybe we should ring the bell?” Zora says, pointing at the intercom.
“Go on, then.” I blow into my cupped hands to warm them. “It’s so cold out here.”
Just as Zora is about to press the bell, I hear a voice behind me.
“So you’re the ones we’re up against?”
LEXI
Doing this escape room is either my best plan ever—or my worst one.
As I look at Tess cycling along beside me, I know this could go one of two ways. Up or down. Sink or swim.
What if this is a really bad plan?
“Did you take your pills?” I ask, just to make sure.
“Of course,” Tess says with a sigh. “You sound like Mom.”
I bite the inside of my cheek. Since the onset of Tess’s depression, I often sound like that. Like I don’t know how to simply be Lexi anymore. I feel like I need to watch my words all the time.
