Riley Mack and the Other Known Troublemakers

  Grandma Brown head-gestured left. “Gave Noodle a cage of her own. She gets the pink one. Apricot will move into the blue one next door.”

  There, on the ground, sitting underneath the closest puppy hutch, were two parakeet cages—the same ones they’d seen Nick carrying outside the pet supply store. The baby-blue birdcage was empty but, behind the pink bars, Riley could see a lump of muddy fur curled up in a terrified ball.

  Noodle.

  “Apricot weighs seventy pounds!” screamed the police chief. “He’s not going to fit in a birdcage!”

  “So, we’ll buy him a big crate!” his mother snapped back.

  Noodle’s parakeet prison had a chain looped through its thin wire bars. The chain was then wrapped around a four-by-four post and secured with a serious-looking lock.

  Riley lowered the binoculars and rolled onto his back. He touched his earpiece. “Jake?” he said in a hushed voice.

  “Yeah?”

  “Chief Brown’s cell number. We need it.”

  “On it.”

  “Briana?”

  She scooted closer.

  “I need to borrow your video camera.”

  Briana was the star reporter on FMS-TV, the middle school’s TV station, which was basically a bunch of kids who read the announcements every morning in a makeshift news studio set up in a corner of the library. She always carried a tiny Flip Video camera wherever she went.

  She dug it out of her backpack. “Here.”

  Riley took it. “Thanks. Now you’ve got to pull Chief Brown out of the scene.”

  “How?”

  “You got that cell number, Jake?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Briana—head back to the gate. Get the number from Jake. Call the chief. Tell him he won something. Make it food. The guy likes to eat.”

  “Cheese of the Month Club!” said Briana in an excited whisper.

  “Works for me,” Riley whispered back. “But your phone call keeps breaking up. Tell him he’s in a bad cell zone. Keep him moving. Toward the farmhouse, away from the cages.”

  “Gotcha.”

  “Go! Hurry!”

  Ducking low, Briana scampered back the way they had come in. Riley turned to the wiry fifth grader.

  “Jamal, you’re with me.”

  “Cool.”

  “Noodle is in a pink parakeet cage underneath the closest coop. The cage is chained to a four-by-four post—”

  “And there’s a lock involved, am I right?”

  Riley nodded. “I can’t tell if it’s a combination lock or a key.”

  “Either way, I’m popping it! But you know, Riley, locks aren’t all I do. Say you needed to rig up a…”

  They heard a hose snick-snick-snick to life. Jets of water needled against the aluminum sides of the shed.

  The chief’s cell phone rang.

  “Hello? I won what? You’re breaking up. Hold on. Can you hear me now? What if I move over here?”

  The chief’s voice faded in the distance.

  “Stay low, stay quiet,” Riley said to Jamal. “Stay in the shadows till the lights go out.”

  “How’s that gonna happen?”

  “I’m pretty sure Grandma’s going to have an electrical accident in about two minutes.”

  “Cool. I’m down with that.”

  “When the lights go dark, unlock Noodle’s cage, grab it, and haul your butt out of here. Meet up with Briana and head for the car.”

  “Where you gonna be, Riley Mack?”

  “Busy.”

  “Doing what, man?”

  “Well, first, I need to shoot some video. Then, I need to take out those lights.”

  26

  ABOUT 150 MILES TO THE south, Chip Weitzel found a quiet corner and placed his telephone call.

  “Hello?”

  “Maddie?” Cough, cough. “Chip Weitzel.” Cough, cough.

  “You don’t sound so good,” said Mrs. Mack.

  “Yeah. I know.” Cough. Cough. “Sorry to be calling you this late on a Sunday night, but I’m gonna need to take a sick day tomorrow.”

  “I’m sorry you’re not feeling well.”

  “Thanks. I think it’s just a bug. One of those twenty-four-hour deals. Should be fine by Tuesday.”

  Or sooner, he thought, if my luck changes!

  “Is there anything I can do to help? Do you need any medicines picked up at the drugstore? Chicken soup?”

  “No. I’ve got everything I need here. Thanks. But tomorrow morning, I need you to fill in for me at the bank.”

