A Reagan Keeter Box Set: Three page-turning thrillers that will leave you wondering who you can trus by Reagan Keeter (fiction novels to read txt) 📗

“We might have missed something.” They had been weaving through tunnels for an hour and a half. Maybe there had been a passage they hadn’t seen.

Cynthia shook her head. “We didn’t.” They had traveled from west to south, and she had been watching for forks, however small, the whole time. “We have to go down.”

Paul was taking short, deep breaths. The lightheadedness that had set in about twenty minutes back was getting worse.

“Stop breathing like that or you’ll pass out.”

He hoped Gina was right. If he lost consciousness, he wouldn’t feel the pain anymore.

She grabbed a water bottle—the only one they had been left with—and pressed it to his lips. She told him to take several deep gulps and then said, “Slow your breathing down.”

He did, and she sighed with relief. She was afraid if he passed out or fell asleep he wouldn’t wake up.

Cynthia harnessed her flashlight in her pocket and turned on her headlamp. She led the men into the chasm, carefully searching out places to hold on to and other places to put her feet.

“How are you doing?” Martin asked, lying on the flat rock. “Is it safe?”

Cynthia nodded but refused to take her eyes off the wall in front of her.

“Bet you wish you had a stunt double here now, don’t ya?” Ethan said.

“I’m doing all right.”

“You’ll want one later.”

Martin hit him in the arm. “Can we focus on getting out of here?”

Ethan’s lips curled distastefully. “Sure.” After turning on his headlamp, as well, he pulled himself into the chasm.

THEN

MARTIN AND CYNTHIA walked back up the tilted roof and crawled in through the attic window. Then, they stepped around Christmas decorations and boxes of miscellaneous junk as they made their way down to the kitchen.

Most of the house was decorated with artifacts from the fifties that Martin’s mom, Janice, had found at yard sales and antique shops. Everything was bright. Everything clashed. That was how she liked it.

Times were simpler then, she said, and she had no interest in bringing the complexities of the present into her own little universe.

Dinner was baked chicken and limp green beans. Janice poured the drinks and passed the food and asked how everyone’s day was.

Gina shrugged. She was a freshman in high school and never had much to say at the dinner table. She thought her mom was a psycho, her brother a geek. What could either of them know about teenage boys?

“And you, Martin?”

“Got an ‘A’ on my math test,” he said through a mouth full of food.

“That’s wonderful.” Then Janice smiled, and Martin—like he sometimes did—wondered what his father would’ve said if he’d still been around.

Martin’s dad hadn’t been around for years. He had run out on the family after he found out Janice was pregnant with Gina. One was too many for him, and two was more than he could handle. Except for some pictures in a photo album and one Martin kept on his dresser, that was all that he knew about his father.

“And acting class? How was that?”

Martin and Cynthia glanced at each other. “All right, I suppose,” he said, and Cynthia agreed. That, however, was hardly accurate.

“Mr. Campbell, I don’t even know why you come to this class,” Professor Baker had said in his fake British accent. “Your monologue was terrible. You’re a disgrace to the art. I sincerely hope, for your sake and the world’s, that, once this class is over, you leave the acting to those of us with talent.”

Martin shrunk in his seat while students giggled around him.

The teacher’s gaze shot upward so that he was looking at the whole class. “What are you laughing at? Do you think any of you are more talented than Mr. Campbell? I have been in theatre houses all across this country. I have seen talent. Trust me when I say there is none in this room.

“Except for Ms. Cudrow. Ms. Cudrow, would you stand up, please?”

Cynthia did as the teacher asked, her hands fidgeting on top of each other from embarrassment.

“That is talent,” he said. “She has poise, beauty, skill. She is what every actor should strive to be.

“Now, everyone, go home. And, for Heaven’s sake, try not to give me a headache on Monday.”

NOW

CYNTHIA WAS THE slowest to descend into the chasm. She was also the most careful. Ethan quickly searched out the crevices where he could put his hands and feet, moving in a way that, to Martin, seemed alarmingly careless. “Catch me if you can,” he dared Cynthia once he’d overtaken her.

Then his fingers wrapped around a loose rock, and it fell. He scrambled for something to hold on to as the rock tumbled into the blackness below them. There was a soft thud when it hit bottom, and Martin told him to be more careful.

Ethan hollered like a cowboy. “What a rush!”

“You’re going to get yourself killed.”

“Not today.”

Then there was another sound—a faint, high-pitched rustle.

“What’s that?” Cynthia asked.

“Don’t know,” Martin said. “Sounds like—”

“Bats,” Ethan said.

And it was. They came roaring up the chasm like a squeaking tornado. Everyone screamed. Martin closed his eyes and pulled himself as close to the wall of rock as he could. As the bats screeched past him, he felt their wings slap violently against his back. Then he heard Cynthia scream and, even though the bats were not yet gone, opened his eyes.

Cynthia had lost her hold. She was sliding quickly down into the darkness. Jagged rocks punched at her face and ripped her jacket. She flexed her hands, desperately trying to grab anything that would stop her fall. The one thing she could get ahold of was Ethan. She clawed at his shirt, his pants—knocked the flashlight out of his pocket—until, her fingers locked around his ankle, pulling his foot off its perch, but also stopping her descent.

“What the hell!” Ethan shouted, as the last of the bats made their way past them, and his whole body jerked, shifted, twisted, trying to rebalance for the new weight