What could he say? The girl he loved was in the middle of a bona fide mystery. And she’d confided in him—and only him. Jared liked that. It made him feel good. He also decided that he didn’t want to let on that he was more than a little uneasy about the whole situation. At the very least, he had to act as bravely as her.
“Okay,” he said, hoping he sounded as calm as she did. “We’ll just pop in for a few minutes.”
She smiled and nearly hugged him. “Maybe Uncle Joe and his friend won’t even know we’re there. You know, if they’re really that sick and all.”
“Remember, we have to get back and to the observatory in time to get on the computer—”
“We will. We can get down to the house within a half hour, and ten, fifteen minutes, tops, to see them. By the time we get back to the observatory we’ll still have about an hour and a half on the Net.”
“Glad to see that you have this worked out,” said Jared, rolling his eyes.
They gathered their books and made their way to the zoo’s exit, then along the small trail that led down the countryside to her home below.
Chapter Thirteen
Jared was getting a bad feeling about all of this.
He often got bad feelings about things—and more often than not, bad things happened. A friend of his at school thought Jared might be psychic. Jared thought his friend was nuts.
Still, a bad feeling was a bad feeling...and Jared’s stomach was practically turning somersaults.
At the moment, he said nothing and blindly followed Anna behind the spacious back yards of some of the wealthiest homes in Los Feliz. Like Anna, Jared had grown up unconventionally. Also like Anna, he’d been home-schooled by parents who worked with animals more than they did people. He thought his parents were crazy, but loved them. Both he and Anna knew Griffith Park—and the surrounding Los Feliz, for that matter—like the backs of their hands. Anna, in particular. In fact, she might have even known the area better than him—especially since she often worked with her dad. Jared was often amazed that Anna knew not only the little-known trails some hikers used, but could follow the paths of wild animals. She knew them inside and out.
Soon, they found themselves behind Anna’s own massive home—her part-time home, as she sometimes referred to it. Anna quietly unlatched the back gate and, once through, led the way quietly through the expansive back yard, past the koi pond she loved so much, and to the key hidden under the third potted plant from the door.
The house was dead quiet. Her father was off working with Carla, the cute cop that she knew her father had a crush on in kind of the same way that she knew Jared had a crush on her.
Two love birds, she thought, and nearly giggled.
That is, until she heard the moan from below.
“What was that?” whispered Jared. He was nearly on top of her.
She didn’t know, and only shook her head. They continued through the big house, moving quietly. Like mountain lions, thought Anna. She loved the local population of mountain lions, and wanted to do all she could to protect them.
Think about the cats later, she admonished herself. Good idea.
Anna assumed that her Uncle Joe and his friend were upstairs, resting in bed, which was where she led Jared now, climbing the stairs as quietly as possible. When they reached the second floor landing, she stopped, puzzled. The hall was in disarray. Pictures were crooked, rugs were askew.
A stone was covered with blood.
Jared stepped forward. “Jesus, is that blood?”
Anna didn’t know for sure. She didn’t know what to think, either. She hurried down the hallway, and pushed open the door to the guest bedroom. Uncle Joe was gone, and Mike’s room was empty, too.
“Where are they?” asked Jared.
Anna jumped at the sound of his voice. “I don’t know.”
“Maybe your dad took them to the doctor.”
“Maybe,” she said.
Anna checked her own bedroom. Nothing had been touched. That gave her some comfort. Her father’s room seemed all right, too.
“Well, what do you want to do?” asked Jared.
Anna stood with her hands on her hips, taking in the trashed hallway, the empty rooms.
Something’s wrong, she thought.
When she didn’t immediately answer, Jared said, “Hey, you got anything to eat?”
“Are you kidding?”
“What can I say? I’m a growing boy.”
Anna tried to push away the need for caution that she was presently feeling. The two black-suited weirdos at the zoo had freaked her out a little. And now this...this mess. And where the heck were their house guests?
“Please,” whined Jared. “Anything. A Pop-Tart maybe.”
She hated when Jared got all whiney. Like a kid. Anna wasn’t a kid. She was almost an adult. At least, she felt like she was almost an adult. She turned to him and forced a smile. “Fine. How about leftover spaghetti? I can nuke it.”
“Sounds good.” He didn’t mean to say it so loud. The place was like a tomb; it seemed to call for silence.
The two headed down, where Anna placed a large portion of the leftovers into the microwave and hit START. Jared liked having Anna wait on him. It almost felt like they were a real couple.
As they waited, Jared said, “So, what were you expecting to find?”
“You mean here?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, I wanted to see for myself what my dad told me,” she said. “I never thought my Uncle Joe could be dangerous to anyone. I’m glad my dad took them to the doctors’ office.”
“If he took them to the doctors,” Jared said, for reasons he didn’t entirely know.
“Of course he took them,” she replied. “Just like you said upstairs. It makes sense. You have to make sense once in a while.”
“Ha ha.”
“Anyway, where else would they be?”
“They could be howling at the moon,” Jared said lightly.
“Stop it. Besides, it’s daytime.”
Anna was getting paper plates out for them when Jared, on a wild whim, reached around her and tickled her. Anna squealed and faced him. “You’re in big trouble now!”
She playfully pushed him as he grabbed her and held on, pulling her in close. The disorder upstairs momentarily forgotten, she lightly pushed him away and darted around the kitchen table. He chased her. Running around the table, laughing, he finally caught her and they ended up crashing to the floor. He rolled on top of her and locked her arms above her head.