Stalk, Don't Run (4 page)

“You mean Roland?” Dad said with a frown.

“Exactly,” I said. “So far there’s nothing about Roland being arrested—which means he’s still somewhere out there.”

Dad gave me his serious lawyerly look—the one he used when helping me with my cases.

“You’ve got to be patient, Nancy, and trust that Roland will be apprehended sooner or later,” he said.

“But he had plastic surgery, Dad,” I said. “Major plastic surgery to look like a totally different person.”

“You can change your appearance,” Dad said. “But you can never disguise evil.”

Wow. Dad never ceased to surprise me. He was right.

“Smoothie break!” Hannah’s voice called out.

I turned to see her carrying two tall smoothie glasses into the den.

“Hannah, I’m going to gain ten pounds!” I said, smiling as I took the glass. “And it will definitely be worth it!”

Later I had no trouble falling asleep. But sometime in the middle of the night my deep sleep was interrupted by a sudden jangling tune. At first I thought it was part of my dream—until I realized it was the ring tone of my phone.

Who was calling me in the middle of the night? Who was calling me at all? My friends usually texted. My first thought was the Casabian sisters. They were probably still on California time.

I fumbled in the dark for my phone and pulled it to my ear. “Hello?” I said groggily.

No answer.

“Hello?” I asked again. “Who’s there?”

By now I was wide awake, sitting up in bed. I listened for any sign of life on the other end. Was it just dead air? Then I heard a faint click.

I turned to the menu, checking the last incoming call. It was labeled
UNKNOWN
.

“Great,” I told myself.

There was something creepy about getting a strange call in the middle of the night—especially when the person on the other end didn’t say a word.

I tried telling myself it was a wrong number as I turned off my phone. What else could it be?

You’re not on Malachite Beach anymore, Nancy. Relax,
I thought as I fell back on my pillow.

“Do you have the cinnamon buns, Nancy?” Hannah called from the doorstep while I made my way to the car.

“Got them,” I called back, lifting the plastic container in my hands. “Thanks again, Hannah.”

She gave me a thumbs-up before going into the house.

I drove toward the Marvin house, surrounded by the smell of warm cinnamon and vanilla. It was then that I decided to deliver some cinnamon buns to my new—if only temporary—neighbors, Mandy, Mallory, and Mia.

I steered my trusty hybrid onto Water Street, parked at the curb, and carried the container up the flagstone path to the front door.

“Casa Bonita,” I said to myself. Leave it to the Casabians to make an ordinary house in River Heights sound like a villa on Malachite Beach.

I rang the doorbell and waited. I knew it was early, especially for the sisters, but as George said, Hannah’s cinnamon buns were worth waking up for at any hour.

After ringing several times—with no answer—I figured the Casabians probably had jet lag.

“So much for that idea,” I decided.

I was about to leave when I heard thumping noises from inside the house, followed by one loud
thud
.

What was that?
I wondered.

Placing the container on the porch, I raced to a window and peered inside the house.

Sprawled at the bottom of the stairs was Mandy!

I
banged on the window and called Mandy’s name over and over. She didn’t move a muscle.

Desperate to get inside, I tried opening the front windows, but no luck.

The garage!
I thought, jumping off the porch.

I remembered Mandy saying it had one of those old-fashioned garage doors—the kind you lifted up and down. When I pulled the door up, I heard the sound of a car engine . . . running!

Carbon monoxide!
I thought in a panic. Carbon monoxide was colorless, odorless, and deadly!

“How could they leave the car on?” I asked myself as I ran toward the car. “How can they be so stupid?”

I flung the car door open, found the keys, and turned off the engine. Then I bolted through the side door into the house.

Was I too late? Had the noxious gas killed the Casabian sisters?

The windows were easier to open from inside. As fresh air blew into the house, I ran to Mandy and touched her neck. Her pulse was throbbing. She was still alive.

“Mandy, sit up,” I said, lightly slapping her face.

