Page 39 of The Executioners Three
Oh god.Freddie gritted her teeth.For Mom, for Mom. “Look, there’s a light through yonder—”
Mr. Binder coughed. “You skipped a part, Freddie! Read it again.Allof it.”
“Just shoot me now, please.” She inhaled through her nose. Exhaled through her mouth. Then she read the line again—properly andloud. “LOOK,MY LOVE,THROUGH YONDER TREES. Maybe ’tis a logging camp. I have heard of a generous man named Allard Fortin here. Perhaps ’tis he?”
Theo’s nostrils flared, like he was trying to hold back laughter. “I think you are—”
“Louder!”
“I THINK YOU ARE RIGHT, MY LOVE. LET US APPROACH AND SEE.”
“Good.” Mr. Binder clapped lightly. “Now you kiss and walk off stage holding hands.”
“Wait,what?” Freddie rounded toward Mr. Binder. “There’s no kiss in here.” She rattled the pages at him.
“There most certainly is.” He lifted his own copy. “Page two, Freddie.”
No, no, no. She tore back the first page…
And yes, yes,yes. There it was in very simple words: Traveler Number One and Traveler Number Two kiss affectionately.
“But it’s just a rehearsal,” Mr. Binder said, “so I won’t make you do it now—though youwillhave to in the performance.”
“Over my dead body.” Freddie twisted toward Theo, thinkingsurelyhe was as horrified by all of this as she was. But he was simply grinning his wolfish grin.
Then, as if all of that weren’t bad enough, the crowd of Fortin Prep students seemed to have figured out what was going on. “Kiss her!” one guy hollered from beside a heater. “Right on the lips!” a girl sang from the third row. “Kiss, kiss, kiss!” chanted another, and in seconds, they were all shouting it.
Freddie was definitely going to murder Theo Porter.
Except that as she watched him, his cocky grin stripped away. In fact, he looked uncomfortable, one hand on the back of his neck and the other tapping at his thigh. “I’m sorry,” he said after several seconds of this. “Just ignore them and let’s walk off stage.”
Kiss, kiss, kiss.
Somehow, the fact that Theo was trying to be nice only made Freddie hate him more. Like, he couldn’t just flip from being a Bad Human to a Good One in the space of ten seconds. That was not how this worked. Plus, if Freddie walked off stage right now—as Theo was currently twisting around to do—then that would be letting all of the jerks in the audience win.
Kiss, kiss, kiss.
No.Freddiewas the Prank Wizard here. This washerVillage Historique,herpageant, and those Fortin kids had messed withhermom.
“Wait.”
Theo was halfway across the stage now. He didn’t hear Freddie above all the shouting.
Kiss, kiss, kiss.
So Freddie said it louder: “WAIT.”
This time he heard. This time he paused and glanced back. And before Freddie could really consider what she was doing or that her mom was watching or that she mightseriouslyregret this once it was done, she kicked into a jog.
Five bouncing steps brought her to him. His forehead creased. “What is it?” he asked. Then he seemed to realize what she was doing—why she was rolling onto her toes and bringing her face to his.
She gave him a split second to pull away. A chance to escape if this wasn’t what he wanted. But Theo didn’t pull away. Instead he leaned in, and Freddie’s lips reached his.
9
The extent of Freddie’s love life could fill twelve journal pages. She knew this because she’d done it. Eight pages had gone to boyfriend number one, and four pages had gone to boyfriend number two.
Boyfriend number one (of the whopping eight pages) had been Freddie’s next-door neighbor throughout grade school. His name was Andy, and one day, when he had been twelve and Freddie eleven, he had asked her if she would be his girlfriend. She had flushed and said,Yes,and for the next six weeks, they had been Very Serious Indeed. Sometimes they’d held hands. Sometimes he had come over for dinner, and twice, they had kissed.
