The Killing Moon by Dan Padavona (books to read for 13 year olds .TXT) 📕

race against time. He hit every traffic snag, every mind numbing delay, Murphy’s Law in full effect as he rushed to reach work before noon. He pulled into the parking lot with a minute to spare. Leaving his car beside Chelsey’s green Honda Civic, he threw the door open and ran down the hall, the popcorn scents tickling his nose.

“There you are,” Chelsey said, looking up from her computer. “You heard about Mark Benson?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s our focus today. I’m setting aside all active cases until we catch Benson.”

“What’s our first move?”

Chelsey waved LeVar over to her monitor. She’d warmed to LeVar over the last month after initial skepticism. He wondered if they’d ever be friends, or if his past with the Harmon Kings would cause Chelsey to judge him forever. She swiveled the monitor so he could look over her shoulder. A Google Earth map of rolling hills and countryside displayed on the screen. A farmhouse sat at the center. That must be where Benson and Damian Ramos held Raven over the summer.

“Raven should be back in Wolf Lake by now. She checked Benson’s Barbells.”

“By herself?”

Chelsey rolled her eyes.

“That’s your sister. Our working theory is Benson concealed emergency funds inside the gym or at the farmhouse. We’ll stake out the property and snag him if he returns.” As LeVar shifted closer to the screen, Chelsey zoomed in on a grove of trees a hundred yards from the driveway. “My Civic isn’t built for off-road driving, but the ground should be solid enough to support the car if we take this turnoff.” She tapped her finger against the shoulder. “There’s no ditch between the road and the grove. We’ll hide the vehicle inside the trees and investigate the property on foot. Then we’ll watch the house from the car and hope our theory verifies.”

“And if Benson shows up?”

“We’ll call the sheriff’s department. But we can’t let him escape. If Benson tries to flee before the authorities arrive, we’ll take him down.” She met his eyes. “You up for that?”

“One hundred percent.”

She watched him for a moment before nodding.

“Here we go, LeVar. Today, you enter the big leagues. Don’t let me down.”

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

October 31st

11:45 a.m.

Valerie’s face stung from where the kick ball smacked against her cheek.

She hadn’t paid attention during gym class, too distracted by Derek not showing up for school or answering her messages. With her mind elsewhere, she’d missed the other girls screaming for her to catch the ball a second before it whacked against her head.

The locker room emptied. Feeling like a fool, she peeled off her gym shorts and T-shirt, and stuffed the dirty clothes into a Duffel bag. As she stepped into her school clothes, she checked her phone. Still nothing from Derek. Where was he? She concocted reasons he hadn’t written. His phone was dead. He played hooky and spent the day in Syracuse, shopping at the mall. The latter didn’t sound like Derek. He wasn’t the shopping type.

“If you’re healthy and ignoring my messages, I’ll slap you silly,” she muttered to herself, putting the phone away.

She closed the locker. The bang echoed off the walls and rang through the showers. Everyone had left for lunch two minutes ago while she took her time, still embarrassed over the kick ball incident. Few horrors in life compared to gym class humiliation.

From the hallway, the gymnasium doors banged shut as Ms. Steele locked up on her way to lunch. Valerie threw the knapsack over her shoulder, grabbed her gym bag, and stood up from the bench. A locker slammed shut in the next row. She hesitated, thinking she’d been alone.

“Hello? Is someone there?”

Water dribbled in the showers. She moved to the end of the row and peeked around the corner. Nobody there. Odd.

Footsteps moved through the room. The person was behind her now.

She swung around and scanned the row. The ghost had moved on.

Valerie had viewed too many horror movies to trust unexplained noises in a vacant room. Not willing to engage in the cat-and-mouse game, she strutted away from the sounds and toward the exit. She found the door closed. Jiggling the handle, her panic spiked. Someone had jammed the door from the outside. Her eyes ran up and down the door, searching for another way out. Footsteps moved between the rows. Coming closer.

Pounding on the door, she yelled.

“Ms. Steele? Can someone let me out? The door is locked.”

A bang swung her head around. It sounded as if someone had slammed a fist against the locker. She tugged on the door and pounded again. A fire exit at the rear of the locker room led to the staff parking lot. That meant she’d need to evade whoever was inside the room.

Removing her shoes, Valerie padded past the first two rows and stopped. She angled her head around the corner and confirmed the next row was clear. It was quiet now. As though the stranger had vanished. Her breaths came quick as she tiptoed to the fourth row. She recognized the pattern of open and closed doors, the stray, abandoned T-shirt on the floor. This was where she’d changed her clothes. Something caught her eye. An object lay on the bench at the far end of the row.

A wallet.

She swore it hadn’t been there before.

“Hello? Did you forget something?”

Her voice faded through the room and died against the walls. She moved down the row, keeping her back to the lockers so nobody could sneak up on her. Plucking the brown leather wallet off the bench, she opened it and stared at Derek’s driver’s license.

She laughed at the ceiling as the puzzle pieces fell into place. How long had Derek planned this elaborate Halloween prank? Anything to put a scare into her. She wasn’t too proud to admit he’d done a solid job.

“Very funny, Derek. Come out, come out, wherever you are.”

Her heart still slammed against her chest as she tucked the wallet into her pocket.

“If you want your wallet, you’ll have to take it off me.