Page 95 of Alice Chen's Reality Check

The sounds of the crew recede, and Daniel steps away from me. I adjust my shirt and decide the best course of action is to act like nothing happened.

“Let’s split up the area around Anton’s body to see if we find anything. You cover the area from the pit to that wall, and I’ll do the same on this side.”

And we start searching. The rain probably would’ve washed away any marks, but the walls and scaffolding seem to have preserved the site. I can see faint drag marks from where Anton was. I keep searching. At first there’s nothing, just the debris of construction and the footprints of the workers around the site, but then I notice a strange pattern in the shoe treads.

“Daniel, check this out,” I say. “The footprints here look different from the rest.”

Most of the footprints are clearly from the rounded Timberlands that the construction crew are wearing. But there’s a single set of footprints that don’t match. They’re narrow with a distinct pointy tip.

“These are leading away from the body. You said that someone tried to drag Anton away, but obviously they failed. They must have had to make a quick exit once I came back, and this must be the route they took,” I deduce.

We track the footprints as they lead into the shadows of the labyrinth.Our silence is punctuated by our shoes crunching in the sand and the cry of birds in the distance.

“Damn,” I say when the already faint shoeprints trail off into a dark corner. “Dead end.”

“Maybe not.” Daniel studies the wall, then pushes it. It gives a little, opening a crack and revealing itself to be a door.

“Whoa, how’d you see that?”

“I saw the hinge. Most of them were painted black, but someone missed this one,” he says, pointing at a silver hinge close to the ground. “I imagine this is how production got in and out of the labyrinth when they were setting up all the puzzles.”

“Good job,” I say, and we open the door.

Or we try to. It seems a little broken, and I realize something’s caught at the corner of the door. I reach down to where some rocks and debris have been kicked up and start clearing them away so the door can move. That’s when my hand brushes against something crumpled and half buried by the sand. It’s a piece of paper.

I smooth it out. Something’s been printed on it, the ink faded by the elements. “I think it’s a photo.”

I look around and spot a fake, battery-operated lantern on the wall. After switching it on, I hold up the image to the light it provides.

“Is that—” Daniel squints. “Mikayla?”

There, looking away from the camera, is Mikayla, in her lingerie outfit from the night of the blackout and straddling someone’s lap.

And that someone isn’t Trevor. I point at the man beneath Mikayla. He’s got one hand between her legs and one cupping her breasts.

“Look at his hair,” I say. The man’s dark hair is peeking out from beneath his hat. “Do you know who that is?”

“I don’t—”

“Hey!” A voice cuts off whatever Daniel’s saying. “You shouldn’t be here.”

I know before I turn around who I’m going to see.

There’s something menacing about how Seth is pacing toward us. Itake a step back, suddenly desperate to put more distance between us. Seth looks tense, even more so than the last time I saw him. His jaw is clenched, and he’s holding his hand carefully, a fresh bandage wrapped around it.

“You should be in your rooms,” Seth snaps. “Does Leah know you’re here?”

“Does Leah knowyou’rehere?” I retort. It’s not the smartest response, but it’s all I can think to say in the moment.

“I dropped something yesterday. Came back for it,” Seth says, adjusting his hat. My gaze leaps to the crinkled picture I’m still holding and the identical blue cap on the man’s head. “And Leah’s not my keeper. I don’t answer to her. But you do.”

The puzzle pieces are slotting together: The blue hat I’ve caught glimpses of around the villa. The figure standing stock-still beneath the palm trees when we first landed on the island. Seth sitting with Mikayla on the speedboat while Trevor fumed. Mikayla disappearing during the storm and then returning to the villa soaking wet.

Mikayla isn’t cheating in the competition. She’s cheating on Trevor.

And Seth’s bandages aren’t wrapped around his entire hand. They’re wrapped around his knuckles. Like he punched somebody.

“What happened to your hand?” I ask quietly.

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