Mandy mumbled something I couldn’t understand. But I had to leave her at the staircase to check on Mallory and Mia.

Thundering upstairs, I found the sisters in the same bedroom. After opening every window in the room, I took turns shaking Mallory and Mia.

“Wake up!” I called over and over.

Mia’s eyes fluttered open. “My head is killing me,” she said in a raspy voice.

“Mine too,” Mallory mumbled.

After helping them sit up, I said, “Headaches are one of the symptoms of carbon monoxide poisoning. The other is death.”

“Carbon monoxide?” Mia asked. “But how—”

“I don’t know. Are there any carbon monoxide alarms in the house?” I asked. “Your car was running—you forgot to turn it off.”

“Nuh-uh!” Mandy’s voice said.

Turning, I saw Mandy leaning against the door frame. She still looked pale and groggy but had managed to walk up the stairs. A good sign.

“What do you mean, nuh-uh?” I asked.

“I remember turning the car off after I parked it in the garage,” Mandy said.

“I saw her do it,” Mallory said. “It’s a rental car, so she was trying to figure out how it worked.”

“Then why were the keys left in the car too?” I asked.

“Oops,” Mandy said with a shrug. “That was me.”

I cocked my head as I studied the sisters. As spaced-out as they were from the CO, they did seem pretty adamant about turning off the engine.

“So if you guys didn’t leave the engine running, who did?” I asked.

“Nancy, what are you saying?” Mallory said, her eyes wide. “Do you think somebody sneaked into our garage to turn on our car?”

“Most of River Heights doesn’t even know we’re here yet,” Mandy said.

I thought about it. The idea of someone killing the Casabian sisters—especially in River Heights—was kind of wild.

“Come on,” I said, nodding toward the door. “I’ll drive you to the emergency room so they can check you out.”

“The hospital?” Mandy shook her head. “Not an option.”

“Deirdre doesn’t want us to go public yet,” Mallory said, swinging her legs over the bed. “Anyway, I feel much, much better now.”

“Me too,” Mia said. “In fact, I could use some coffee and a little breakfast.”

I remembered the plastic container I’d left out on the porch. “In that case,” I said with a smile, “cinnamon buns, anyone?”

The Casabians and I ate Hannah’s sweet specialty. Soon it was past eight, and I had to get to the Marvins’ before the
Bugle
arrived.

As I drove, I couldn’t stop thinking about the close carbon monoxide call.
Could
someone have broken into the sisters’ garage to turn on the car and poison them? They were celebrities—and with celebrities came stalkers and wackos.

Once at the Marvin house, I raised the question with Bess and George.

“It does seem kind of weird,” Bess said, licking frosting off her fingers.

“Especially since no one knows the sisters are here yet,” George said.

“Hey, speaking of weird,” I said, remembering something else that happened. “I got a call in the middle of the night.”

“Who was it?” George asked.

“There was no one at the other end,” I said.

George groaned under her breath. “Quit it, Nancy,” she said. “Will you please just quit it?”

“Quit what?” I asked.

“Quit thinking too much,” George said. “The call you got probably was a wrong number, and the sisters are such flakes it’s no surprise they left the car running.”

I didn’t bother telling George that Mandy, Mallory, and Mia insisted they’d turned off the car. She probably wouldn’t believe it anyway.

“Whatever,” I said. “Fortunately, I got there in time to wake them up.”

“And speaking of sisters, here comes mine,” Bess said with a little sigh.

I looked up to see Bess’s twelve-year-old sister, Maggie, race into the kitchen. She was wearing leggings and an Austin Gruber T-shirt.

Austin was the famous teenage singer who Bess, George, and I met while solving our case in Malachite. For a while Austin was a suspect, but after we cleared him of sabotaging Stacey Manning’s fund-raising party, he became our friend.

“Cinnamon buns! Bring it!” Maggie squealed. She leaned over the table to grab a bun when—

“Step away from the cinnamon buns!” Mrs. Marvin’s voice snapped. “I repeat, Maggie, step away from the buns!”

