Gabriel’s mom waved him over and handed him a hotdog. “Here you go, bud.” She tilted her head and furrowed her brow when he didn’t snatch it right away. She placed a hand on his shoulder. “You okay, honey?”
Gabriel nodded and took the hotdog that his mom had plastered with ketchup just the way he liked. He gulped down a bite and mumbled, “Yep. I’m fine.”
Actually, he’d been trying to find Tahlita in the crowd—but he didn’t want to tell his mom that. It’s not that she wouldn’t understand if she found out who Tahlita really was—his mom had been in Valta herself. But she’d been through enough already. She had been turned into a freaking gruock for Pete’s sake. The last thing he needed to do was make her worry. No. Gabriel and his friends would figure this mess out themselves.
He ran a hand over his chest feeling for the necklace tucked under his shirt—the one that Empress Malina had given him when they left Valta. The emblem allowed for a one-time contact with the empress. He’d been holding out on using it because he and his friends thought they should reunite Tahlita and Dane first. Who knew if the portal could only be opened a few hours once they contacted her? They couldn’t risk it. They needed time to get Dane and Tahlita together. Then they could contact the empress about opening a portal to send them back home.
Gabriel realized there was a chance the other portal Tahlita had come through could still be open, but they didn’t know where that one was. And if Tahlita was faking her amnesia, she wasn’t coughing that info up. But now he had proof. Proof she was something other than human. She couldn’t deny that what she’d done in the cafeteria wasn’t normal for humans.
Just then, Gabriel spotted her. She was sitting in the shade under a big willow tree, reading a book. Gabriel’s eyes widened. His dog, Zigzag was spread out at Tahlita’s side while she stroked the boxer’s back. Who knew Tahlita liked dogs? He tried catching Brent and Piper’s attention for backup, but Brent was busy eating and talking with a bunch of boys, and Piper twirled around, dancing. Gabriel sighed. He’d have to try for a breakthrough on his own this time.
“Hey, Tahlita,” he said, trudging up beside her. He plunked down on the grass beside Zigzag while Tahlita ignored him. “You’re a traitor, Ziggy,” he whispered to his dog, nudging her with a smirk. Zigzag sighed and rolled over looking for a belly scratch. Gabriel laughed and complied. “Whatcha reading, Tahlita?” he asked.
Tahlita grumbled and closed the book. “I was reading a story about an annoying boy who won’t leave a girl alone.” She smirked. “It was getting to a really good part where the girl was about to whack him on the head, and then you interrupted.”
“And the boy’s name was Gabriel. Got it. You’re funny.” Gabriel tugged aimlessly at some grass between his legs. “Look … ” He kept his eyes locked on the ground. “I, um, wanted to say thanks for helping me and Brent out yesterday. That was cool of you and um—magical.” He swallowed and peeked at Tahlita from the corner of his eye.
“You’re welcome. Now will you leave me alone?”
He sat straight up and widened his eyes. “So you admit you’re the fruit bandit?”
Tahlita lifted an indifferent shoulder. “I guess so.”
Gabriel twisted around on the grass and faced her. “You guess so? Did you just say that? Because, you know people from Earth can’t, like, just make fruit dangle in the air and fling it around without touching it, right?”
Tahlita’s eyes grew stormy. “What is it with you? Look, I don’t know how I did that. I admit it was kind of strange. That hasn’t happened to me before, but I don’t want to talk about it. Don’t you get it?” Tahlita’s cheeks flushed red. “I don’t remember anything from my past. I don’t want to remember anything either. I told you, if my parents hate me so much that they dumped me in Harmony and left me for dead, then I don’t want to remember them!”
Gabriel thought he saw tears spring to Tahlita’s eyes. She genuinely looked sad. The last thing he wanted was to make the girl feel like that. Nobody wants to feel abandoned. Gabriel knew what that felt like because he had once thought the same thing about his own mother.
“Listen. I’m sorry,” Gabriel said. “But your dad does want you. I promise he’s been looking for you.”
