“I had four more days,” I whined. I even stamped my foot. I didn’t care if I was acting like a spoiled kid. I wanted to spend time with my dad.
“I know, and again, I’m sorry. I’m not happy about it, either. I should’ve mentioned it the second I saw you, but I knew it would upset you.”
Of course it was going to upset me!
But I couldn’t say that. I didn’t want my last night with Dad to be spent being angry, but I was. At the whole situation.
Dad pulled me in for a hug. “Listen, we’ll have dinner and then you and I can go for a walk afterward. Just the two of us. And we can talk about what we’ll do at Thanksgiving. Okay?”
He looked at me expectantly. I didn’t want any of those things. What I wanted was for him to move here. For him and Mom to be able to be in the same room. None of this was my fault, but I was the one being punished for it.
But I knew I couldn’t say anything. There was really only one answer I could give.
I swallowed the anger and frustration down. I forced a smile on my face.
“Okay, Dad.”
“My boy,” Dad said as he placed his arm around my shoulders as we walked around the neighborhood after dinner. “You know I’m so proud of you.”
I simply shrugged in response. I wasn’t in much of a mood for small talk. All through dinner I had to focus on not crying or throwing a fit over him leaving early. Now that I had the chance to tell him everything I felt, the words got caught in my throat.
“Listen.” He stopped us in the middle of the sidewalk on Lenox. He moved in front of me so I had to look at him. “I know this has been hard on you, but you need to know it’s been hard on me, too. I’m missing so much of your life. However much you miss me, I miss you that much and more. You’re my son. I love you.”
I looked down at the sidewalk. I wanted to believe him, but why was he leaving? Why couldn’t he move here?
“Please look at me, John.”
I clenched my jaw and looked up at my dad. There were tears welling in his eyes. Oh man, that almost broke me.
“I can’t leave here thinking you’re mad at me.”
I shook my head. “I’m not mad.” I was sad. I was angry at the divorce. But I could never be mad at him. He was my dad.
“It’s not always going to be like this.”
“Do you mean you’re moving here?”
He sighed. “I don’t know. I want to be closer, and I’ve talked to my superiors about maybe moving to the East Coast. But I won’t know for a while. What I do know is that I want to see my boy smile before I have to get back on a plane. And know that you’re also counting down the days until we see each other again.”
“Twenty-eight,” I said softly.
Dad leaned in. “What was that?”
I finally looked him in the eye. “There are twenty-eight days until I get on a plane for my visit.”
Dad brightened up. “Is that a fact?”
Okay, so yeah, I totally have been crossing out the days on my calendar until I get to see him.
“It is.” I couldn’t help but smile. I was going to see him again in twenty-eight days.
Dad laughed. “Okay then, what do you want to do in twenty-eight days?” He put his arm around me again as he continued to walk and talk about our next visit.
It still stung. But at least we had a future to plan.
There was a knock on my bedroom door an hour later.
Mom stuck her head in. “How are you doing?” she asked.
“Fine,” I replied as I pulled up the covers around me. It wasn’t even nine and I was already in bed.
She sat down next to me and rubbed my cheek with her thumb. “Oh, honey, I know you’re upset, but you’ll see him soon.”
“Yeah.” I did know that. And we already had a bunch of things Dad and I were going to do, but now that he was gone, it ended up hurting more.
“Why don’t you and I do something special this weekend? Maybe go to Central Park or the Met. I think there’s some kind of writers’ exhibition at the Morgan Library.”
“Okay.” I gave Mom a hug. I didn’t want her to think I wasn’t happy to be spending time with her. She understood about my focus being on Dad (and the case) the last few days.
“Well, I came in to tell you that there’s someone here to see you. You up for some company?” Mom stood and opened the door. I saw Shelby standing there with two napkins in her hand.
“Oh, hey,” I said, a little embarrassed that Shelby was going to see me in my camouflage pajamas.
