Page 25 of Playing With My Heart Strings

“Val! Put in six, one, five! That’s the area code for Nashville.” Sage’s words rattle out in a frantic tone, and I can hear Valerie trying to put the numbers in as quickly as possible.

“It worked! There’s a flashlight in here. And…magnets? But there’s no key,” she explains the contents of her toolbox.

“Can you shine the flashlight into the window of my door? Maybe there’s something in here that I need to find.”

A few moments later, a light beam shines through the window, providing the little bit of light that I’ve been needing.

“There’s a small sliver under the door. I think these magnets might fit under it. Do you think that’s what we need to do next?” Valerie asks.

I shrug. “It’s worth a shot. I’ll try to scoot my chair over to the door and see if I can grab them.” I clumsily make my way over to the door, the legs of the chair painfully scraping the ground with every movement. “Okay, I’m here. Slide them under.”

The light disappears and the clink of metal on concrete fills the room. Valerie pops back up and shines the light inside again.

“I don’t think I can pick them up so I’m going to have to try to lean my chair back to grab them,” I grumble, once again trying to maneuver my chair to a favorable position. God, I hope I don’t fall over. That would be embarrassing. Not to mention, the last thing I need is a concussion.

I plant one leg on the ground to steady myself and lean my chair back as far as possible. I can’t quite grab the magnets, but I don’t need to. The attraction between the magnet and my cuffs is strong enough that one latches on. The cuff also clicks, releasing my arm.

“The cuffs were magnetic! Give me one second, and then I’ll be free.

” I give the girls an update before grabbing the second magnet and attaching it to my other cuff.

The metal slides off my wrist, and it’s sweet, sweet bliss.

I didn’t realize how sore I was getting, even though the cuffs weren’t heavy duty ones that police officers use, just prop handcuffs.

I stand, and Valerie just about blinds me with her flashlight. I grimace, but give her a wave. “Can you shine the flashlight around the room? Just so I can see if there’s anything in here that might help me?”

She complies, shining the light along the walls and every corner. At first, there’s nothing—to my dismay—but then a glint catches my eye.

“Wait! Go back to the corner you were just at.”

Bingo.

Hanging from the ceiling is a key. I carry my chair over to the corner, because I already know I’m too short to grab it without a little bit of help, and then I stand on it.

“I have a key!” I exclaim, and I’m met with cheers from Sage and Valerie. I run over to the door to see if it unlocks my door, but no luck. “It’s not for this door. It must be for Sage’s room. Here, Valerie.” I slide the key under the door, and she picks it up.

“Be right back!” she reassures me.

“Talk to me, girls. Maybe I can still help,” I offer.

“The key worked for Sage’s door!” Valerie hollers right before a metal door opens. “Holy shit, you weren’t joking, Sage. There’s a ton of shit in here.” There’s a few banging noises and what I assume is things being thrown around as Valerie looks through the room.

“What are you seeing in there?” I ask, just trying to get a feel for what they’re working with.

“There are a shit ton of keys on the wall with letters on them, a big cabinet, and the weird cage thing that Sage is in. I’m going to open the cabinet and see what’s inside, because it doesn’t look like there’s a lock on it.”

Metal rattles for a few seconds, and then Sage asks Valerie what’s in the cabinet.

“There’s a pair of wire cutters and a piece of paper with a bunch of letters on it… Ugh. Not another math puzzle,” she groans.

“Hey, at least getting Sage out should be easy. Just need to use the wire cutters, right?” I say, hoping to reassure her.

“That’s true. Okay, hold on, I’m going to get her out.”

A few minutes later, something—wires, I assume—clatters to the ground.

“I’m out, Baylor!” Sage updates me. “So, this piece of paper has letters on it, but the keys all have numbers on them. So we’re just trying to figure out which one gets you out.”

“What’s on the paper?” I ask, trying to help as much as I can without being able to see what they see.

“Just all of the letters of the alphabet. Not even a code, it’s just the alphabet,” Sage replies, her tone a bit uncertain.