Tahlita stood and folded her arms across her chest. “My dad, huh? That guy Dane you mentioned from this other part of the universe you talk about? Valta?” She raised a disbelieving eyebrow and snickered. “Right. I guess that would make me an alien.” She stuck her face an inch in front of Gabriel’s. “Boo!”
Gabriel reached for his necklace, ready to pull it out and show her. His heart pounded. He wanted her to believe him so bad—needed her to. But before he could tug the Valtan emblem out, Tahlita snatched up her book and stormed off to the other side of the street to the safety of her home.
Gabriel sunk his hands in his jeans pockets as he watched her escape.
The city of Harmony …
If they couldn’t get any information out of Cedric or Tahlita, he and his friends would have to head into the city and start searching for Dane there. If that’s where Tahlita ended up, then maybe that’s where Dane was too.
Except, one of the biggest cities in the country was nothing like its name, ‘Harmony,’ implied. Harmony was anything but harmonious.
It was … dangerous.
CHAPTER FOUR
The wheels on the bus rumbled to life as they spun against the pavement and started their two-hour drive to Harmony. Puffs of black smoke billowed up and trailed behind them into the safety of their hometown of Willow Creek.
Piper sat grumbling in the back seat. It had taken Gabriel and Brent hours the night before to convince her they needed to go to Harmony.
“Harmony is the biggest city in, like, the whole world,” she had said. “With the highest crime rate.”
Gabriel wasn’t sure of those stats, but reminded her that even though they’d never been to Harmony alone before, they’d already been to another realm. If they could handle that, they could handle anything. Then when Brent told her it could be much worse if Dane shape-shifted into some sort of monster when he couldn’t find his daughter, Piper paled, and finally agreed. The next morning they told their parents they were going to each other’s houses and raced off.
The farther the bus drove, the fewer trees filled the skyline, replaced more and more by towering brick buildings coated in a thick veil of smog.
When they arrived and jumped out onto the sidewalk, Gabriel couldn’t decide which place was scarier: Valta when it had been dying, or Harmony at its finest.
Sirens wailed all around them, taxi cabs and speeding cars zoomed past, dusting them with a thin layer of grime, and homeless people waited on every corner begging for money. One guy tromped by, hands sunk into his tattered pockets, and scowled at them from behind his black hooded sweatshirt. His eyes looked like two black bugs shoved deep into hollow sockets.
Piper pulled at her ponytail, dragged a strand of her black hair around to her face, and chewed on it. “What now?” she mumbled, inching closer to Brent.
Gabriel wasn’t sure. He looked around the bustling city wondering where to begin searching for a man like Dane. Seriously, Dane was a Zeveron from another world with who knows what kind of power. He had been on the evil Duke Malgor’s council, but he also helped Gabriel and his friends escape from the dungeon that Malgor had locked them in. Dane was … complicated. He could be anywhere. And Gabriel definitely didn’t want to admit to Piper that he didn’t really have a plan to find him.
Piper’s question sat there a moment, then Brent pointed to an ice cream shop behind them. “How about we get some food and figure it out?”
Gabriel’s gaze followed Brent’s pointer finger. The sign in the shop’s window had a picture of an ice cream float complete with whipped cream, a cherry, and a red and white straw, all for $1.99.
Gabriel shrugged. He wasn’t gonna be the one to turn down ice cream. “Sure,” Gabriel said, thankful for the diversion and extra
time to think. Leave it to Brent’s appetite to pull through and help him out.
The old lady behind the counter whipped them up three floats in minutes while they settled into the stools facing her. Brent plunked down on the middle seat and began spinning side to side in obvious anticipation.
The woman, whose white uniform held a silver nameplate with the name Madge, set down the three floats in front of them. Brent handed her the money while slurping loudly through his straw. The frosty drinks didn’t look nearly as good as the one in the picture, but Gabriel thought his still tasted pretty good.
Madge slid the money into the cash register, then eyed the three of them like they were two tacos short of a combo plate. She tucked the rim of her hair netting back under her white hat. “You kids live around here?”
“Nope, just hanging out,” Brent said.
“Hanging out?” Madge quirked a brow. “Are you with your parents?”