“Thanks, Dr. Watson,” Shelby said as Mom closed the door behind us.
Shelby pulled my desk chair over toward me. “Here,” she said as she handed me a napkin that had part of a chocolate chip cookie wrapped inside. “Your mom said it was okay.”
It shouldn’t come as a shock that I didn’t have much of an appetite at dinner.
She then unfolded the other napkin that had the remaining part of the cookie.
“I wanted to—” Shelby began, but I had to cut her off.
“How did you know my dad’s flight changed? And Michael?” But what I really wanted to know was why they knew before me. That was the part that upset me the most.
Shelby put the cookie down on my desk. “When he picked up his phone, I could see a flight notification pop up on his screen. You can’t check into a flight until twenty-four hours before departure, so I knew he was leaving tomorrow. I presume Michael saw the exact same thing. I’m sorry that’s how you found out. I should’ve deduced from your body language when you walked in that you were unaware.”
I shrugged in response. I hadn’t seen his phone, but I probably wouldn’t have put it together even if I had. Since, as Shelby has told me before, it was hard to see clearly if you had already made up your mind about something. And for me, I wouldn’t have believed that my dad would leave early.
I was still in denial.
Shelby pursed her lips together and took a deep breath. She seemed unsure of herself, which wasn’t like her. I almost wanted her to insult me or something to get my life back to normal. I mean, my life wasn’t really normal anymore without Dad, but I had a new normal and I had to accept the fact that he wasn’t going to be a big part of it.
“Okay, Watson, I want to tell you something.” She got up and sat next to me on the bed, right where Mom had just been. “You know I can see things that others can’t.”
I nodded because well, duh.
“Your father really cares about you. In the time that I’ve been with the two of you, I’ve observed how he beams when you talk. How he gets sad when you discuss things he’s missed, like your first day of school or when you were in the ambulance. But today, it didn’t take a genius of my caliber to see how much it tore him apart that he had to leave. You need to know that your father loves you, and just because he isn’t here all the time doesn’t mean he cares less about you.”
I was stunned. Yeah, Dad basically told me the same thing, but . . . I don’t know. It was different hearing it from Shelby. She didn’t say things to make you feel better about yourself. She told you the truth. She told you what you needed to hear, and not what you wanted to hear.
I looked down at my hands. It was hard to look Shelby in the eyes. I didn’t want to cry in front of her, but what she said meant a lot to me. “Thanks, Shelby.”
“I’m simply stating facts,” she replied as she got up. She began studying my room. “Could you be more of a male cliché?” she stated as she took in my basketball posters.
I let out a forced laugh as I took a bite of my cookie.
“Hey, Shelby,” I said as she returned her attention to me. “You’re a really good friend. And well, I just wanted you to know that.”
“Thank you. And Watson”—she folded her arms—“I wanted you to know that . . . your pajamas are absolutely ridiculous.”
Well, with that burn it seemed my life had returned to its new normal.
And, even though I was still sad, I
couldn’t be more grateful for it and for Shelby.
Just yesterday, I wanted this case to be over.
But now I was happy for the distraction.
You didn’t need to be a Shelby Holmes to know what I didn’t want to think about.
At the skating rink the next morning, I walked over to the outskirts of the rink. I didn’t even have a chance to sit down before Tatiana skated toward me.
“Do you have report?” she asked.
“We should wait for Shelby,” I replied. Shelby was usually out before me, but I simply threw my bag in the boys’ locker room before coming out. I didn’t even bother to lock it up. I figured if something happened to me then we would know for sure it was Douglas. Maybe he’d leave me a note. Maybe he’d try to steal something. (I was really hoping he’d steal my homework or that awful outfit Shelby asked me to carry “just in case.” I didn’t want to know in which circumstances that sparkly monstrosity would be needed.)
