Riley Mack and the Other Known Troublemakers (9 page)

BOOK: Riley Mack and the Other Known Troublemakers
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“WELL, THAT WAS JUST CRAPTACULAR,”
said Briana.

“You did a very good job,” said Jake, who had listened to both sides of the conversation on his headphones. “You matched Rebecca's voice perfectly.”

“But Gavin swears he doesn't even know what a goldendoodle is; doesn't know one was just stolen.”

“Maybe he's telling the truth, y'all,” added Jamal.

“Yeah,” Riley mumbled. “Guess there's a first time for everything.”

“He really didn't steal my mom's dog?” asked Mongo sadly.

“I don't think so,” said Jake.

“Me neither,” added Briana.

“Then who did?”

“That, my friend,” said Riley, “is the question.”

Riley sank down into a beanbag chair. Tried to keep cool. But this was bad. Real bad. His big scheme had just gone bust. He'd wasted everybody's Saturday and come up empty.

But getting mad at himself for blowing the rescue mission wouldn't help. What was it his dad always said? “Regret is a waste of energy. You can't build on regret; it's only for wallowing in.” Riley was certain someone like Churchill or Shakespeare said it before his dad but, still, it made sense. Wallowing was something a pig did. Rolling around in the mud because it feels good and because a pig is, basically, a walking slab of bacon.

So Riley knew not to waste time feeling sorry for himself. He needed to figure out what to do next. He rubbed his cheeks. Tortured his hair. He thought. Then, he thought harder.

He had built Operation Blind Date on a faulty assumption.

But if Gavin Brown hadn't stolen the dog, who had?

Did Noodle just run away when Emma opened the gate?

If so, how come Grandma Brown had the dog's sparkling pink collar for sale in her antiques tent?

He glanced around the rumpus room. His crew
looked brokenhearted. Defeated. Jake, Briana, Mongo, even chatty Jamal, were sitting there, silently staring at their shoes.

They needed Riley.

And he needed a new plan.

A new clue.

“Somebody had to steal Noodle,” mumbled Mongo.

“Yeah,” said Briana. “A space alien on a rocket ship, remember?”

Riley's eyes brightened.

“Jake?” he said.

“Yeah?”

“What time is it?”

“Seven twenty. Why?”

“Call the Pizza Palace. See if they're still open.”

“We're having a crisis and you're ordering pizza?” said Briana. “Honestly, Riley. At least act like you care what happens to Noodle.”

“Make the call, Jake. Please.”

“What's up, Riley Mack?” asked Jamal, the first to spring out of his chair. “You just hatched a new plan, didn't you?”

Riley held up a hand, focused on Jake. “Hang on.”

“Uh, yeah—how late are you guys open tonight?” Jake asked whoever answered the phone at the pizza place. “Nine?”

“Ask them if Nick is working tonight.”

“Hey, is my buddy Nick working there tonight?”

Riley flashed Jake a thumbs-up. Adding that “buddy” bit was a smooth move.

“Okay. Cool. Uh, yeah, I think we're going to order a pie but I have to find out who wants what. Call you right back, dude.” He thumbed the off button. “What's up, Riley?”

“Nick. The Pizza Palace busboy. We saw him, remember? Outside the pet shop.”

“Oh, yeah,” said Mongo. “He had those two birdcages. Pink and blue.”

Riley nodded. “And he said something like, ‘Hey, Mongo, sorry about your mom's dog, man.'”

“Yeah,” said Mongo. “I thought that was very considerate of him.”

Riley refound his foxy swagger. “So, Mongo—how'd Nick know your mom lost her dog?”

“I dunno. I guess he read the poster.”

Riley ambled over to where Jake had a stack of Lost Dog flyers piled beside a computer printer.

“Oh, you mean this poster? The one where we specifically left off your mother's name and only printed her phone number? You think maybe Nick has your home telephone number memorized? You think, maybe, he sees this number, the only identifying information on the whole poster, by the way, and, boom, he instantly knows it's your mom's dog that's gone missing?”

“Whahoobi!” said Briana. “Brilliant!”

“And don't forget, guys,” Riley continued, “Nick was there last Friday at the Pizza Palace, when Mongo first told Jake and me how much his mom spent on Noodle. Nick was eavesdropping. Fishing for a sitting duck.”

“Dude,” said Jamal, “now you're the one mixing metaphors.”

“Sorry. I do that sometimes when I get excited.”