“No—” Brent started to say. Piper kicked his shin, making him jolt and spill some soda. “Hey,” Brent protested. When Piper gave him a steely glare, he caught on and smiled at Madge. “Ya know what they say about soda and kids right?” Brent plastered an innocent looking grin across his face. “Makes us hyper!” He laughed and spun his stool around in a full circle for effect. “Oh, and sorry about the mess,” he added when he stopped spinning.
Piper cleared her throat. “Our parents are across the street picking up some, um … ” She twisted around and looked out the window. She pointed at the hardware store across the street and whirled back around. “Tools,” she told Madge.
“Tools, huh?” Madge grabbed a damp cloth and started wiping down the countertop. “Well, you kids better be careful.” She raised both eyebrows. “Whether you’re with your parents or not.” The look on her face told Gabriel she didn’t believe there were any parents involved. “There’s a man on the loose that’s been harassing young, dark-haired girls.” She stopped and set her stare on Piper. “Dark-haired girls about your age, dear.”
Piper’s glass shook in her hand. She gripped it tighter and sipped soda, looking grim.
After a moment, Brent spoke up. “Dark-haired girls only?” he asked Madge. “And only about our age?” Madge pulled a poster from a drawer and slid it across the counter toward them.
A wanted poster with a man’s picture spread out in front of them. There was no mistaking the dark-haired man wearing black-rimmed bifocals that made his eyes appear to pop off the page.
Dane.
***
After scooping up the wanted poster, thanking Madge for the advice and sodas, they headed out. According to the poster, Dane had been spotted at Harmony Zoo, toy stores, and was last seen near Trinity Park. Gabriel figured it made sense that Dane would scope out places where kids their age hung out.
After doing a sweep of Trinity Park and checking out a couple of games arcades in the area without luck, they decided to go to Harmony Zoo. Then, according to the map Gabriel picked up from a street vendor, they figured they could check a couple more toy stores close by before they’d have to catch the bus home.
By the time they got to the zoo, they’d already spent a few hours searching and it seemed pretty hopeless. Gabriel was running out of ideas. And from the look on Piper’s face as the attendant scanned their zoo tickets, she was running out of patience. Not to mention it was getting close to dinner time and Brent was eyeing the ice cream cart. Worse, they had no money left.
Crowds of people lined up for camel rides, petting the stingrays, and a tour of the park on the train, otherwise known as the Zoo Mobile. Sounds of chatter and squeals of crying babies being pushed in strollers by their doting parents filled the air. At least the zoo didn’t seem as creepy as the city streets did.
Gabriel suggested the Zoo Mobile was the quickest way to go, so they headed for the green and white tram.
“This is pretty cool and everything,” Brent said, as the Zoo Mobile pulled away. “But I had to use all the money I saved just for admission, and I’m starving.”
“Me too,” Gabriel said. “We’ll leave soon, man.”
Piper stared at the white rhino whose horn shone in the sunlight as they rolled by. “What if we head to the butterfly pavilion first?” she suggested. “Seems like the perfect place a stalker might go to look for a girl.”
“Yeah, but Tahlita isn’t your typical girl,” Gabriel said, remembering the alfalfa sprouts and flying fruit.
“True,” Piper replied with a laugh. “She’d probably want to check out the tarantulas or something.”
“Or the Komodo dragons,” Brent added.
Gabriel checked his watch before hopping off the tram near the gorilla enclosure. “C’mon, we’re running out of time. Let’s look in here and then we can go check out the spiders and bats or something.”
Piper rolled her eyes. “Sounds enticing.”
As Brent climbed out of the tram, he knocked into a woman pushing a large-wheeled stroller.
“Hey!” she said in a high-pitched voice while fixing her curly blond hair. She gripped the handle of the stroller with her white-gloved hand. You’d swear she thought Brent would steal her baby or something.
“Sorry,” Brent replied as he sidestepped the baby carriage and caught up with Gabriel and Piper.
“You need glasses?” Gabriel kidded to Brent, remembering the incident in the cafeteria. “That’s two collisions you’ve had lately, dude.”
Brent gave Gabriel a playful shove while Piper squealed something about a new baby gorilla and dashed through the door to the gorilla pavilion.