“What numbers do the keys all have?”

“There’s a lot of them, Baylor. I’m not sure…” Sage’s voice trails off. “Well, all of them have three digits except for seven of them. Those ones have seventy-three, fifty, thirty-two, seventy-two, ninety-one, eighty-nine, and twenty.”

“Maybe the alphabet is a code?” Valerie suggests. When she’s met with no response, she explains. “A could be one, B could be two, and so on. It’s a common way to convert letters to numbers. But we’d just have to figure out what letter combinations add up to the ones on the keys.”

“It could take all day for us to figure that out,” I sigh.

Valerie’s probably right, though. I can’t think of anything else that would work. And from the sound of it, it would take just as long to try every single key that’s on the wall.

“Wait, my name adds up to thirty-two!” Sage exclaims. “Try your name, Valerie.”

After a few moments, Valerie confirms that her name adds up to seventy-two.

“It’s gotta be all of our names. What if the key that unlocks Baylor’s door is just her name?” Valerie suggests.

“That’s gotta be right. It’s seventy-three, guys! Come on!” My heart is pounding in my chest, and I can only hope that we have enough time left…and that the other team hasn’t already figured out their clues.

Feet pound from the next room over until a door slams and the steps get closer to my door. The key fits into the lock, and the door creaks open, granting me freedom.

“Congratulations, Baylor, Sage, and Valerie,” Jarrod’s voice booms from a speaker in the corner of the hallway.

“Your team has broken out of the rooms. However, your challenge is not over. You haven’t officially won until you are out of the warehouse.

The race is still on. And if I were you, I’d act fast.”

“That either means that time is almost up, or the other team is close. We’ve gotta go.” I hope the urgency in my voice is enough to motivate us.

Sage wrings her hands, but Valerie nods, and we all take off running down the hallway. The inside of the warehouse is a maze, full of twists and turns. That’s why we were blindfolded in the beginning—so we wouldn’t have an idea of how we got in.

“Should we split up?” Sage asks, huffing out breaths, as we run into our third dead end.

I shake my head. “No, no, we have to all be out to win. What happens if someone gets lost? We stick together.”

“We need to retrace our steps and remember which ways we turned. We need a map or something,” Valerie mutters.

“Wait, that’s it! Sage, do you still have that piece of paper from the cabinet?”

She nods, her eyebrows furrowing in confusion. She digs out the piece of paper from her pocket and hands it to me.

“Come on, let’s go.” I take off running back the direction we came. And when we reach the fork in the maze, I tear off a piece of paper and let it fall to the ground. “Breadcrumbs. That way we’ll know where we’ve already been.”

The plan works perfectly. We hit a few more dead ends, but we aren’t running around in circles anymore thanks to the pieces of paper we’ve left lying around.

We’re close to sprinting now, because this stretch of hallway we’re in keeps going. “We have to be close to the end, guys! Keep pushing!” I encourage them, even as my lungs burn. I am not a cardio girl.

There’s a left turn at the end of the hall, and once we round the corner, street lights shine up ahead.

“We made it!” Sage cheers.

We race out of the old warehouse, panting once we come to a halt. I drop my head down as my hands rest on my knees.

A slow clap begins, and I look up right as Jarrod Stone starts walking toward us. “Well done, ladies. You made it out with only a couple minutes to spare. Now, let’s see if your competitors are as lucky.”

I look around, something I hadn’t thought to do in my exhaustion. A digital clock counts down the time; two minutes and thirty seconds remain.

As the clock winds down, there’s no sign of the opposing team. Only after two minutes since the timer stops do Aspen, Katherine, and Jade emerge from the warehouse. And they look pissed .

“Ladies, welcome back. I’m so sorry to inform you that not only did the other team beat you out, but you didn’t make it out in the hour’s time.

” Jarrod frowns as he delivers the bad news to the losing team.

He turns to my team. “Baylor, Sage, and Valerie. Congrats, you have won the team escape room challenge and you are all immune from this week’s elimination. ”