“But, Riley,” said Jake, “how did the dog's collar end up at the flea market this morning? Is Nick somehow connected to Grandma Brown?”

“He has to be,” said Riley, pacing around the room. “He said something else that maybe he shouldn't have when we bumped into him on Main Street. He told us he had another job, doing ‘this and that.'”

“So maybe ‘this,'” said Briana, “is stealing dogs.”

“And ‘that,'” added Mongo, “is giving them to Gavin's grandmother!”

“Jamal? Briana?” said Riley. “Grab your backpacks. You two are coming with me. Mongo, Jake—hang tight.”

“Where you guys going?” asked Mongo.

“Where else? The Pizza Palace.”

AT 7:30 ON SATURDAY NIGHT,
Otto and Fred, the suburban bank robbers, were hungry.

The only food at the cheap motel where they were staying was hanging off pegs in a vending machine. Fig Newtons, Pop-Tarts, or microwavable popcorn. And there was no microwave in their room.

“You wanna go grab a pizza or something?” suggested Fred.

“Yeah. Let's head downtown. That place we saw near the bank.”

They drove their battered blue van the few blocks from the low-rent motel to Main Street.

Fairview being a sleepy suburban town, even on a
Saturday night, they had two dozen parking meters to pick from. Otto was chewing a fresh toothpick. Fred was cracking his “neck knuckles.” The two men climbed out of the van and breathed in the fresh, suburban air.

“Looks like they roll up the sidewalks pretty early in this burb,” said Otto, surveying the empty streets.

“Means we can get an early start Thursday night.”

Otto nodded. “Come on. I'm starving.”

They approached the glowing windows of the Pizza Palace. A sign dangling in the window said,
YES, WE'RE OPEN
.

Otto shoved open the door. Fred followed after him.

“Can we help you gentlemen?”

It was a police officer. He was sitting at a table in the center of the dining room, his butt cheeks sagging over the sides of his seat like saddlebags.

There was an old woman sitting to his left, her grouchy face circled by a red-checkered head scarf.

To Tubbo Cop's right was a pimply-faced geek with greasy black hair tucked up under a hairnet. The kid was wearing a tomato-sauce-splattered apron over his shabby white T-shirt.

“I said, can we help you gentlemen?” the cop repeated.

“Yeah,” said Otto. “Pepperoni, onions, and peppers. To go.”

“We're closed,” said Pimples, who appeared to be
seventeen, maybe eighteen.

“That so?” said Fred. “How come the sign in the window says Open?”

“Sign's wrong,” said the cop, standing up—bringing the chair with him the first six inches because it was sweat-glued to his butt. He pointed to the sauce-speckled schlub. “Nick closed early.”

Now the cop started squinting hard at Fred and Otto, like maybe he recognized their faces.

Like maybe he had seen some wanted posters circulated by cops back in the Buckeye State.

“Sorry to bother you, folks,” said Otto.

“We're not really hungry,” added Fred.

Then the two of them dashed out the door.

 

Chief Brown smiled as the two strangers hurried out of the pizza shop.

He still had
It.
The ability to boss ordinary bums around, to tell the weaklings of this world what they could do and when they could do it. If he were the one over in Afghanistan, instead of “heroic Colonel Mack,” that war would've been won in a week. But not everybody could go gallivanting around the world playing soldier. Somebody had to stay home and keep the economy humming.

“Lock the door,” he snapped at Nick.

“Yes, sir.”

“And take down that stupid sign!”

“All right,” said the sheriff's mother, reconvening their little meeting after the brief interruption, “we have ten thousand dollars from the banker.” She spit tobacco juice into a paper cup. “We're just about ready to get into the goldendoodle business!”

“Great,” said the chief, “because I checked out what Nick heard that idiot Mongo Montgomery say to his pals: every puppy Noodle cranks out will fetch us at least fifteen hundred bucks, most of it pure profit!”

“Don't get cocky, son. We still need to be careful. Play this thing smart. We ship puppies to out-of-state customers only. No local sales. We don't want a bunch of looky-loos nosing around my operation out at the farm.” She screwed down her tiny eyes. “Now then, we need to take the next step: we need to find Noodle a mate.”

“Hey,” said Nick, “maybe I should just go steal another goldendoodle, a boy this time.”

“No,” said Grandma Brown. “We want to breed what they call a backcross goldendoodle.”

“A what?” asked the chief.

