Double Dating with the Dead by Karen Kelley (best fiction novels to read .txt) 📗

“Shh, not so loud. I don’t want Selena to know we’re here.”

“She won’t unless we allow her to see us.”

She frowned. “I know, but it’s still hard for me to remember I don’t have to let her see me.”

“Yeah, I know what you mean.” His brow furrowed as he glared at Trent. “I still don’t think I like him. He talks about us like we don’t exist.”

“See, I told you we have to teach him a lesson, but you wouldn’t listen to me—again,” Dixie said. “You’d be content to let life pass you by if not for me.”

“Life did pass me by.”

She made herself comfortable in the branch across from his. “Well, do you want death to do the same thing?”

“What’s after death?” He pushed his hat higher and scratched his head.

She picked at the ruffle on the hem of her dress. “I would think it has to be worse than this,” she solemnly stated. She didn’t even want to imagine what they would face after they left the hotel. Sometimes that light would show up, but they were always too nervous to walk toward it. What if it burned them up? The one time she reached her hand toward it, she thought it felt kind of nice. Not exactly the fires of hell that those old biddies had warned her she was going to burn in for all of eternity.

“Maybe we should scare the hell out of him. I’ve been kind of bored lately.” Wesley looked thoughtful.

“Oh, now I bore you?”

When he turned toward her, he gave her a slow, sexy look that warmed her glow to a mellow yellow. “Darlin’, you won’t ever bore me, and if I had a body, I’d show you just how much you don’t bore me.”

He was a sweet talker, that was for sure, but wasn’t that what had drawn her to him from the very start? She cleared her mind and drew in a deep breath. “So, what are we going to do first?”

If they couldn’t have sex, then they could at least have fun. And this was going to be a lot of fun now that Wesley had come around to her way of thinking.

She looked at Trent as he sat on the porch, quite unconcerned. Selena had tried to tell him there were such things as ghosts, but he wouldn’t believe her. It was almost a shame to burst his bubble—almost.

Chapter 8

Trent closed the door to his room before answering his phone. He wasn’t taking any chances. Not that he wouldn’t put it past Selena to plaster herself against his door just to see if he was talking about her.

“Trent here,” he said after bringing the cell phone to his ear.

“You’re still alive. Amazing,” Tye said. “I know I managed to live with you all these years, but it was sort of a have-to situation with us being brothers and all, but I figured Selena would’ve done away with you by now.”

“You’re so damn funny I can’t stop laughing,” he said with more than a touch of dry sarcasm.

“I’ve always thought I had a rare talent. Maybe I should’ve been a comedian—have my own television show.”

“Yeah, so I could turn you off.”

“That was an old one, bro. It’s like I told you, no sense of humor anymore. You’ve gone stale.”

“Maybe because I don’t have anything to laugh about.”

“Okay, then have you seen any ghosts yet?”

Sometimes Tye could be a real pain in the ass. Why women flocked to his little brother was still a mystery to him.

“I take it that’s a no?”

“What do you think?”

Something clunked outside his door.

He jumped, then smiled. Caught in the act. He eased to the door. He had her now.

“Yeah, Selena is real crazy or one of the best con artists I’ve ever had the misfortune to run across.”

“Hey, I can hear you. Stop yelling. You almost busted my eardrum.”

He flung his door open. “Gotcha!”

Empty.

He peered down the hall both ways. Odd, he could’ve sworn he heard Selena right outside his door.

“I think you’re losing it, bro. What the hell are you doing?”

“I thought I heard Selena eavesdropping.” He walked down the hallway and to the landing. Selena was just coming in from outside, and she was talking on her phone.

“No, Mom, I really don’t need any food.” She grimaced. “What? Pizza. No, we shared. Yes, I’m eating salads. Mom, I’m fine, really.” She glanced up, but quickly looked away when she saw he was watching her.

“Maybe it was a ghost,” Tye offered.

Trent raised the phone to his ear. “What?”

“I said that it might have been a ghost.”

“Go to bed, Tye.”

“Can’t. I have a date with Cindy later.”

Trent glanced at his watch as he headed for his room. “It’s almost ten.”

“Yeah, that’s when the fun starts. Don’t you know midnight is the witching hour?”

“Since I’m hunting imaginary ghosts, I won’t have anything to worry about—unless Paige shows up. Good night.” He closed his phone at the same time that he walked inside his room.

He could’ve sworn he’d heard someone outside his door. As he’d said earlier today, it was an old hotel. The foundation was probably shifting. That was how a lot of ghost stories were started, with the creaks and groans of an older home that was settling…or hotel as was this case.

He put his cell phone on the dresser and opened the top drawer, then paused. His pants were in the top drawer. That wasn’t where he’d put them. He opened the next drawer. Socks and briefs that were supposed to be in the top drawer. He shook his head. Childish stunts.

“Ahh, Selena, do you really expect me to fall for something so juvenile?” He grabbed a pair of pajama bottoms and tossed them on the bed. Her little tricks weren’t fooling him.

After removing his clothes, he pulled on the bottoms and turned back the covers.

“Jesus!”

Footsteps hurried down the hall, and his door was flung open.

“What?” Selena rushed inside. She took one look at his bed