Page 81 of Stay Scared

“I reviewed rumors about yours.”

“You called Crimson Night cowardly.”

“I said hiding every honest review behind an NDA made the company look afraid.”

“You wrote something better.”

Owen turns toward me. Rook continues.

“An attraction without meaningful withdrawal stops being immersive and becomes assault.”

Ash looks at me.

“That was never published.”

“It was in my drafts.”

Owen’s expression changes. He looks from the photographs we carried from the archive to the network logs, then back to me. I see the connection at the same time he does. Rook did not only have access to Crimson Night. He had access to me. My apartment network. My laptop. The unpublished review. The material I thought died on my own hard drive. Rook lets the silence do the work.

“You see the problem now. Nothing you wrote about me stayed private.”

My fingers close around the edge of the console.

“You changed the invitation.”

“Ash sent it.”

“You altered what came after.”

“I stripped away the lie.”

That separates the two decisions. Ash wanted me inside Final Girl Protocol. Rook saw the invitation and turned it into something else. Cade shifts another half step toward me.

“By stabbing Evan?”

“He moved before the cue was complete.”

Cade surges forward. Ash catches his shoulder before he reaches the monitors.

“He could die.”

Rook gives no sign the words bother him.

“He is conscious.”

Ash releases Cade and reaches for the microphone.

“Listen to yourself. You are using the same justification you used in that room.”

Rook leaves the accusation unanswered. The monitors switch again. The red room appears beneath its original lighting with recorded versions of Cade, Owen, Ash, and me. The angles are wrong. My movements jump between rehearsals and stolen footage. Rook freezes the frame with me facing the three masks.

“You built her escape before she ever entered.”

Ash says nothing.

“You told everyone else that begging might become part of the performance. Then Salem walked in, and all three of you created a command that dropped you where you stood.”

I look at them. Cade stands near enough that one movement would put him between me and the monitors. Owen’s hands are off the keyboard. Ash remains beside the microphone with one hand braced against the console. This is the argument Rook has been building since he took over the screens. Crimson Night sold helplessness to everyone. They gave me an exception because they wanted me.