Dad offers to make tacos for lunch. His tacos are always delicious with his special seasoning and juicy organic tomatoes. I leave Honey curled in her cushioned cat bed in my room.
“You stay right there and don’t get into any trouble.” I wag my finger at her.
She blinks her golden eyes innocently, as if to say, “Cause trouble? Me?”
“Yes, you,” I say firmly.
I don’t know how she got into my sister’s room, but I have to make sure she doesn’t do it again. I can’t lose Honey after waiting so long to bring her home. She was one of three kittens Becca, Leo, and I rescued from a dumpster. At first we secretly cared for them in the Skunk Shack, our CCSC clubhouse, until Leo was allowed to take his kitten home. Then Becca brought her kitten and mine to live in her house. Stuck in an apartment that didn’t allow pets, I didn’t think I’d ever get to keep Honey and would only be able to visit her after school and on weekends. Then Dad got a job, and it came with a house big enough for my large family, our energetic dog, Handsome, and my sweet kitten. Now every night I fall asleep to Honey’s purring lullaby.
I am not giving her up.
Shutting my door firmly, I hurry downstairs to join my family around the dining table. I plop a crispy taco on a plate and take a big bite. Spicy tomato juice dribbles down my chin and I lick it off. Yum.
When my brother reaches for his third (or fourth) taco, Dad grins. “As the chef, I take that as a compliment. But don’t stuff yourself. We have an important dinner tonight.” Dad winks, as if we need reminding despite him telling us a zillion times about our dinner invitation to Bragg Castle.
It’s not really a historical castle but it sure looks formidable with massive stone walls and turrets spiraling to the sky. It’s just past a grove of trees beyond our new home. I can’t wait to see inside the castle. But I’m kind of nervous too, because King Bragg is famous and I won’t know what to say to him. I’m better at listening than talking.
I’ll ask Becca for advice. Her CCSC title is Social Contact Operative, and she can talk to anyone. Sometimes I think she can talk to animals too, or at least understand what they’re saying since she helps her mom run their animal sanctuary. When I called her earlier, she was getting ready to give a bear a bubble bath. Yeah, a real bear.
Becca and Leo, our club’s Covert Technology Strategist, will be here in an hour to see my new home. When Dad first told us we were moving into a cottage, I expected something small and cozy like out of a fairytale. But a five-bedroom house is a cottage to the King of Resorts when compared to his castle. I wonder if there will be suits of armor propped up like guards, secret passages, or a dungeon. Exploring a dungeon would be cool.
After lunch, I head up to my room to check on Honey. The door is shut just like I left it. As I step inside, I say, “Honey, I’m back.”
She doesn’t romp over to rub my ankles or meow to be picked up. And when I look at her kitty bed, only a catnip toy and fuzzy red blanket are there.
My cat is gone.
- Chapter 3 -
Cat-Napped
Honey has to be in my bedroom somewhere. I look beneath my bed. Nope. I check behind my desk. Nope. The closet is open a crack, but when I search inside, still no cat. Impossible! She couldn’t turn a door knob or lift a latched window. Could someone have taken her?
Suspect #1: Kiana. Motive: Revenge for her ruined homework.
Is she trying to get my cat in trouble so I can’t keep her?
She is not getting away with it!
I start for my sister’s room but as I pass my window I catch a flicker of movement outside and see orange. To be exact, the soft orange shade of Honey.
How did my cat get outside?
I practically fly down the stairs, the front door banging behind me. Honey is crouched in the grass, stalking an unsuspecting leaf. She loves to pounce on leaves like they’re birds or mice. It’s funny to watch her strut around with a leaf in her mouth, like a trophy she’s showing off.
But nothing about my escapee-cat is funny now.
“Bad kitty,” I say as I scoop her up in my arms. She mews and her leaf floats to the grass. “How did you get out here?”
She licks my arm and I giggle because it tickles. She’s so soft and sweet, and I’m just relieved she’s safe. I run my fingers through her orange fur, my anger melting away.
A fanged monster with a spiked tail? I smile. What was my sister thinking?