I also didn’t know what to say to Tatiana. Yesterday we thought it was either Aisha or Douglas—and all signs pointed to Aisha. But now it could be Douglas, Sergi, Belle, or Belle’s mom. Even though Belle’s mom said she didn’t understand the cipher, I didn’t trust her. I wasn’t about to be the one to tell Tatiana that we were further away from finding the person than ever.
Oh, and also, I had no idea how we were going to figure out who was sending the messages. And I really didn’t want to have to get here even earlier to try to catch the person as they left the cipher, but I wasn’t sure we had any other options.
I looked around the two rinks. Sergi was busy with Belle, Douglas, and Aisha skating around. Belle’s mom was in her usual hovering position. Jordan was stretching off to the side of Tatiana’s rink. She didn’t seem especially bothered.
“Do you have a new cipher for us?” I asked.
Tatiana shook her head. “No.”
“Really?” I was concerned. We didn’t have one yesterday and look what happened. Someone tampered with Jordan’s water. What would be next?
Tatiana sighed. “I thought you would know by now. Regionals in two days.” She appeared annoyed.
I didn’t blame her. I was annoyed we hadn’t figured this out yet.
“We’ll get whoever is behind this,” I replied confidently, even though I wasn’t so sure.
Tatiana skated off without another word. I bent over to tie my skates, dreading the fact that we were going to have to skate since we didn’t have a cipher to decode. I wasn’t in the mood to hear Belle’s mom tell us how useless we were.
I tied my second skate and when I looked up, something on the side of the rink caught my eye. It couldn’t possibly be . . .
I took a couple steps and then knelt beside the gate to Tatiana’s rink. There it was. Another message written on the paneling:
Tatiana and Jordan must’ve not seen it. I reached inside my skate to produce the key code to the cipher. (Shelby wasn’t the only person who could use it as storage!) I didn’t have anything to write on, so I tried to do it in my head.
The first word had two letters we hadn’t gotten yet. I looked back to the girls’ locker room, willing Shelby to come out to help me. The first word was WAT--. Okay, maybe I could figure it out using the rest of the words.
Second word was out. Okay, so it was WAT--OUT. We still didn’t have the letters for B, C, H—then it hit me.
WATCH OUT
While I should’ve been happy the bully wasn’t calling Jordan any names, I was worried. They had moved on to threats.
But what was Jordan supposed to watch out for?
And maybe it was something to help us. Something that would lead us to the culprit! Maybe this was the break we’d been looking for!
I quickly decoded the third word and it was . . . Nancy?
WATCH OUT NANCY
Nancy? Who was Nancy?
Could it be that these messages were never intended for Jordan and they were for another girl named Nancy?
That would just be the icing on this mess of a case.
“What are you doing?” Shelby asked as she walked over, her skates already on.
“There’s a message,” I said as I guided Shelby away from the code not to draw attention to us. The person who left it was in the room. We didn’t want them to know that we were onto him or her.
Shelby started stretching. “What does it say?”
“Watch out, Nancy,” I replied as I bent over to stretch out my legs.
“Who’s Nancy?”
I didn’t know if I should be worried or relieved that Shelby didn’t know, either. We were both clueless.
(Yeah, I should’ve been worried.)
Wait a second. The name Nancy was familiar. Not from the rink, but there was a skater named Nancy.
It was the story my dad told me. I’d been trying to push away all my memories of his visit since it was too hard to think about what I had before he abruptly left. But this was important. He told me about those two skaters. The ones who made the news all those years ago.
I sucked in my breath.
“What is it, Watson?” Shelby asked, a concerned look on her face.
“It’s Jordan.”
“Jordan is Nancy. That doesn’t make sense.”
“No.” I looked over at Jordan as she started skating. “Jordan’s in real danger.”
My eyes scanned the rink, wondering if someone was lurking in the shadows preparing to hit Jordan on the knee.
No. Nobody would do that when we were all out here together.
But maybe they were going to do something else. I thought about what Jordan did to Aisha. (Allegedly.) Maybe they were going to tamper with something like her shoelaces.
