Hot Wheels (7 page)

At the car wash, Pete dried and polished each car as it emerged from the automatic wash. He and the other hand finishers carried rags and bottles of window cleaner. They worked in teams.

As Pete worked, his eyes were constantly alert for any signs of Joe Torres or Tiburon and the Piranhas. The afternoon passed. He saw nothing but dripping cars rolling out of the automatic wash line — and Ty sipping Cokes and eating burritos at the Taco Bell next door.

Pete went on working.

Ty went on waiting.

*

In the gloom of the parking garage, Jupiter raised himself up to look out the window. The parked cars stood silently under the dim lights.

He became aware of the sounds of mechanics working on the second floor. He could even hear faint sounds coming from the third floor — air compressors humming and hammering to supply the power to paint the cars.

He strained to listen for other sounds. The orange Cadillac had vanished somewhere inside this building. And Joe Torres and the gunman had come from somewhere in the black Buick.

But where?

*

At four o’clock, Ty looked at his watch. Nothing had happened at the car wash. All he’d seen was a steady stream of cars that Pete and his fellow hand finishers swarmed over like ants on a log full of honey.

There had been no sign of Tiburon and the Piranhas or their girlfriends. Joe Torres had not appeared. It was almost time to go and pick up the Honda and Jupiter.

Soon they would all have to quit for the day.

*

Twice Jupiter had to duck down as Max the gunman passed on his patrol of the floor. Jupe’s watch read four thirty when he slipped out of the little Honda. He crept through the dimness of the garage interior toward the automobile elevator.

He listened intently as he moved, in case Max returned. He had seen no one else. No cars had driven in, stolen or otherwise.

Now he circled the entire floor to see if there was anything he and Pete had somehow overlooked the first time. He even opened the half-glass doors of the offices. All were being used as storerooms, or were unfurnished and abandoned.

He ended his search at the car elevator with its slatted wooden gates. The platform was down on the ground floor. The wide shaft above was as dimly lit as the floor itself. Two rectangles of light showed where it opened onto each upper floor.

The footsteps caught him by surprise!

Max the gunman was walking down the ramp.

*

Tiburon and the Piranhas arrived at the car wash in their lowriders. They looked like a western outlaw gang riding into their hideout after a raid. It was five o’clock, closing time at the car wash. Pete was being paid as Tiburon strode into the owner’s office.

“Thanks, sir,” Pete said loud enough for anyone to hear. “I sure need the money. My dad’s out of work, so if you hear of anyone who needs a good mechanic, I’d appreciate knowing about it.”

“Sure, Crenshaw,” the owner said. “You do a good job. I’ll keep my ears open for you.”

“I’m a really good mechanic,” Pete emphasized. “I’ll do anything to make some money.”

When he saw that Tiburon was looking at him, Pete left. He didn’t want to lay it on too thick and make the bandleader suspicious. Outside, he walked two blocks to his Fiero.

As he passed the Taco Bell he saw that Ty had gone.

*

Jupiter held his breath as the footsteps of Max the gunman came steadily closer. There had been no time to get back to his Honda, and barely enough time to dive beside the first car facing the elevator.

Now Max walked along the clear lane between the elevator and the first row of cars. All he had to do was glance left and down and he couldn’t miss Jupiter. In a matter of seconds he would look straight down the aisle where Jupiter crouched.

The leader of the Investigators lay flat on the dirty, greasy, oil-splattered concrete floor and rolled under the car. He watched Max’s legs walk past only a few feet from his head. The gunman paused, as if he were looking along the now empty aisle.

Jupiter breathed slowly and wiped the sweat and oil off his brow. It seemed like Max would never move on. His legs were so close that Jupiter could have touched them.

Then the small outside door opened, letting in a long shaft of late-afternoon sunlight.

“Yeah?” Max challenged instantly.

Ty’s voice loudly answered, “Hi. Just came to get my car.”

“Let’s see your ticket.”

