I, Michael Bennett (Michael Bennett 5)

It was about two o’clock, as I lay there in a beery, sun-dazzled

state, when I heard the whistle. When I sat up, I saw Mary Catherine waving from the distant dock. I looked over for a panicked moment to see if it had anything to do with any of the kids in the water, but it looked like everyone was in the backyard playing volleyball.

Mary Catherine whistled and waved some more. Something was up.

“I knew it,” I said as I started kicking and splashing back toward the house. It had been too quiet for too long.

“Sorry to bother you, Mike. It’s probably nothing,” Mary Catherine said as I finally made it back and tossed the tube up onto the dock.

Unfortunately, one glance at the concerned look on her face as I pulled my dripping self out of the lake said the opposite.

“Okay. I’m here. What’s wrong?” I said.

“It’s Brian and Eddie. They left to go to the pizza place down the road about an hour ago, and they’re not back yet. I called and texted Brian’s phone, but it seems like maybe the battery is dead. I just sent Seamus down the street to see if maybe they went to the neighbor’s. They weren’t there, but the neighbor said when he passed the pizza place, he might have seen Brian and Eddie talking to two girls and a teenager with a car.”

No wonder Mary Catherine was looking concerned. Brian was sixteen but Eddie was only thirteen, and they were hanging around some older kids and girls? It just didn’t sound right.

“A car? What kind of car?” I said, pissed. We’d had a big family meeting with the older ones about always making sure to let people know where they were.

“A black convertible,” Mary Catherine said, biting at a thumbnail.

“A black convertible?!” I repeated after a frustrated breath. “Oh, well, that’s just great. Maybe they’ll learn how to drag race. Let me get dressed, and I’ll go find them.”

“Do you think they’re in trouble?” she said.

“No, no, Mary Catherine. I’m sure it’s probably nothing. I mean, how much trouble could they possibly get into up here in the sticks?”

CHAPTER 42

FROM THE BACKSEAT of the growling Mustang convertible, Eddie Bennett wiped the blowing hair out of his eyes, looked out at the green blur of passing roadside trees, and shook his head.

He couldn’t believe it. He thought coming up here into the country was going to be dullsville 24-7, but wow, had he gotten it all wrong. Right off the bat, as he and Brian walked into the country-road pizza place, they met two girls, Jessica and Claire. Not just any girls, either. They were older, pretty high school girls wearing Daisy Duke shorts and tank tops and lots of makeup. They started talking to Brian first, joking with him, but after a little while, they were saying how cute Eddie was and asking him if he liked older women.

“Come on, we’re going to go for a ride,” the redheaded one, Claire, said, pulling out her cell phone as they came outside in the pizza joint’s parking lot.

“Yeah, come on. It’ll be fun,” added Jessica, who had wild, mascara-rimmed eyes. “Or do you have to go home and ask Mommy?”

“Of course we’ll go,” Brian said before Eddie could open his mouth.

Then Claire sent a text message, and this guy, Bill, a long-haired dude with tattoos and those freaky flesh-tunnel earrings, rolled up in a rumbling black Mustang convertible. It was hard to tell how old he was. At least twenty. Eddie had gotten into the backseat with Brian and Claire, and now here he was, roaring through these wild country roads with the top down and Mac Miller blasting from the stereo.

I ain’t gotta Benz, no just a Honda

But try to get my money like an Anaconda.

Who knew life could get this cool? Eddie thought.

“Hey, you dudes havin’ fun?” Bill said, turning down the stereo. “Jessica tells me you boys are from New York. That right?”

“Yep,” Brian said with gusto. “New York, New York. Born and raised.”

“Big Apple in the house!” Eddie tossed out, but then shut his mouth as Brian gave him a glare.

Bill nodded and looked at them in the rearview mirror. He had a long, weird-looking face, Eddie thought, like one of the elves from The Lord of the Rings. Kind of cool but also sort of creepy, actually. Eddie looked away.

“That’s cool,” Bill, the tattooed elf, said. “I love the city. It’s good to meet people who are down. Hey, I have an idea. I know a spot over in Newburgh where they sell some primo smoke, you know what I’m sayin’?”

Jessica started giggling in the front seat. She stopped as Bill gave her a long cold look.