“Offspring of a goldendoodle and a
poodle
. A backcross hybrid is even less likely to shed. Better for rich people whose kids have allergies. We can charge sixteen, maybe seventeen hundred per puppy. Then we screw 'em for another four hundred bucks on the
shipping, which costs us maybe fifty.”

“So, I need to steal a poodle?” said Nick.

“No.” Grandma Brown pulled out a crinkled clipping. “I want this one. Apricot.”

She showed the chief an ad for a very kingly-looking standard poodle, one of the big ones.

“How much?”

“He's a champion sire.”

“How much, Momma?”

“Whatever it takes! Relax, Johnny. We'll earn it all back. Apricot here will turn Noodle into the goose that lays us our solid gold eggs.”

AT A QUARTER TO EIGHT,
Riley, Briana, and Jamal rode their bikes down Main Street.

The darkened town was deserted.

“You guys?” said Riley. “Let's take the alley!”

He swung his bike hard to the right. Briana and Jamal followed.

“You think Nick's still in the Pizza Palace?” whispered Briana as they pedaled through the puddles pockmarking the gravel alleyway behind the brick walls and back doors of Main Street's shops.

“There's his delivery moped,” said Riley, pointing out a scooter with a pop-top cargo carrier mounted over the rear bumper. The moped was leaning up against
the Pizza Palace's big green Dumpster.

“Park here,” said Riley, bringing his bike to a skidding stop behind Fairview Fluff and Fold, the Laundromat next door to the Pizza Palace. Riley swung off his bicycle seat, slung his backpack off his shoulders, and toed open his kickstand. Briana and Jamal did the same.

“Now what?” asked Briana when the bikes were all tucked into the shadows.

“I'm not exactly sure,” said Riley.

“What?”

Riley gave her a playful wink. “You know me, Bree. I kind of make this stuff up as I go along.”

“You have what they call an impulsive or improvisational spirit,” said Jamal. “Am I right?”

“Yeah.”

“That's cool. I'm all about staying loosey-goosey.”

“Jamal?” said Briana.

“Yeah?”

“Do you ever not talk?”

“Not really. I suffer from what they call logorrhea, an excessive flow of words. Some call it diarrhea of the mouth.”

“Gross.”

“I don't like it either, but—”

“You guys?” Riley put a finger to his lips.

Crouching low, he slunk quietly up the alleyway. Briana and Jamal slunk after him. They made it to the
rear entrance of the Pizza Palace and pressed their backs up against the swirled stucco walls.

“Briana?”

“Yeah?”

“Go around front. Keep Nick busy. Order a pizza or something.”

“Excellent! And right before he slides the pie into the oven, I'll change my mind. ‘Oh, I'm sorry, I forgot. I'm a vegetarian! Can you take off the sausage I just ordered?' And when he does that, I'll say, ‘Wait. My brother
loves
sausage. Make it half veggie, half sausage!'”

“Works for me,” said Riley. “Go!”

Briana slipped sideways up the tight breezeway between the pizza place and the Laundromat.

“So, you figured out what we do next?” whispered Jamal. “If not, I got a couple ideas. One. We go inside and grab a couple slices. I'm starving. Two—”

“Jamal?” Riley's head bobbed toward the motor scooter. “Can you pop open that cargo box?”

“Is a pig pork?” said Jamal as he pulled a soft cloth wallet out of his back pocket. It held all sorts of slender metal tools that sort of looked like a combination of nail files and dental instruments. “C'mon. Let's go crack that sucker open.”

“What do you mean you're closed?” they heard
Briana declare much too loudly from up at the front entrance to the Pizza Palace. “Your advertisements clearly state that you are open until nine!” She was loudly enunciating every word so Riley and Jamal would know what was going on inside the building.

“Hurry,” said Riley as Jamal worked a metal pick with a squiggly head into the keyhole.

“You know,” said Jamal, jiggling the stainless steel tool, “this cargo carrier is big enough to hold a puppy.”

“I know,” said Riley. “Come on. Open it.”

“Hi, Nick!” they heard Briana shout from out on the sidewalk. “How are your parakeets? Is that a new T-shirt? Oh, I like the hairnet, too.”

The lid on the hard plastic trunk sprang open.

“What's that?” said Jamal.

Riley reached in and pulled out a rubber Halloween mask.

“Meet Emma's Martian,” he said, holding up a green alien face with two Ping-Pong-ball-sized eyes; a tall, wrinkled forehead; and stubs where his antennae had broken off.