“Right here,” Ty called out.

The legs disappeared. Jupiter waited a long minute, then rolled out on the other side of the car and peered over it. The gunman walked toward the front door, where Ty stood in the shaft of sunlight.

Jupiter stood and waved, then dropped low again to work his way through the silent rows to his car. He hoped Ty had seen him and would hold the gunman long enough for Jupe to reach the Honda.

“We close at six o’clock,” Jupiter heard Max say.

“You don’t get back, you don’t park till tomorrow.”

“I won’t need to park until tomorrow,” Ty’s voice said. “You have a phone I can use?”

“Over there on the wall.”

“You want to show me?”

“You want a lot for a lousy hundred bucks.” The distraction gave Jupiter time to reach the Honda and crawl in. Moments later Ty got behind the wheel. When Ty slowed the car at the front door, Max the gunman leaned in.

“Six o’clock, or wait until tomorrow.”

“How early tomorrow?” Ty said.

“Someone opens seven a.m. It ain’t me.”

Ty laughed at the joke. Max didn’t laugh. It wasn’t a joke. The gunman was proud that he was important enough to not have to come in at seven a.m. Ty drove slowly out of the garage. “You okay, Jupiter?”

“I’m fine. But I didn’t see anything.” The garage doors closed behind them. Ty turned at the corner and pulled to the curb. Jupiter opened the passenger door, slid out and into the front seat. “Did Tiburon come to the car wash?”

“Not until after five.”

At the salvage yard they hurried into the trailer. Pete was counting his pay before putting it into the team’s treasury. Calls to Bob’s office and home failed to locate the elusive third Investigator, so they made their plans without him.

“I think we continue tomorrow exactly as we did today,” Jupiter said. “Pete goes to the car wash, Ty waits for a chance to sabotage Tiburon’s car, and I watch in the garage.”

“Tiburon better show up earlier tomorrow,” Ty said, “or we’re stymied.”

*

Tiburon did show up earlier the next day, but Ty had no chance to sabotage his graffiti-covered low-rider. Jupiter watched all day in the garage and saw nothing. The only good thing was that Tiburon liked Pete’s energy and good humor — and the string tie with its shark head slide that hid Pete’s mini walkie-talkie!

“You’re a okay guy for an Anglo,” Tiburon said. “That’s a kick bolo slide, too. We find a big-bucks job for you, hey?”

Pete said he’d like that, but nothing more happened that day. Time was running out. Spring break would be over in three days.

But the next day Ty finally got his chance. Tiburon and the Piranhas came early and stopped at the Taco Bell. While they were all inside arguing about what to eat and how much, Ty slipped under Tiburon’s low-rider and pulled two hidden wires from the electrical system. He had told Pete what he’d do. Pete would know just what to reconnect.

When Tiburon tried to start his car, nothing happened. As he worked at the car wash, Pete saw them all hovering and arguing around Tiburon’s car. First the car-wash owner went over. Then one of the older employees. Finally, Tiburon yelled from the Taco Bell. “Hey, you, the new Anglo guy, come on over here!”

Pete dried his hands on a rag as he walked to the Taco Bell lot. “Me?”

“You’re a hotshot mechanic, right? So let’s see you get my heap running.”

Pete leaned into the open hood. He looked at the engine, poked at the battery and spark plugs, and made noises. Then he slid under the car, where he knew the loose wires were but where no one else had thought to look.

“Someone hand me a half-inch combination wrench,” Pete said from under the car.

There was a discussion about tools. The car-wash owner went to his office and returned with the proper wrench. Pete didn’t need it, but it made him look much more impressive when he crawled out, saying, “Try it now.”

The car started instantly.

“Hey, you sure know cars.” Tiburon looked at Pete thoughtfully. “I’m gonna talk to some people could maybe use you. The pay’s real, real good. I mean, real good. Comprendes?”

Tiburon was saying that the job was illegal, and asking Pete if he understood. Pete nodded.