Maggie’s hand froze over the plate. “Mom! You know I can eat a gazillion of these.”

“Which is exactly why you’re going to Camp Athena,” Mrs. Marvin said, folding her arms. “And not a moment too soon.”

“You’re going to camp this summer, Maggie?” I asked.

Maggie nodded, but not happily.

“I’ve never heard of Camp Athena,” George said.

“That’s because it’s a
boot
camp!” Maggie said with a scowl. “It’s not fair. You guys got to hang with Austin Gruber this summer, and I get shipped off to do hard labor.”

“Hey, we brought you back an Austin Gruber T-shirt,” George told Maggie.

I couldn’t get past the words Maggie had used to describe Camp Athena.

“Excuse me, Mrs. Marvin,” I said. “Why is Maggie going to a boot camp?”

“Camp Athena is anything but boot camp,” Mrs. Marvin said. “Maggie eats way too much junk food when she’s around her friends, which is why I looked into Camp Athena in the first place.”

Maggie rolled her eyes.

“Camp Athena is a camp that encourages healthy lifestyles, including positive thinking, exercise, and healthy eating,” Mrs. Marvin explained. “And it’s right here in River Heights.”

“Wait a minute. I think I saw something about that camp online,” George said. “Isn’t it run by a woman named Amy?”

“Yes!” Mrs. Marvin said with a smile. “Amy Paloma is a rising star in girls’ health. In fact, she was a guest last week on
Rise and Shine, River Heights
.”

“Going to camp is neat, Maggie,” I said, trying to cheer her up. “You’ll play sports, do arts and crafts, make s’mores—”

“S’mores—as if,” Maggie snorted. “We’ll probably eat birdseed and rabbit food.”

“I’ve already checked out the camp and was very impressed,” Mrs. Marvin told us. “I’m taking Maggie there today to see for herself.”

“Can’t I go with Bess instead?” Maggie asked.

“Me?” Bess asked.

Maggie nodded and said, “If you like it, I’ll go. If you don’t, I won’t.”

“Oh, Maggie.” Mrs. Marvin sighed. She turned to Bess and said, “Will you go with her?”

“I was going to start working on Dad’s shed today, Mom,” Bess said.

“
Please
, Bess?” Maggie begged. “It’ll only take a few minutes to check out that stupid camp.”

I wanted so badly to eat another cinnamon bun, but I didn’t want to tempt Maggie. I was also curious about Camp Athena and Amy Paloma. Was she really so dynamic?

“I’ll go too, Bess,” I said.

“So will I,” George said. “If they have computers, maybe I can drum up some business.”

“Okay, okay,” Bess said. “We’ll all go to Camp Athena later this morning.”

“Yes!” Maggie said. She turned to her mom. “Now can I have a cinnamon bun? If I go to Camp Athena, I may never see food again.”

Mrs. Marvin chuckled, then said, “You can have half of one.”

I tore a bun in half and shared it with Maggie. Just as I was about to pop it in my mouth, we heard a
thunk!

“The
Bugle
’s here!” Bess said, jumping up from her chair.

The three of us raced outside, where the
River Heights Bugle
lay on the doorstep. Bess turned to page four and sang, “Ta-daaaa!”

George and I peered over her shoulder at the page. Splashed across the River Heights Spotlight section wasn’t an article about us, but a photo of Mandy, Mallory, and Mia!

“ ‘River Heights Welcomes the Casabians,’ ” Bess read the headline. “ ‘By Ned Nickerson.’ ”

“Ned?” I gasped. “This page four article is supposed to be about
us
.”

“I thought the
River Heights Bugle
didn’t print cheesy celebrity gossip,” George said angrily.

“They do now,” Bess said. “I wonder what changed their minds.”

“What—or
who
,” I said, narrowing my eyes. “Deirdre said she wanted to talk to Ned about running a piece on the Casabians.”