Riley zipped open his backpack and found his miniature flashlight. He shone its beam around the inside of the hard-shelled carrier. The light glinted off a clump of shiny, curled hairs.

“Noodle's golden locks,” said Riley.

“You want to tag and bag the forensic evidence?” asked Jamal.

“No need. We know Nick did it. And this motor scooter? That's what made those puttering rocketship sounds Emma told me about.”

“Miss Bloomfield,” a voice boomed from the front of the Pizza Palace. “Where are your hippy-dippy parents?”

Riley, of course, recognized the voice. The blowhard. Police Chief Brown.

“At home, sir. Watching that movie about Woodstock. Again.”

“Go watch it with them. This restaurant is closed.”

“Yes, Chief Brown,” Briana chanted in a singsong voice meant to be heard a block away. “Sorry, Chief Brown. I was just hungry for pizza, Chief Brown. Say, who is that attractive elderly woman spitting into the paper cup?”


My
mother. Now go home before I call yours!”

Good work
, Riley thought. Briana had let him know Grandma Brown was in the house, further cementing the connection between Grandma, Nick, and the stolen dog.

Riley's eyes swept up and down the dark lane.

There was a boxy truck parked at the far end of the alleyway. As his eyes adjusted, Riley could read
Grandma's Antiques
painted in frilly letters over the cab.

He whipped out his cell phone. Speed-dialed Jake. Phone pressed to his ear with one hand, he grabbed his backpack with the other and sprinted toward the truck. Jamal was sprinting right beside him.

Jake picked up. “Riley?”

“Hey. If I turn on the GPS locator in a cell phone, can you track it?”

“Definitely. If I know the number and we spend a few bucks on one of the web-based tracking services, we can follow it wherever it goes.”

“Cool. Hang on. Jamal?”

“Yeah?”

“Come with me.”

They scooted around to the rear of the truck. The roll-down door was shut and secured with a combination lock.

“You want me to pop this lock, too?”

“Exactly.”

“So, tell me, Riley Mack: Is this some kind of initiation or something? If I pass, can I join your crew?”

“Just crack the lock, okay?”

“I got you. We're gonna steal back all the fifth-grade loot Grandma's been peddling in her tent, right?”

“No. I want to add something to her stash.”

“Add something?”

“Yeah.”

“You're whacked, you know that, Riley Mack?”

“Yeah. Come on. Hurry.”

Jamal grabbed hold of the combination lock and pulled down hard to tighten the hasp. Riley thumbed the controls on his cell. Turned off all the alerts. Activated the GPS.

“Can you do that any faster, Jamal?”

“Maybe. If I, you know, didn't have to answer so many questions while I was doing it.” Jamal clicked the dial clockwise. Felt it stick. Moved two numbers farther. Rotated the dial counterclockwise. Found the second sticking point. Now he clacked it clockwise until it hit the sweet spot.

The lock popped open.

“Ten seconds. New personal best. That fast enough for you, Riley Mack?”

“Yeah. Thanks. Help me shove this thing open.”

They maneuvered the rolling door up an inch or two.

“Wait,” said Riley. “Close it.”

“What? I thought we were opening it.”

“Close it and lock it!”

“I just unlocked it.”

“I know.”

“Oh, you're being all loosey-goosey again, aren't you?”

“No. I just realized that if I toss my cell phone into the back of Grandma's truck, she'll find it.”

“And sell it,” added Jamal.

Riley nodded. “Hang on, Jake.”

“I'm hanging.”

“Jamal, see if there's a good spot under the truck to stash a cell phone.”

The wiry little fifth grader slithered under the bumper. “We could put it on top of the muffler. Of course, it might bounce off. Be better if we had some duct tape or something to strap it down with.”

Riley pulled a roll of silver duct tape out of his backpack. Tapped Jamal on the knee with it. “Here you go.”

Jamal's hand found the tape. “You carry duct tape with you all the time, Riley Mack?”

“Yeah. There's nothing it can't do.” He put his phone to his ear. “Get ready, Jake.”

“Wait a second. What number do you want me to tail?”

“Mine.”

Riley handed his cell phone to Jamal, who quickly taped it on top of the muffler, then crawled out from underneath the truck.

“Let's go,” said Riley. They ran back to the moped and Dumpster, where Briana was anxiously waiting for them.

“Where were you guys?”

Riley smiled. “Up the alley.”

“Doing what?”

“Helping Grandma Brown lead us to wherever she hid Noodle.”

BOOK: Riley Mack and the Other Known Troublemakers
9.49Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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