*

Jupiter was dozing in the Honda when he heard Ty’s voice somewhere near the garage door.

“Just came to get something out of my car.”

“Don’t make it a habit. We don’t like people coming here all day,” Max’s voice said.

Jupiter sank down out of sight.

“What’s up?” Jupiter whispered.

Ty leaned in as if searching the car. “The trick worked! Tiburon told Pete someone’d come for him at the car wash and take him to a garage.”

“When?”

“Today sometime. If this is where the chop-shop is, they have to come past you.”

After Ty had gone, Jupiter settled down to watch again. He was excited now. In the Honda, he was in a perfect position to see where they took Pete. Then he’d know where the chop-shop was hidden.

An hour passed. Then two. Five o’clock came and went. At six, Jupiter heard Max lock the big double doors. Pete had not appeared. No one had. What if they’d been wrong all along, and the chop-shop was somewhere else?

Jupiter’s walkie-talkie suddenly gave a tiny beep. Jupe flicked it on. Ty’s voice was low but urgent. “Jupe! We’ve got trouble! Bad trouble!”

“I’m locked in,” Jupiter said into his walkie-talkie.

Ty’s voice said, “Sneak out. Try the small door.”

Jupiter tiptoed silently through the dimly lit garage to the door. The big doors were padlocked, but the small door just had a deadbolt. Twisting the knob on the lock, Jupe slipped out and saw the pickup at the corner.

“Get in,” Ty said urgently.

“What is it?”

Ty was grim. “About fifteen minutes ago Bob drove like a maniac into the salvage yard with Pete’s girlfriend, that Kelly Madigan. She said Pete told her what he was doing at the car wash and all about Tiburon and the stolen cars.”

Jupiter groaned. “Pete tells her everything.”

“Maybe it’s good he does,” Ty said. “Kelly just found out that another cheerleader, Tina Wallace, is El Tiburon’s brand-new girlfriend! She’s going around with him all the time — and she knows Pete, and who he is, and all about The Three Investigators!”

Jupiter was stunned. “If she spots Pete — ”

“She could tell Tiburon all about him.”

“And she could spot him anytime,” Jupiter said.

“Kelly says Tina’s a good kid and that she probably doesn’t know anything about stolen cars. But there’s no way of knowing when she might just stumble over Pete and say something.”

They reached the salvage yard and the HQ trailer, where Bob and Kelly Madigan were waiting. The feisty, dark-haired cheerleader jumped up.

“Did you find him?” she demanded. “Did you get him away from there?”

“We don’t even know where he is,” Jupiter said. “You’re sure he’s left the car wash, Ty?”

“Tiburon came back and talked to him. Pete gave me thumbs up and drove off in the Fiero with Tiburon.”

“Then,” Bob said, “we’ve got to find him.”

“But how?” Kelly asked, looking at each of them.

Bob and Ty looked at Jupiter. Kelly sat down, almost in tears.

“Jupiter?” she said. “Please?”

Jupiter stared at the wall as if he could see through it. He began to pinch his lower lip with his forefinger and thumb, a sure sign that he was deep in thought. “We must assume Pete was being taken to work in the chop-shop. Therefore our problem is still the same — to locate the chop-shop.” Now he looked around at them.

“Not just if it’s in that garage, but exactly where. In fact, we have to get inside it ourselves.”

“Wait,” Ty said. “We figure Pete’s inside. And we figure the shop is in that garage. Can’t we just contact him and he’ll tell us where he is?”

“Yes!” Kelly cried, bouncing up again.

“No,” Bob said. “We don’t know for sure the shop’s in that garage. And we can’t risk contacting him on the walkie-talkies. We don’t know who could be near him and hear.”

“Bob’s right,” Jupiter said. “I think I have a plan, but it depends on Tiburon and the Piranhas being out of town tonight. Bob, can you find out — ”

“They are!” Bob cut in, triumphant. “I can’t believe our luck! I looked them up just out of curiosity. They’re playing at a multiband outdoor gig up in Malibu.”