Honey squirms in my arms. I follow her gaze to the enormous tree that towers over the front yard. It’s so huge it eclipses the house and it’s so dense I can’t see through the leafy branches. A good climbing tree, I decide. I’ve had a lot of experience climbing trees, especially on CCSC stakeouts. A shady tree with sturdy branches can be a spy’s best friend.
I carry Honey to the porch swing and she settles comfortably on my lap. The swing squeaks as I rock back and forth. I scratch Honey in her favorite spot just below her chin and she purrs loudly. “No more escaping, you little Houdini. You have to be good.”
She looks at me with big golden eyes as if to say, “How could I be anything but perfect?” I just laugh.
When I hear a humming motor, I look up and see Leo zooming toward me on the homemade robotic skateboard he calls a gyro-board.
“What are you doing here so early?” I ask as he rolls to a stop, gravel spitting from his wheels.
“Should I leave?” Leo asks with an uneasy frown.
“Of course not.” I gesture for him to come up to the porch. “Let’s wait here for Becca so I can give you both a tour together. She won’t be here for a while.”
“Twenty-two minutes, if she’s punctual.” Leo hops off his gyro-board and flips it up to balance on one end. “To be honest, I came early on purpose.”
“Oh?” I raise my brows.
“I thought we could…you and I, or is it you and me?…could talk.”
He sounds more awkward than usual. My spy senses flash alert and I study Leo. He looks normal enough in dark slacks and a vest over a white shirt. But he seems nervous, shifting his feet and twisting the gyro-board remote in his hand. He’s not meeting my gaze either. He’s looking down at my feet as if my sneakers are encoded with a secret message.
“Talk about what?” I ask in an encouraging tone.
“It’s nothing…I mean…uh…just a question…” He looks away from me.
“About what?”
“Nothing really…I mean…umm…”
Stammering from precise Leo? Something is definitely up.
“Want to sit down?” Smiling, I pat a spot on the swing.
“Next to you?”
“I don’t bite, although Honey might,” I tease.
Fair-skinned Leo blushes like his face is on fire. As a collector of secrets, I can tell Leo is working up the courage to confide in me. Does it have to do with his new drone project? Yesterday he hinted that his new project will be both “huge and minuscule”—whatever that means.
As I scoot over to make room for Leo, Honey suddenly leaps off my lap and scurries over to the huge oak. She crouches by the trunk, her gaze sharp like a predator at something gray that disappears into leafy branches. Probably a squirrel, I think. And then Honey springs up the tree trunk. In a blink, my kitten is gone—as if the massive tree has swallowed her.
“Honey, come back here!” Jumping off the porch, I run over to the tree and peer up. But I only see leaves.
“Don’t worry about her,” Leo says, coming beside me. “According to my calculations, a cat will come down from a tree in three to five days.”
“I can’t wait that long!” I stare anxiously up into dense branches for any sign of my kitten. “I have to get her now or she might get hurt. I think she’s chasing a squirrel but I can’t see anything except leaves. And the lowest branch is way over my head. How can I get up there?”
“Want a boost?” Leo clasps his hands together and holds them out to me.
“Thanks,” I say gratefully.
I lif
t one foot carefully into Leo’s hands. Is he strong enough to hold me? I don’t want to break him. But his grip is steady. I gaze up, searching for any sign of my cat. I see a flash of orange and then it’s gone. The tree is even bigger than it looked from my bedroom window. It reminds me of Jack’s Beanstalk. Branches with dense leaves blot out the light as if there’s no sky, only endless tree.
Reaching high, I still can’t grab the lowest branch. “Drats. Can I climb onto your shoulders?”
“Wouldn’t it be easier to climb on that?”
Jumping back down, I follow Leo’s gaze to the far side of the trunk. At first I don’t notice anything unusual until I realize an area of bark doesn’t match the rest. A worn wooden slat is nailed into the bark, blending in like a shadow. More slats rise up the massive tree trunk.
“A ladder!” I exclaim.