  “Oh-kay,” Mrs. Mack said hesitantly.

  “Don’t worry. It’s not much extra work. Just need you to open up at eight. Turn on the lights.”

  “Well, I think I can do that.” She sounded relieved.

  “Of course, you’ll need to go in the back door.”

  “Oh. Okay.”

  “And you’ll need the security code. Do you have a pen and a piece of paper?”

  “Hang on.”

  He gave her a second. Glanced over to the flashing lights of the casino floor.

  “All right,” said Mrs. Mack. “I’m all set.”

  “Good. Write this down, memorize the code, and then eat the paper.”

  Silence on the other end of the line.

  “That was a joke, Maddie.”

  “Oh.”

  “You really don’t have to eat it. Just destroy it.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Okay, here we go: two-two-two, three-three-three, four-four-four. Got it?”

  “Two-two-two, three-three-three, four-four-four.”

  Sure, it was a simple code, but Chuck Weitzel was a busy man; he didn’t have time to memorize a complex string of numbers.

  “And Maddie? I’d appreciate it if I wasn’t disturbed tomorrow. Need to get my rest.”

  “We won’t bother you. I promise.”

  “Thanks. My apologies again for calling so late. I know it’s a school night. Riley’s probably already asleep, huh?”

  “Actually, he’s off on a field trip with some friends. They’re working on an astronomy project.”

  “Good for him. Well, I better crawl into bed.”

  “Feel better.”

  “Thanks.” Cough. Cough. “I’ll try.”

  Weitzel powered off his phone.

  It would take a miracle for him to feel better.

  For the first time since he launched his Casino Based Investment Strategy, he was down. Losing. Having one of those cold streaks all the gamblers who weren’t savvy bankers constantly whined about.

  And it was all on account of that greedy police chief!

  After he had given John Brown the ten-thousand-dollar “small business loan” out of his personal funds, the money stored in his secret safe had shrunk from fifty to forty thousand dollars—a very unhealthy 20 percent dip.

  So, Sunday morning, he had grabbed the remaining money, stuffed it all into a briefcase, and brought it three hours south to Atlantic City, New Jersey. It wasn’t Vegas, but it was closer and had roulette wheels just like they had out in Nevada.

  Only, for some reason, the New Jersey roulette wheels didn’t spin the same way as the ones out in Vegas.

  Instead of winning, Chip kept losing.

  In fact, he was down to his last one thousand dollars.

  Fortunately, the forty thousand dollars came out of his profits column; it wasn’t the bank’s money. If he lost a little before this Jersey jaunt was done, the head office wouldn’t launch a full-scale embezzlement investigation.

  But, losing so much of his own money so rapidly made him feel queasy, like falling down an elevator shaft on a bungee cord. It’s why he needed the sick day.

  He needed to stay in Atlantic City until he once again had fifty thousand dollars to stow in his desk safe, because Monopoly was no fun if someone came along and took away all your money!

  “One hundred on red!” he said, sliding a chip across the felt. If the little silver ball landed in any red-colored nu
mber slot, one hundred dollars would turn into two hundred dollars and slowly, but surely, he would begin rebuilding his fortune.

  The dealer sent the wheel and ball spinning.

  Round and round and round they went.

  Until the ball bounced and hopped and skipped and landed in the eleven slot.

  “Eleven wins, odd wins, black wins,” announced the dealer, raking Chip’s chip away.

  Chuck Weitzel hated Atlantic City. He hated the whole state of New Jersey. He hated the color red, the number eleven, and the dealer’s stupid bow tie because it was red, too!

  He was down to his last nine hundred dollars.

  He would definitely need a sick day tomorrow.

  Because he was feeling ill. Very, very ill.

  27

  GRANDMA BROWN WAS TUGGING ON the garden hose, pulling it behind her up the muddy path between the dog kennels.

  “Quit gawking at me!” she hollered at a trembling beagle puppy with frightened eyes. “Or you don’t get any water!”

  Riley put down the binoculars, hopped up over the fallen tree, and dashed as quickly and quietly as he could toward the closest dog coops. He flicked on Briana’s Flip camera and checked the viewfinder. The digital video recorder was capturing everything: the skeleton-skinny older dogs, the trembling puppies crowded into cramped cages, the extremely unsanitary filth heaped up in the mud below.