“Chance favors the prepared mind,” Jupiter pronounced. “You looked it up because all our years of detecting made you realize we might need to know.”

“Whatever,” Bob said. “Why do we need them out of town?”

“Because I’m gambling that the Mercedes wasn’t the only car Tiburon swiped on his own and sent to the bodega,” Jupiter said. “And other people besides the band seem to drop off cars at the bodega too. Torres gave a horn signal when he took that orange Caddy to the garage so they’d open the doors and let him in fast. Pete told me Torres gave the same signal with a second car. And I think what Ty was told to say at the bodega is a sort of password.”

Ty watched Jupiter. “What have you got in mind, Jupe?”

“Tiburon’s out of town. We get a car and drive it to the bodega. We turn it over to Torres. With any luck, he’ll drive it to the chop-shop!”

“How will that help Pete?” Kelly demanded.

“Two of us will be hidden in the car,” Jupiter said. “I had the idea earlier, but it seemed too risky. Now we have to take the risk.”

Bob asked the big question. “Who hides in the car?”

“You’re the only one Torres doesn’t know,” Jupiter said. “You’ll have to drive the car. Ty and I will hide in the back.”

“After I deliver it, then what do I do?” Bob wanted to know.

“Get in your own car and follow Torres.”

“How do I get my car if I’m driving the stolen car?”

“Kelly drives it behind us and waits out of sight.” They each thought it over.

“Where do we get a car, Jupe?” Ty said. “Ours aren’t worth stealing. You want us to really steal a car?”

Jupiter looked at Kelly. “I thought maybe Kelly could borrow her dad’s Jaguar. That’d be worth stealing.”

“Dad’s Jag?” Kelly gulped. “Well, I mean, okay. If it’ll get Pete out of there. Only you be careful with it.”

“We will,” Jupiter assured her. “Can you get it now?”

She nodded. “I guess.”

“I’ll take her,” Bob said. “Show her how to drive my car on the way.”

“When you get back,” Jupiter said, “we’ll set the details.”

“Tiburon would need time to steal a car,” Ty said.

Jupiter nodded. “We’ll wait until midnight.” He looked around at them. No one said anything more.

“That’s it, then. We go at midnight.”

*

It was five minutes before midnight when the elegant Jaguar glided up to the bodega. The store was still open.

Jupiter was in the trunk. Ty, the thinner of the two, was on the floor behind the front seat under a stadium blanket and some cushions. Bob wore a baseball cap and his old glasses. Kelly was behind them in Bob’s VW, out of sight.

Joe Torres and his two henchmen, Nacio and Carlos, came out of the bodega and stared at the glistening Jaguar. Bob leaned out the window.

“Guy named Tiburon paid me a hundred dollars to drive his brother’s car down from Malibu. You his brother?”

Torres nodded. “That’s me. You delivered the car, you can take off now.”

“I need a ride downtown.”

“Call a cab,” Torres said. “You got paid, now get lost.”

Bob climbed out of the Jaguar and walked away into the night. In the trunk and under the blanket in the rear seat, Ty and Jupiter waited. They heard the foot-steps of the three men approach the car.

“Hey, there’s a blanket and cushions in back.”

Joe Torres’s voice laughed. “Some guy up in Malibu ain’t just out a car, he’s freezin’, too!”

The front door opened on the driver’s side.

“I’ll take it over right now,” Torres’s voice said. “The shop’s workin’, and a Jag don’t look right around here. At least Tib got this one delivered okay. Not two days late like last time.”

The driver’s door closed and the car started. It pulled away in a squeal of rubber and drove fast, with Jupiter hanging on in the trunk and Ty silent under the blanket.

*

Bob jumped into his bug.

“Is everything okay?” Kelly asked, anxious.

