Page 30 of Kiss Slay Replay

He looks at me, and there’s a hint of that crooked grin. “Deal.”

9

We veer to the left, follow the hall to a set of aluminum swinging doors into the kitchen.

“Hi. Hello,” Wyatt says. “Is anyone back here?”

I wait for Evan to make a sarcastic comment, something about how we’re woefully unprepared for a masked murderer situation, about Wyatt’s Minnesotan manners—if he wants to go ahead and ask our assailant if it’s easier for him if we stand still with our hands behind our backs.

But Evan says nothing. He has Wyatt by the arm, pulling him close.

Platters of food congeal under heat lamps. Giant bowls of grilled peppers go cold and waxy on the counter. There are pots on the stove, gas burners still glowing purple underneath.

“Everyone probably bailed when they heard the screaming,” Luke says.

“Where’s the door?” Danny asks.

I look around, my eyes frantic and refusing to focus. I spot a knife gleaming on the counter and pick it up. It’s nowhere near as big as the man in the mask’s, but it’s something.

I don’t know how to hold it. I feel fucking ridiculous.

“Do you have my keys?” I hear Evan ask Wyatt. Wyatt shakes his head. “Does anyone have their car keys? Wills?”

“At the cabin.” Why didn’t I grab them when I had the chance? Would it have made a difference?

“I’ve got keys,” Luke says, holding up a fob. “I can get the van. We all get out of here. Get help.”

“No,” Cassie says.

“It’s one guy, Cass.”

She huffs. “We don’t know that for sure, do we? We’ve been over this. I’m not risking it. And at least one of us would have to stay behind to lock up so whoever’s out there can’t get in. I don’t like that. We should stay together.”

“The door,” Danny says. “Where’s the door?”

“Hmm…back there?” Wyatt says, pointing. He walks past the double oven and rounds a corner. The moment he’s out of view—a thud, followed by a sharp intake of air.

“Wyatt!” Evan runs after him.

“I’m okay,” Wyatt says. “I stepped on him. I didn’t mean to. I didn’t know. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

There’s a body on the floor in a pool of blood. A member of the waitstaff—black shoes, black slacks, black shirt, throat slashed, no eyes.

Wyatt, Evan, Cassie, and Luke all freak out. Howl. Retch. Panic. But this isn’t the first horror scene that Danny and I have witnessed tonight, and we’re somehow already desensitized. He steps over the body to get to the back door.

He turns around, and his expression churns my stomach.

“What is it?”

“It’s locked. The door is already locked.”

No one else is paying attention—they’re all preoccupied with the slaughtered body at their feet—so they don’t get it, don’t understand what this means.

I lean down and touch the dead man’s forehead with the back of my hand, trying to avoid the leakage from his empty sockets. He’s still vaguely warm.

He hasn’t been dead for that long.

“We have to go,” I say.