  Poor Jamal. Unfortunately, he’d have to kneel in the sloppy dog dung to crack open the lock on Noodle’s chain. They’d definitely have to make him an official member of the Gnat Pack after heroic service like that.

  As planned, Jamal left his hiding place exactly one minute after Riley. He was now creeping stealthily toward his target.

  Satisfied that he had all the video he needed to prove that what the Browns were doing was wrong, Riley stuffed the slim video camera into his back pocket and headed for the shed.

  Luck was on their side: Chief Brown, intent on winning his Cheese of the Month Club contest, had taken his cell phone for a stroll to some point far, far away.

  And Grandma Brown was currently watering the dogs in the far dog hutch, her back turned to the cages where Noodle was chained.

  Riley picked up his pace. Trotted toward the shed.

  “Oh, you want some of this?” he heard Grandma Brown cackle behind him. “Ha! Here you go! Hehe-hee!” Riley had to glance over his shoulder to see what the old woman found so funny.

  She had her hose nozzle aimed like a pistol at a small French bulldog, its black fur flecked with white. She pulled the trigger and blasted the dog smack on its snout with a gusher that slammed the dog back into the web of chicken wire at the rear of its cage.

  The bulldog whimpered. Grandma Brown laughed and laughed, louder and loonier. Then she spit tobacco juice into the crate.

  It was time to shut the lights down.

  Riley darted behind the post supporting the circuit breaker box. Flipping down his night vision goggles to hide his face, he tried to imitate the high-pitched voice Briana had used when playing Rebecca Drake.

  “Hey, lady! Yoo-hoo!”

  Startled, Grandma Brown whipped around, her hand still clamped tightly on the nozzle.

  “Over here!”

  Grandma raised the metal spray gun, aiming to douse Riley like she’d just doused the dog.

  Riley leaped sideways, took cover behind the elevated circuit breaker box. Grandma fired a straight stream of water that shot across the kennel yard and hit the bull’s-eye: the exposed wiring in the wide-open electrical panel.

  Sparks flew. Fireworks erupted. The air smelled like a short-circuiting toaster on top of a pyramid of burning tires.

  Then something happened that Riley hadn’t planned.

  Water being an excellent conductor of electricity, some serious voltage surged upstream to the metal nozzle (metal being another excellent conductor of electricity) and jolted Grandma Brown so hard she zizzed into a seizure—legs thrashing, arms twitching, eyes nearly popping out of her skull—until she finally let go of the hose and toppled, face-first, into the muck.

  Oops.

  The lights went out.

  Somewhere in the distance, Riley heard an explosion and a popping shower of sizzling sparks.

  Guess they shorted out the transformer down on the main road, too.

  Riley ran over to Grandma Brown to make certain he hadn’t accidentally punched out her lights when he knocked out the ones overhead. He raised her wrinkled wrist to feel her pulse. She was unconscious but alive. He tossed her limp arm to the side, where it splatted into a fresh pile of dog poop, courtesy, Riley hoped, of the French bulldog she had just sprayed in the schnozzle.

  “Jamal?” Riley called out in an urgent whisper.

  “I got Noodle, man.”

  Riley whipped to his right. It was pitch dark but, thanks to his dad’s night vision goggles, he could see Jamal huddled under the dog coop, hugging the birdcage.

  “Let’s go!”

  “I can’t see diddly.”

  Riley grabbed him by the elbow. “I’ve got you. Come on.”

  They started running toward the tree line, Riley guiding Jamal around rocks and brambles and bushes.

  Behind him, Riley could hear five dozen yelping dogs, begging him to come back and rescue them, too.

  “Don’t worry,” Riley muttered under his breath. “I won’t forget you.”

  “You better not,” said Jamal, who thought Riley was talking to him. “I’m running blind here! Coming in on a wing and a prayer!”

  They made it to the dirt road and trotted down to the gate.

  Briana was waiting for them at the hole in the fence.

  “You got Noodle! Fabtastic!”