“Torres bought it,” Bob told her. “It looks like Jupe had it figured. Torres wasn’t surprised at all. What I said seemed to be the right words.”

Kelly pointed ahead. “There it goes! Dad’s Jaguar!”

“Hang on,” Bob said.

He turned the little red bug into the cross street behind the already distant Jaguar. The sleek import gave no sign of looking for or seeing a tail.

“Don’t lose him, Bob!” Kelly pleaded.

“I’m doing the best I can,” Bob said as he floored the gas pedal in pursuit of the Jaguar.

But the silver sedan moved steadily farther ahead as Bob tried desperately to keep up.

*

In the trunk Jupiter held tight to keep from rolling and making noise as the Jaguar sped along. He was braced so tight that when the car suddenly screeched to a stop he almost slammed into the trunk wall. But he managed to make no noise. He heard Torres honk the signal: one long, two shorts, a long, and a short.

He heard a padlock being unlocked and heavy garage doors open. The Jaguar drove in.

“One of Tiburon’s little extras,” Torres’s voice said. “The boss ain’t gonna be happy. That Mercedes got us into enough trouble.”

It was the voice of Max the gunman! The passenger door opened and someone got in. The car started again. In the dark, Jupiter sensed the Jag moving and turning slowly. Then it hesitated, bumped over something raised, and stopped.

There was a rattling sound. The slatted wooden gates of the car elevator were closing! The elevator lurched upward. Jupiter tried to gauge how far up it went, but he couldn’t tell for sure.

The elevator stopped. Jupiter heard a faint rumbling sound. The Jaguar started, then drove slowly off — in the wrong direction!

*

“We’ve lost it, Bob!” Kelly wailed.

“It turned at that corner up there,” Bob said grimly. “Maybe we can pick it up again.”

Bob sped down the street in the commercial area, started to turn — and drove straight on past the cross street.

The Jaguar had been stopped in front of a three-story red-brick building a block up the street they just passed.

“You think he saw us?” Kelly asked. “We’re just another car. Torres never saw my bug.” Bob made a U-turn, drove back, and parked short of the corner. They ran to the corner and peered around. The Jaguar was gone. They moved along the dark and deserted street to the double doors where the Jag had gone in. There was a smaller door inside the large double doors.

Both doors were locked.

“What do we do?” Kelly whispered in despair. “Hope that nobody shot the deadbolt home after Jupe left earlier,” said Bob.

He reached into his jacket pocket and brought out a plastic ID card. He slid the card into the crack between the smaller door and its frame, next to the lock. After a moment, he managed to slip the latch. Seconds later they stood inside in the dimness of the Freeway Garage.

Bob and Kelly studied the rows and rows of parked cars.

“This must be where Jupe parked his Honda to watch,” Bob said. “Look for your dad’s Jag.”

They moved through the vast, dim, silent room of parked cars. Finally they stood near the caged shaft of an automobile elevator. Its platform was somewhere above in the gloom. They listened for any sound, but heard nothing. No sounds, and no Jaguar.

“It’s not here!” Kelly said, her voice rising.

“Shhhhh!” Bob hissed.

There was a sudden slamming noise, a rattle of wooden slats, and the car elevator began to descend!

“Quick!” Bob whispered.

He grabbed Kelly and dragged her behind the nearest row of cars. They crouched out of sight as the elevator reached the ground floor. Joe Torres stepped off alone and walked through the enormous room and out the front door.

Bob and Kelly stepped out to the elevator.

“My dad’s car has to be somewhere up there,” Kelly said, looking up the elevator shaft.

“Jupiter said he’s sure the chop-shop is hidden in the building,” Bob agreed. “Only where is it?” A voice spoke from behind them.

“It’s a real shame you know about the chop-shop, Andrews. You should have stuck to music.”

Jake Hatch stood behind them, an ugly pistol in his thick hand. The burly man who stood on the other side of Bob and Kelly held an even bigger gun.