Page 46 of Escape Girl

“Can you tell me more about the escape rooms?” I blurted. Apparently alcohol was going to control my mouth for the rest of the night.

Andie looked a little startled but nodded. “We use them a lot as fundraising vehicles. It was Jo’s idea, of course. She theorized that if you put a bunch of rich egomaniacs in a virtual escape room together as a competition to see who can solve the puzzles and get out first, their competitive juices go crazy. They’ll end up bidding wildly on clues so they can win and have bragging rights.” She smirked. “It costs us nothing except Jo’s brainpower and my coding time to create, but we can pull in thousands in thirty minutes with the right combination of PR and arrogant men.”

Super interesting, of course, but not what I was asking. “I meant Bobby’s rooms,” I said into my beer.

“Oh!” Andie turned pink. “Of course you did. Sorry. Um, about a month ago he asked if I could teach him how I created them. Said he wanted to build a custom series of them for an audience of one. For you.”

Still not what I was asking. “Did he ever say why—”

Before I could finish my awkward question, Tess made a grand entrance into the bar, striding up to our table in tight jeans, a black V-neck T-shirt, and thigh-high boots. If suits were my trademark look, boots were certainly hers. “Ladies!” she crowed. “Getting wild on a weeknight? I approve!”

Jo patted the empty seat next to her. “Glad you could join us.”

Tess smirked. “As if I would miss a karaoke night.” She winked at Sloan. “Except for you. No singing for you.” Sloan gave her the finger.

When Tess’s gaze met mine across the table, her amber eyes widened. “Wow. You look so much better than you did last night.”

I decided to take the compliment instead of the insult. “Thanks.”

“Max is on his way. He wants to talk to you,” she said. “He found something when he was doing the research you requested.”

“Oh!” I exclaimed, putting down my beer bottle for good. I was going to need a clear head for that discussion. Right now I couldn’t even remember what I’d asked him to look up. I drained a glass of water. “Great.”

Tess glanced down at her watch and back at me. “They’ll be here in a few minutes.”

Jo’s head snapped up. “They?”

Surprised at the edge in her voice, I watched as she leaned over and whispered something in Tess’s ear.

Next to me, Andie and Heather started cheering for a pair of dudes struggling valiantly to sing Jay-Z. Unfortunately, they didn’t seem to know the beat, melody, or be able to read lyrics.

Across the table, Tess’s mouth fell open. “Well, I didn’t know that! Fuck, Jo, you should have told me!”

Jo spoke urgently again, but as much as I strained to hear, her low voice carried only intermittently over the other girls’ voices. “Trying to respect…privacy! He…even supposed…Chicago!”

On stage, the Jay-Z wannabes stopped singing altogether and just stared helplessly at the screen. “They’re way worse than you, Sloanie,” Andie said, and Heather snorted.

At the other end of the table, Tess and Jo started frantically jabbing at their phones. “There’s just no signal in here,” Tess groaned.

Oblivious to whatever was going on at the other end of the table, Sloan mock-glared at Andie and then batted her eyelashes at me. “You’re up next, by the way.”

“What? No,” I said firmly, my attention reeling away from Tess and Jo to settle firmly on Sloan’s mischievous face. “I already said I don’t want to sing.”

She made a brushing motion with her hands, flinging away my protest. “Yeah, yeah. That’s what yousaid. But you’ve been mooning at the stage like a big-eyed puppy ever since we got here. You’ve been lip-synching along with every single song.”

OK, guilty. But in my defense, all of the talk about my mom with Jo had made me remember our karaoke afternoons—in a happy way, for once.

I glanced up at the stage, at the microphone. In my veins, the champagne, wine, sangria, and beer joined forces and began an attack on my better judgment. But what was the worst that could happen? I’d already embarrassed myself to the moon and back in front of everyone today. Singing a tipsy song wasn’t going to change anything.

Sloan leaned closer; she knew she had me. “What do you want to sing? I’ll tell the DJ.”

My pulse tripped over itself, and I had one last sip of beer. “Janis Joplin,” I whispered. Sloan bounced up and sauntered to the stage.

“Hey, guys,” Jo called, hurriedly. “I got the check. Let’s head out.”

Andie and Heather looked down at their full drinks and frowned.

“C’mon, let’s roll.” Tess pushed her chair away from the table and stood up. “This place is beat. I know a great little pub around the corner. Next round’s on me.”

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