  “Yeah,” said Jamal, cradling the puppy’s cage in his arms. “I had Riley run what we call a diversionary tactic. He distracted the old biddy in the combat boots while I did what needed to be done with the locks and chains and various technical issues.”

  “I heard an explosion,” said Briana as Jamal passed her the birdcage so he could slip through the fence.

  “They had a small electrical problem,” said Riley, climbing through the hole after Jamal.

  “You got her?” came a happy voice over their earpieces. “You guys rescued Noodle?”

  “Yeah, Mongo,” said Riley. “Jamal and Briana were awesome!”

  “Woo-hoo!” Mongo shouted so loudly into his phone, he nearly pierced everybody’s eardrums on the other end.

  “We’ll swing by your house in fifteen,” said Riley.

  “I’ll meet you guys there!”

  “We should take Noodle out of that birdcage, man,” said Jamal. “She looks miserable.”

  “Because she is,” cooed Briana, swinging open the tiny door. “Come here, liddle Noodle doodle oodle-baboodle.” Baby talk. Another voice Briana had down cold.

  Jamal kicked the empty wire birdcage off into the underbrush.

  “Jake?” said Riley. “You still on the line?”

  “Yeah, Ri?”

  “Good work tonight, bro. You were awesome. See you at school tomorrow.”

  Riley took the Bluetooth device out of his ear and walked up the rutted dirt road with Jamal and Briana, who now had Noodle cuddling in her arms. The happy puppy wouldn’t stop slurping its tongue across her face.

  “So, what do we tell my mom?” Briana asked between giggles.

  “That our friend’s lost dog just happened to be running around in the exact same field we picked for stargazing,” said Riley.

  “Cool. She’ll call it kismet. You know what that word means, Jamal? Kismet?”

  “No. But I tell you what, Briana Bloomfield: I know how to look it up! It starts with a K, am I right?”

  When they all laughed, Noodle barked.

  It was the first happy bark any of them had heard all night.

  28

  AT EIGHT A.M. ON MONDAY morning, Otto and Fred, the suburban bank robbers, were sitting behind the tinted windows of their dark-blue van, eat
ing doughnuts and sipping coffee, which was especially difficult for Fred because he had a pair of binoculars glued to his eyes. He kept dribbling mocha-colored drool down the front of his black poplin jacket.

  “Not for nothing,” said Otto, “but I’m wondering if maybe you should wait on breakfast until after we complete our morning surveillance?”

  “Shhh! Here comes somebody.”

  “The bank manager?”

  “No. It’s a woman. If memory serves, she’s one of the tellers. The redhead.”

  “Ah, yes,” said Otto. “Window three, I believe.”

  “You ready for the magic numbers?”

  Otto flipped open a tiny spiral notebook. Licked the lead in his stubby pencil. “Fire when ready.”

  “Two-two-two,” said Fred. “Three-three-three. Four-four-four. She’s pushing open the rear door.”

  “That’s it? Two-two-two, three-three-three, four-four-four? You’re sure?”

  “Positive.” Fred lowered the binoculars. “And, since I didn’t see her insert no key into no keyhole, we can assume the code not only disarms the burglar alarm, it also unlocks the back door.”

  “Fred?”

  “Yes, Otto?”

  “This is the lamest security code I have ever seen. It’s like Mr. Weitzel, the bank manager, isn’t even trying!”

  “I concur. Also, the fact that the same code, lame as it is, unlocks the back door seems to indicate Mr. Weitzel takes a very lax attitude toward all security measures.”

  “Which should make our job on Thursday night even easier.”

  “Just so long as there ain’t no guard dogs,” said Fred with a quivering shiver.

  “Relax, Fred. Somebody so lazy they make two-two-two, three-three-three, four-four-four their entry code is gonna be too lazy to even think about hiring guard dogs!”

  That same Monday morning at Fairview High School, Gavin Brown was wandering the hallways, searching for the girl of his dreams.

  Rebecca Drake!

  The perky blond cheerleader. The girl who said she loved Gavin’s ripped-sleeve look, which was why he had worn another sleeveless shirt to school. Sure, it made things a little chilly around the armpit hairs and gave everybody a good whiff of his BO, but Gavin didn’t care. He was in love.