Before following her, Gabriel read the sign outside the double doors announcing a new addition to the gorilla troop that Piper must have read. It was complete with a picture of a mother gorilla holding her baby, Hershey.
A wave of humidity hit Gabriel as he and Brent entered. The temperature in the room could thaw out a frozen meat patty, never mind what the smell could do. On either side of the wide aisle, thick panes of safety glass separated the gorillas from the people.
Brent yanked off his jacket as they weaved through the thick crowd. “It’s hotter than a sauna filled with smelly old men in here.”
A family of about ten traipsed past them, all wearing the same bright orange t-shirts, heads bobbing slowly left to right as they took in the scenes.
“Look,” Brent whispered with a chuckle. “We’re locked behind a wall of zombies dressed like pumpkins.”
Gabriel was too busy searching for Piper to even laugh. He looked around, but couldn’t see her anywhere. “Do you see Piper?” Gabriel asked, jumping up and down and trying to see over the crowd in front of him.
“I’d say she’s baby monkey searching,” Brent said as the last pumpkin tottered by.
“It’s a gorilla, not a monkey.” Gabriel brushed past a man holding his toddler’s hand. “And we can’t lose Piper in here, come on!”
Gabriel and Brent snaked their way through the crowd until they reached the baby gorilla. It was impossible to get near the safety glass to know for sure, but with the murmuring oohs and ahhs in the area, they were pretty positive they were in the right spot.
Except Piper wasn’t there.
“You check the other side of the glass,” Gabriel said, before worming through a throng of people fighting for prime real estate in front of the window. His heart pumped wildly as he made his way to the front, bumping against elbows, backs, and meeting groans of protest.
Their near-impossible mission of finding Dane had quickly turned into a search for Piper. Back pressed against the safety glass, Gabriel twisted his head left to right at the smiling faces looking past him at the gorillas.
No sign of Piper.
Gabriel pounded his fist against the barrier. Hoping Brent had found her instead, he squeezed back out from the crowd, resigned to tell Brent that Piper wasn’t looking at baby Hershey. His eyes locked on Brent, and Gabriel came to a dead stop. Brent’s face had paled and sweat rolled down the sides of his face. He barrelled
toward Gabriel, knocking people out of the way like bowling pins.
Alarm rang through Gabriel’s veins as his gaze dropped to Brent’s hand.
Piper’s purple backpack dangled between Brent’s fingers.
“Dude, her backpack was on the ground!” Brent yelled. “And she’s gone!”
Panic shot through Gabriel. “Show me where her backpack was!” Gabriel tugged Brent’s arm forward. “Maybe she just dropped it,” Gabriel said, trying to sound calmer than his imploding heart screamed.
They hurried toward the far exit when Gabriel saw the back of a girl’s head that looked familiar. Her black hair was pulled into a long ponytail just like Piper’s. His eyes trailed down to the girl’s turquoise jacket—Piper’s jacket. It was Piper! Except she seemed to be talking to someone they couldn’t see. Someone who stood behind a vending machine.
A white-gloved hand suddenly reached out and yanked Piper behind the machine.
Brent clenched his fists and made a rumbling sound in his chest. They both lunged forward. Gabriel’s legs couldn’t move fast enough.
“Leave her alone!” Brent yelled as he approached the vending machine, his cheeks flaming as red as pizza sauce. When Brent got closer, he staggered back a step. “Whoa!”
Gabriel sprang beside Brent, gasping for breath. Gabriel blinked. Blinked again.
An empty stroller lay beside Piper and the woman she was talking to. Gabriel recognized the woman as the one Brent had bumped into when he’d gotten off the Zoo Mobile.
Except this time her blond hair was twisted, lopsided, and in disarray. Dark strands of hair sprung out from beneath the blond. Gabriel suddenly realized the blond hair was actually a wig. Even weirder, her glasses made her eyes bulge. Then it hit Gabriel. She wasn’t a she at all.
It was Dane in disguise!
CHAPTER FIVE
“Dane?” Gabriel shrieked. “Is that really you?” He pressed a hand against the vending machine to steady his legs.
Gabriel Stone and the Wrath of the Solarians Page 2