Page 20 of Stop and Seek
Someone yelled, “What’s the prize, Kyran?”
“Stay in the chat and I’ll tell you, Paul,” Decker said, his voice carrying even without the microphone.
Theo’s skull ached. Migraine central coming around the bend. What couldpossiblybe worth this? A month’s supply of beer? A damn jelly subscription? A signed yearbook so they could all lament about who they used to be?
Still, he pulled out his phone. The messages started pouring in, unreadable flurries of emojis, question marks, and excitement.
Kyran Decker is typing…appeared, and the words slowed.
Kyran Decker
Our favorite Sterling girls’ mom and dad opened their pocketbooks for this.
We’ll have a few practice rounds before elimination.
The last hider and seeker standing each receive $25,000. Cash.
For a second, Theo just… stared.
The texts exploded. The feed became unreadable again. But all he could do was stare at those numbers.
Twenty-fivethousanddollars.
His hand shook slightly as he clicked his screen off, thumb fumbling against the power button. He almost dropped it.
That was—world changing.
It was a ticket out. A real,actualexit sign flickering in the distance.
He could move.
Get a new job.
Start over.
I could leave Ohio.
“Oh my god,” Alyssa whispered.
“I can’t take the time off work,” Rachel said. “I had to switch with another nurse to make it tonight.”
Ethan’s eyes looked too wide, his face bathed in the ghostly white glow of his phone. “I have to talk to Carrie but… can you imagine? Twenty-five grand for a kids game.”
Yeah. He could imagine it.
And that was the problem.
Because once Theo let himself imagine something, he wanted it like oxygen. And if he didn’t get it?
He knew what would happen.
The lights clicked on and—hey—Noah could see what thefuckhe was doing.
He blinked against the floating white dots. Scraped the last part of the sticker off his tank top. Maybe he got it all. He couldn’t tell. Everything smelled like sweat and someone else’s cologne—Benji’s probably, or maybe it was hot-bathroom-guy from earlier still stuck to his clothes.
“How long did it take you to learn everyone’s names?” he asked, scrubbing his thumb against the sticky spot.
“A magician doesn’t tell all his secrets,” Kyran said. He tossed the microphone to a guy in glasses. “It takes theje ne sais quoiout of it.”