“Incorrect term,” Leo says with a critical shake of his head. “A ladder is a structure consisting of a sequence of steps or bars between two upright lengths of wood or metal. These slats are nailed to the tree.” He points upward. “If you want your kitten, I suggest you start climbing.”
I look up, up, up. How far will I have to go to find my cat? Except for that glimpse of orange, I haven’t seen or heard even a mew from her. And it’s impossible to see beyond the curtain of leaves. I wonder who put up these slats.
I grab the first slat then use it for balance as I scoot up higher and reach for the next slat. I pause to peer down at Leo. “After I get Honey, we can finish talking about whatever you wanted to ask me.”
“Um…it can wait. Becca will be here soon and it’s not something I can say in front of her.”
“Why not?” I ask, surprised.
“Um…” He clears his throat. “She would misconstrue the objective of my query.”
“Huh?” I grasp the next slat and my leg dangles in the air until I find my footing on the next slat. “Speak English, please.”
“Um…” His voice is almost a whisper. “Becca might get the wrong idea…I mean, I know she has a lot of friends…and she probably is…well…” He takes a deep breath then asks quickly, “Does she like anyone?”
“Becca likes everyone! But if you mean like a boyfriend, the answer is no. Although I think Trevor Auslin likes her,” I add, chuckling. Leo is 100 percent confident when it comes to book-smarts but socially, he’s 100 percent clueless. Becca is the easiest person in the world to talk to, so why is he so nervous?
I’m about to ask him when my hand slips. Rough bark scrapes against my skin as I slide. I dig my fingers like claws into the bark and come to a stop.
“You okay?” Leo calls up.
“Just a little oops.” My palms sting but I grab the next slat.
“Can you see your kitten yet?”
“No. I’m getting worried.” I reach for another slat, balance, swing my leg up, and grab the next one. Reach, swing, grab, repeat. The slats are evenly spaced up the tree—until they abruptly end at a ceiling of branches.
“Why did you stop?” Leo sounds far away.
“No more slats.” I push and tug at the branches over my head. A leaf falls into my hand. Something is odd about the leaf; the green color is too bright and shiny. I press it between my fingers. Plastic! When I look closely at the leaves directly over my head, I discover they’re fake too.
What are plastic leaves doing in a living tree? I touch the spot from where the leaf fell and feel a solid surface; not branches or leaves, but a board.
Puzzled, I push at the board until it lifts, revealing a gaping hole. I poke my head through the hole and stare in astonishment.
“Leo!” I shout down. “I’ve found a tree house!”
- Chapter 4 -
Up in a Tree
“A tree house?” Leo’s voice wafts up to my high perch.
I peek through the hole. Inside, there’s a metal table with rusty legs; torn cushions that may have fit the small green couch; a crate; a cooler; and three metal folding chairs, one lying on the floor. When I look down to the ground, Leo seems very far away. I hear a whirling sound and push aside a twig to peer up the driveway. Becca is pedaling toward us on her bike.
“Becca’s here,” I call to Leo. “Tell her what I found, then both of you come up here. I’m going to check out the tree house.”
Leo nods and hurries toward Becca. I pull myself through the hole until I’m inside. It’s a mess of dust, dirt, and animal droppings, and it stinks too.
Spotty trails of animal prints crisscross the wood floor and over the top of a filthy table. Dust puffs up around my feet as I cautiously step forward. I stare at the tracks, wondering what animals scampered through here. I’ll ask Becca since she knows more about animals than I do. I don’t see any animals now—including Honey. Where did my cat go?
A dark shape moves in a shadowed corner. I jump back, my heart pumping fast. On the crate, a stubby tail swishes and golden eyes flash.
“Honey!” I reach out for my kitten. She mews as if to say, “About time you showed up,” and springs into my arms.
“I was so worried.” I kiss her head. “You’re a very bad cat or maybe very smart. Did you lead me here on purpose?”
I’d like to think she’s a clever detective kitty but cats just like to chase anything that moves. She saw a squirrel and instinct kicked in so she chased it. Still, if she hadn’t climbed the tree, I would never have noticed the slats and found this tree house.
