Twice Shy by Sarah Hogle (ebook offline reader .TXT) 📕

The timer dings while I’m preoccupied with an internal speech that is half pep talk, half threat. “They’re ready!” I shout.

When he doesn’t pop back in, I assume he must be busy choosing a movie and pounce on the opportunity to roll the donuts in the topping myself, which I confess I wanted to do anyway. Once I’m finished, I lay them aside, wash my hands, and set off to scold Wesley for not doing the thing that I’m glad he didn’t do.

He isn’t in the living room. I walk by the television, which I left paused on The Great British Bake Off, but instead of the charming Noel Fielding gracing my screen I get a horrifying eyeful of Pennywise the clown. “Jesus Christ.”

I wheel around, panning the room. “Wesley!”

No response.

I plant my hands on my hips. “I am not watching It.” I punch the exit button on my remote as fast as I can, then click on Legally Blonde. Much better.

Wesley jumps out at me from out of nowhere, hands in claws. I scream.

He laughs and laughs and laughs. I hate him. I really, really want to hate him. I am not even close to hating him. “The look on your face!” he howls, doubling over.

“You about finished?” I level him with the most hateful look I can muster. “Where the hell did you come from?”

He flashes a lopsided grin. “Wouldn’t you like to know.”

“Yes.”

“You’re cute when you’re mad. Like that movie with the duck who says the sky is falling? Have you seen that one? That’s what you remind me of, and when you’re mad it’s hilarious.”

How very flattering.

“It’s a chicken,” I snap.

Whatever my face is doing is really cracking him up. I am on the fence about finding a stepstool to stand on so that I can climb up there and give him a good dressing-down when he relents. Wesley crosses the room, flattens a palm to the wallpaper, and digs his fingers into it. The edge of a camouflaged doorway gives, swinging out to reveal a black corridor.

I gape. “Where did that come from?”

“Secret passageway.”

I’m already hurrying inside. Far behind me, Wesley’s complaining that I changed the movie: “What’d you do that for? I’ve been busy setting up a joke. Now the red balloon won’t make any sense.”

“If I see a red balloon in this house, Wesley Koehler, you’re going to be in big trouble. I hate clowns.”

“Balloon?” I hear a loud noise that is inarguably the pop of a balloon. “Never seen a balloon in my life.”

The secret passageway leads to the library. I decide to teach Wesley a lesson in karma by shutting the light off and squeezing myself inside a large, deep bookshelf. When he walks by, I reach out and grab his ankle. He shouts, releasing a string of curses he then spends five minutes apologizing for.

I lie on the floor laughing.

“Oh, you’ll be sorry you did that,” he says darkly, offering me a helping hand. “I know all sorts of secret passageways in this house.”

“So do I.”

“You didn’t know about the one in the living room.”

My eyes narrow with challenge. “Close your eyes and count to twenty.”

Chapter 17

HE ISN’T THE ONLY one who knows a thing or two about this old house. There’s a large framed painting in the hallway upstairs that conceals a storage area. Not very big—Violet used it for ice skates and tennis rackets, if memory serves—but big enough for someone to curl up inside of if they wanted.

“I can hear you running up the stairs!” he yells after me.

“Stop listening!”

“You’re bad at this game.”

“You’ll eat your words.”

I clamber inside the hole in the wall, close the picture behind me, and sit as still as possible. I’m a lot bigger now than I was the last time I sat in here. I have to squish my head between my knees to fit.

Wesley finds me in under a minute. “Hey there.”

“You cheated!”

“I bested you.” He bites into a cinnamon-sugar donut. “Are these my words? They’re delicious. I’m so good at making donuts.”

“I tell you to stop being nice, so you subject me to killer clowns and bad sportsmanship.”

“Your turn.” He shuts the picture frame on me again. I hear his muffled shout down the hall: “Count to twenty! And use Mississippis!”

Twenty Mississippi seconds later, I’m diverted in a number of dizzying directions thanks to Wesley’s switching on every television set in the house. Jumanji is playing on FX, stampedes of animals throwing out red herrings every time I think I’ve heard him. The surround sound he’s set up in his art studio to amplify a spooky playlist is particularly evil.

“Gotcha!” I cry a dozen times, using a broomstick to poke flickering curtains and lumps under his bedspread. No Wesley to be found.

I shoot him a text. I see you.

It’s a bad bluff, and he knows it. Actually, I see YOU.

All the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end.

He adds: Ha. Bet I made you look.

Come out, I demand.

Can’t. Hide and seek is on Violet’s list. Wish number 6.

And to think I’ve been comparing him to angels.

But texting gives me an idea. I call his phone as I creep along, smiling wickedly when I peek around the corner of a hallway and spot a tiny white-blue light floating. I follow it, and footsteps, into yet another secret passage I had no idea existed. Not simply a secret passage, but a secret stairway, leading into the ballroom downstairs. It was hidden behind a heavy floral curtain that I’d assumed was just another window. I’ll never trust a curtain again.

I was right on his tail all the way down the stairs, so there’s only one place he could have hidden so quickly. “Hmm, wonder who’s behind that Christmas tree,” I muse into the phone when he answers.

He walks out in a huff, hanging up the phone. “You cheated.”

“I bested you, you mean.”

His mouth