Jordan kept skating. She was building momentum. That meant she was getting ready to jump.
What would happen if she jumped and her shoelace broke?
Before I realized what I was doing, I threw open the door to the rink and skated toward her.
“Stop!” I called out.
Jordan ignored me and continued to pick up speed.
“STOP!” I waved my hands at her, but in my rush, I tripped and fell flat on the ice.
Tatiana came skating over with Jordan behind her. “What is going on?” Tatiana demanded. “You interrupt practice.”
“Yes, I’d also like to inquire into your behavior, Watson,” Shelby commented as she skated behind me.
I got up from the ice. Jordan, Tatiana, and Shelby were standing in front of me, all waiting impatiently.
One glance at the other rink showed that everybody over there was now focused on me as well.
Awesome.
I had to remind myself I was still undercover as far as Sergi, Douglas, Belle, and her mom were concerned. You know, our suspects.
“There was another message today. You didn’t see it,” I said, surprised how out of breath I was from my quick sprint . . . and subsequent fall. “I think someone is going to mess with your skates.”
“What exactly did message say?” Tatiana asked.
“Watch out, Nancy.”
“Who is—” Jordan began to ask before her eyes got wide. “Oh. But there’s nothing wrong with my skates.”
She moved around a little. It seemed fine. But she hadn’t really done anything difficult yet.
“Look, I’m okay,” Jordan said. “I’ll be extra careful when I leave the rink. Now, can you please clear the way so I can skate.”
“Okay, okay.” I skated over to her with only a little wobble. “Can you please just take your skates off so we can get a good look? Then I’ll leave you alone.” I’d feel awful if anything happened to Jordan.
“That’s not necessary. See?” Jordan said as she took her left foot and slammed the toe pick down. Little flakes of ice came up on contact. She picked up her right foot. “Like I said, everything is—” As soon as the front half of her blade came in contact with the ice, it came undone from her boot.
It left a tiny dent in the middle of the rink.
Oh, wow. I was right. I WAS RIGHT!
But I couldn’t feel that great about it because, well, yikes.
“What is going on?” Sergi shouted over the plastic partition that separated the two rinks.
“Mind own business!” Tatiana replied.
The four of us looked down at Jordan’s broken skate.
Her right skate. The one that she used for the majority of her jumps.
This was getting serious.
And we were running out of time.
Shelby bent down, pretending to retie her skate, but instead inspected Jordan’s boot. “Someone must’ve loosened the screws. The skating you’ve done has continued to dislodge them. I don’t want to think what would’ve happened if you attempted a Lutz on this skate.”
I didn’t, either. Jordan could’ve really gotten hurt.
“Excellent job, Watson,” Shelby remarked with a nod of respect.
I felt my chest swell, until I looked over at Jordan and saw the blood draining from her face.
“What are we going to do?” Jordan asked. I think it had finally settled in that there was a real problem. And it wasn’t just messing with her mind. This person was taking it a step further. A dangerous step further.
“We need a team meeting,” Shelby said as she got back up.
We made our way off the ice. Jordan held on to Tatiana’s arm as she skated on her one good skate.
“What is going on?” Mrs. Booth approached us. “What happened to Jordan’s skate? And are you two really skaters? Because Julian can hardly stay on his feet.”
Yeah, like I needed her to tell me that.
“Yes, we are skaters,” Shelby replied with a huff. (And conveniently not answering the question about Jordan’s skate, although maybe Mrs. Booth knew exactly what happened and was playing coy.) Shelby blocked Mrs. Booth while Jordan hobbled to Tatiana’s office. “I’m seriously contemplating making a switch to a better partner. Isn’t that something Douglas has done . . . more than once?” Shelby raised her eyebrow at Mrs. Booth.
Well, that quieted her up.
The Great Shelby Holmes and the Coldest Case Page 11