Hugging her, I return my attention to the tree house. There are no windows, only cracks of light coming through loose boards. From the dust and stale air, I doubt any human has been here for a long time. There’s evidence of an interrupted lunch. On the table are two red plastic plates, three plastic forks, and two soda cans on their sides. There’s a third plate and can underneath the table. While small wild animals probably ate every scrap of leftover food, I doubt they could have toppled over a chair.
Someone left in a big hurry.
Did kids play here? I wonder. Who were they? Did they live in the cottage too? Dad didn’t mention who lived here before us. The number of sodas, chairs, and plates show there were at least three kids.
Voices snap me out of my thoughts, and Becca’s dark head pokes up through the trapdoor. Honey squirms in my arms so I let her down.
“Coolness!” Becca says as she climbs inside with Leo behind her. Glitter in her leopard-patterned scrunchie shines as her black ponytail sways. “I can’t believe this is here. I couldn’t see anything from the ground except leaves.”
“Plastic leaves hide the tree house like a huge invisibility cloak,” I say. “I thought the leaves looked kind of odd but I had no idea they hid a tree house.”
Leo sneezes then pulls a white handkerchief from his vest pocket and covers his nose. “It’s too dusty in here.”
“I like the dust because it shows us clues to the animals that have been here.” I point to the floor. “Becca, can you identify the animal prints?”
Becca squats down. “These fresh ones are easy—your kitten. Hmm, I think this is a raccoon paw print and there are more in different sizes like a raccoon family was partying here. The smallest ones could be rats. I’m pretty sure those are squirrel. Those long skinny prints look familiar, like bear prints but too tiny.”
“I’ll take photos to analyze later,” Leo says, his voice muffled through his handkerchief. He takes his phone from his pocket, aims, and clicks.
Becca picks up something from the table between her thumb and finger. “Yuck. A dried banana peel.”
I blow dust off one of the soda cans and hear a sloshing sound from inside. “Why leave an unopened soda on the table?”
“Maybe whoever was here was interrupted,” Becca says in an ominous tone.
“By a tragedy,” I add dramatically. “I can imagine it now—kids hanging out here, getting ready to have lunch. Then something terrible happened… maybe the trapdoor was left open and one of the kids fell…” I shudder at the image.
“Horrible!” Becca s
teps away from the trapdoor even though it’s closed.
“And illogical,” Leo scoffs. “If there had been a serious accident, this tree house would have been torn down. The more likely scenario is that the previous inhabitants moved. According to my calculations, considering the accumulation of dust, humans haven’t been here in 3.5 months.”
“But how did the wild animals get in?” I wonder as I scan the room.
“The same way we did.” Becca points at the floor.
I shake my head. “The trapdoor was shut when I found it, and I had to push hard to get it open. And there aren’t any windows.”
“What’s this?” Leo goes over to a large square board on a wall. He shoves with both hands against the board and it splits in half, swinging out to reveal a window.
“Fantastic view!” Becca says, coming beside Leo.
“A camouflaged window.” A branch slaps against Leo’s arm as he learns through the opening. “I can see across the driveway and woods and even the top of Bragg house, but no one can see us because we blend in with the branches.”
“But we still don’t know how Honey got inside.” I knit my brows together, and sweep my gaze around the room. It’s like a locked-door mystery when a crime is discovered in a locked room and the detective must figure out how the bad guy got in and out without anyone knowing. Only there’s no crime here—just a curious kitten that chased a squirrel up a tree.
“Where did the squirrel—or whatever creature Honey was following—go?” I wonder aloud. “There has to be another way in and out.”
“I don’t see any.” Becca turns slowly in place, surveying the room.
“Honey was on that crate,” I say. “Maybe there’s a hole behind it.” I walk over and look, but there’s nothing. “Not here.”
“Maybe under the old couch,” Leo says but he doesn’t find anything either.
“Honey, if only you could tell us your secrets.” I cuddle my kitten in my arms and look into her golden eyes. “How did you get in here?”
Honey meows and squirms.
“I think she understands you.” Becca smiles.
The Secret of the Shadow Bandit Page 2