Mountain Secrets by Elizabeth Goddard (good books to read for teens txt) 📕

the trees that surrounded the property, he stared at the monitor in his surveillance van as a man made his way toward the door of the secluded mansion.

Ten miles from the house and nestled in the Montana mountains was the town of Silver Strike. The booming tourist spot was not only a place for world-class skiing and fly-fishing, but also ground zero for an international smuggling ring. Couriers used empty vacation homes as pickup points for valuable smuggled items that were often of cultural significance to the country they’d been taken from.

As a private detective, Jason had been working with the FBI for months to identify the couriers and the buyers in hopes that one of them would lead to the mastermind behind it all. The Bureau coordinated with US Customs to track when artifacts had been stolen from museums or personal collections.

As Jason watched the man type in security codes on the keypad by the door, look around nervously and step inside, he was pretty sure he’d hit pay dirt. Figuring out how the thief had gotten the security codes was a piece of the puzzle for the Bureau to discover. Jason’s job was to take photos that would lead to identifying all the players involved.

Three weeks ago, an eighteen-karat-gold bookmark that had belonged to Mussolini had been stolen from a museum in Italy. The Bureau had been watching several empty properties ever since.

Jason took a deep breath. His camera hadn’t recorded a clear picture of the man’s face, so he’d wait around until the perp came back out. That way he’d be sure of a positive ID. The thief had walked up to the mansion. He must have parked his car in some out-of-the-way place so it wouldn’t be spotted in the driveway of a house that was supposed to be unoccupied. The falling snow would cover the man’s tracks in a matter of minutes, leaving no trace.

Jason stared at the monitors. A car pulled up, and a woman stepped out. His heart beat a little faster as he leaned closer to the screen. She tilted her chin and squared her shoulders with none of the nervous body language the man had displayed. Everything about her, from her posture to the way she dressed, projected confidence and money, very Ivy League. Who was she?

The woman punched in the security codes and disappeared behind the ornate wooden door. Jason’s throat went dry. Was she an innocent homeowner unexpectedly walking into a dangerous situation or was she allied with the thief?

If she was not involved, he needed to get her out of there before she crossed the thief’s path. Most of the men in the crime ring who had been identified had a history of violence. The thought of harm coming to a woman made Jason’s chest tight. He wrestled with indecision. He couldn’t risk blowing this operation either; months of work would go down the tubes if the smuggling ring found out the Feds were onto them. Arresting the couriers would be an act of futility, since only finding the kingpin would end the syndicate.

He reached for a work shirt with the name Mel written on the pocket and a clipboard he kept in a tote, part of his go-to kit for his work as a PI. Walking around a neighborhood in a uniform meant most people didn’t notice you. He put his zip-front hoodie and coat back on.

His chest muscles squeezed tight. He was taking a huge risk in showing himself, but a woman might get hurt if he didn’t.

He pulled the van into the driveway, grabbed his gun from the glove compartment and placed it in his waistband so his winter coat covered it. He prayed he wouldn’t have to use the gun. Snow cascaded and twirled from the sky as he hurried toward the door.

Usually it was easy enough for him to get a read on people. If the woman was innocent, he’d find a way to convince her to leave. If guilty, he’d get a good look at her face, assuming she would even answer the door. Not answering would be a giveaway that she was involved. It would take an Oscar-worthy performance to not give away his real reason for being here if she was in on the operation, but he was confident of his abilities.

He touched the doorbell with a gloved finger, took in a breath and prepared to play Mel the concerned county worker.

From the moment she’d stepped into the Wilsons’ house, something felt off to Isabel Connor. The hairs on the back of her neck stood at attention as her heart thudded faster. She couldn’t let go of the feeling that she was being watched.

She shook her head, trying to free herself of her uneasiness. Maybe it was just because the Wilsons had chosen to show up three days earlier than expected. They’d texted her directly instead of getting in touch with her employer, Mary Helms at Sun and Ski Property Management. It was Isabel’s job to get the houses ready for the clients. Stock the refrigerator, make sure the property was in working order, place fresh flowers in the vases, whatever it took to make clients feel comfortable in their vacation home.

Grabbing some books that had been left on an entryway table, she headed toward the upstairs library, stopping to turn the thermostat up a few degrees. She put the books on the shelf and then ran back downstairs to inspect the kitchen, where some papers and boxes had been left on the counter, probably by a cleaning crew. Since she still needed to unload flowers and groceries from her car, she’d left the alarm off so she could run in and out of the house quickly. She’d reset it when she left.

The doorbell rang.

Her breath caught in her throat as that gut feeling that something was off rose to the surface. Who on earth could that be? The Wilsons’ house was miles from downtown Silver Strike and other