Crawled Document Text Preview (Page 1 Excerpt)
[Page 3] This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. Text copyright © 2019 by Karen M. McManus Front cover photographs © 2019 by Johner Images/Getty Images and Jamie Grill/Getty Images All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Delacorte Press, an imprint of Random House Children’s Books, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York. Delacorte Press is a registered trademark and the colophon is a trademark of Penguin Random House LLC. Visit us on the Web! randomhouseteens.com Educators and librarians, for a variety of teaching tools, visit us at RHTeachersLibrarians.com Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: McManus, Karen M., author. Title: Two can keep a secret / Karen McManus. Description: First edition. | New York : Delacorte Press, [2019] | Summary: While true-crime afficionado Ellery and her twin brother are staying with their grandmother in a Vermont community known for murder, a new friend goes missing and Ellery may be next. Identifiers: LCCN 2018022931 (print) | LCCN 2018029202 (ebook) | ISBN 978-1-5247-1474-1 (el) | ISBN 978-1-5247-1472-7 (hc) | ISBN 978-1-5247-1473-4 (glb) | ISBN 978-1-9848-5190-1 (intl. tr. pbk.) Subjects: | CYAC: Murder—Fiction. | Missing persons—Fiction. | Community life—Vermont— Fiction. | Brothers and sisters—Fiction. | Twins—Fiction. | Moving, Household—Fiction. | Grandmothers—Fiction. | Mystery and detective stories. Classification: LCC PZ7.1.M4637 (ebook) | LCC PZ7.1.M4637 Two 2019 (print) | DDC [Fic]—dc23 Ebook ISBN 9781524714741 Random House Children’s Books supports the First Amendment and celebrates the right to read. v5.4 ep [Page 4] Contents Cover Title Page Copyright Dedication Chapter One Chapter Two Chapter Three Chapter Four Chapter Five Chapter Six Chapter Seven Chapter Eight Chapter Nine Chapter Ten Chapter Eleven Chapter Twelve Chapter Thirteen Chapter Fourteen Chapter Fifteen Chapter Sixteen Chapter Seventeen Chapter Eighteen Chapter Nineteen Chapter Twenty Chapter Twenty-one Chapter Twenty-two Chapter Twenty-three Chapter Twenty-four Chapter Twenty-five Chapter Twenty-six Chapter Twenty-seven Chapter Twenty-eight Chapter Twenty-nine Chapter Thirty Chapter Thirty-one Chapter Thirty-two Chapter Thirty-three Chapter Thirty-four Chapter Thirty-five Chapter Thirty-six Chapter Thirty-seven [Page 5] Chapter Thirty-eight Acknowledgments About the Author [Page 6] For Gabriela, Carolina, and Erik [Page 7] CHAPTER ONE ELLERY FRIDAY, AUGUST 30 If I believed in omens, this would be a bad one. There’s only one suitcase left on the baggage carousel. It’s bright pink, covered with Hello Kitty stickers, and definitely not mine. My brother, Ezra, watches it pass us for the fourth time, leaning on the handle of his own oversized suitcase. The crowd around the carousel is nearly gone, except for a couple arguing about who was supposed to keep track of their rental car reservation. “Maybe you should take it,” Ezra suggests. “Seems like whoever owns it wasn’t on our flight, and I bet they have an interesting wardrobe. A lot of polka dots, probably. And glitter.” His phone chimes, and he pulls it out of his pocket. “Nana’s outside.” “I can’t believe this,”