Latitude Zero (10 page)

We piled into the Fingernail, and Kylie peeled out of the lot.

While Kylie drove, fast, back to Route 2, I explained the latest texts, while looking behind us every five seconds. No cars seemed to be following us, and near the exit for Cambridge, we all finally relaxed. A little.

“So no clues, no bike—what now?” asked Sarita. “And you’ve got spies,” she added grimly, as if I had head lice.

“Why is this guy keeping tabs on you anyway?” asked Kylie.

“He’s monitoring her,” said Sarita. “Making sure she doesn’t slip up. Or hoping she’ll just lead them to the bike directly.”

“Tessa, it’s time to call the cops,” said Kylie. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”

I’d done everything wrong.

I shook my head. “Not so simple. I don’t know how many of these ‘eyes and ears’ Darwin has. I’m going to keep looking for the bike or for leads and get him off my back.”

“And we still have until Thursday to find something,” Sarita pointed out.

“No,” I said. “
We
don’t.
I
do. You guys should keep your distance from me until this thing is over.”

“What? No!” said Sarita. “We’re not abandoning you to this creep.”

“Seriously. Don’t text or call my cell phone and don’t come by the house. I don’t want him tailing you, too. From now until Thursday, my phone is a direct line to Darwin.”

17

TAPPING SOUNDS
at my window woke me up that night.

I glanced at my nightstand clock. It was just after midnight.

The tapping grew louder. Insistent. The windowpane shook. I sat up and drew the covers up to my chin, like a kid in a picture book frightened by monsters. There could be a monster out there. Darwin. Could he have come back to the house, and located my
room
?

The slats of my bottom shutters were down, but my top ones were open enough so that I could just make out a baseball cap shape in the moonlight.

Through the shutter slats I saw the movement of an arm reaching up, as if the person was looking for some way to open the window.

My heart in my throat—I now understood what that expression really felt like—I glanced at my cell phone, plugged in to the wall charger. Across the room, out of reach.

I glanced at Bianca Slade’s photo. And in the moonlight, I read the second item on the list of Qualities of Good Investigative Reporters: Having courage.
You may find yourself under attack, legally or personally. Believe in what you’re doing and find the courage to carry on.
No more games. I’d confront Darwin head-on and make him believe I had not intercepted his stolen bike.

I got out of bed and crept up to the window. At the last second, I grabbed from my bookshelf a trophy I’d received last year, when
KidVision
was honored at the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences. It was heavy, made of brass, and might function as a weapon.

I took a deep breath and threw open my shutters.

And stared into the face of a guy wearing a Red Sox cap and a startled expression. Jake.

I stared at him, my fingers tightening around the trophy base. Even though I’d rather see Jake than Darwin at my window, my anger at him came back in a rush.

“Can I come in?” he asked through the window.

I set the trophy down on the desk, opened the window, and let him in. We did need to talk. Might as well get it over with.

Jake was no stranger to my window. He’d even stayed over half the night in my bed a couple of times. But now we stood awkwardly facing each other, our hands at our sides.

“Hey,” he said. “You up for a moonlight picnic?” He gestured outside. “I have fruit and a blanket. And brie. Oh, and this.” He reached into his back pocket and took out a spray of baby roses. “I’d have sprung for the big ones, two dozen, but it’s hard to bike with those.”

I stared at him, and the roses. How could he show up and act like nothing had happened?

“And this?” He reached into another pocket and pulled out an EcuaBar. My favorite flavor, Jungle Gem, with real cacao nibs. The ultimate peace offering. “I think I may have overreacted,” he said. “A little.” He set the EcuaBar down on my desk.

Those were welcome words, long overdue. Something sharp lodged inside me softened. But only for a moment. Now Juan Carlos was no longer a threat, out of the picture. Is that what freed Jake up to finally say words I wanted to hear?

“You know he died, right?” I said.

He looked down. “What a freak accident. I don’t get how it happened.”

“You’re probably happy about it.”

He frowned. “I’m not. Do you really think that? Yeah, I didn’t like the guy. But I definitely didn’t want him to die.” He shuddered. “I can’t imagine what he must have gone through out there. It’s freaky. It’s every cyclist’s worst nightmare, that kind of crash.”

I glanced at my nightstand, where the necklace I’d removed just before falling asleep gleamed in a beam of moonlight slanting through the shutter. I didn’t feel like explaining that to Jake. I backed up slowly and picked up a sweater. I casually tossed it toward the nightstand so that it covered the cross.

Jake stepped forward and gently touched the gauze pads taped to my right arm and right leg. “Babe. You’re hurt,” he murmured. “You really were in the crash yesterday. I’m so sorry.”

“Not as sorry as I am.” I flinched and pulled away. “You have five minutes.”

“To do what?”

“To tell me why you dropped me on the ride.”

Jake sunk into a beanbag chair. “What happened to ‘hello’?”

“Okay.
Hello
, you dropped me on a ride?
Hello
, what was the point of doing the ride together if we weren’t going to actually do the ride together?”

“I was pissed. Okay? Pissed. Is that a crime? Am I allowed to have an emotion? Or are you the only one?” He glared at me a moment, then sighed. “Okay. See? My emotions took over just now. And they did on the ride, too.”

“Yeah, that seems to happen to you a lot lately. Maybe you should get some help.”

“What, like talk to someone? A professional? Please.” Then he stood up again and reached for my hand. Held it. Caressed it softly. “I don’t need to talk to anyone except you, babe. You’re the only one who truly understands me. You’re like a part of my soul. You know?” His eyes teared up. That couldn’t be faked.

But he was wrong. I didn’t truly understand him. Sometimes I felt like I didn’t even know him. And he definitely did not understand me. I snatched my hand away. “You now have three minutes to wrap up your story about what happened to us on that ride.”

“Fine. I made it to the first water stop, at mile twenty. You weren’t there.”

“Mile twenty? God, Jake. You left so fast, did you really think I’d be right on your wheel? And make it that far without saying a word?”

“I got caught up in the moment,” Jake insisted. “Besides, you’re a better rider now. I trusted you weren’t far behind me.”

“Really? I think your guilt didn’t catch up with you until mile twenty.”

He ignored this. “Anyway, then I heard there was this big pileup back at the six-mile mark. I got really scared that you might have been caught in it. I couldn’t get all the way back because they were turning people away. I went out to the main road and rode back to the medical tent at the staging area.”

“Why?”

“Why? Are you kidding? Because I was worried sick about you. I looked for you everywhere. Finally some EMT in the medical tent said you’d gone home with your mom. Tessa.” He ran one finger down the inside of my unhurt arm. A movement that used to send electric thrills through my whole body, now just made me recoil. “I feel so terrible that this happened. It’s all my fault. I should never have asked you to ride bandit with me.”

I pulled away. “I don’t get it. Why did you ask me to do that ride in the first place?”

“Because I just wanted to ride with you. I want you in my world, okay? Why is that such a crime? It was supposed to be fun. Then it got . . . complicated. That’s all.”

Complicated.
Like so many things with Jake these days.

There’s a beautiful moment in bike racing. The breakaway: when a rider breaks out of the line of riders in the peloton and charges toward the front, taking the lead. Now was my moment. I looked him right in the eye. “You left me on the ride. And you
dismissed
everything I was worried about. Like getting caught. Or the stolen bike and the guy in the woods.”

“It won’t happen again. I’ll do better. I’m willing to fight for us, Tessa. Aren’t you?”

“No. I’m not.”

He stared at me. “We have something really rare and special. You know it. You’re probably not going to find something like this with anyone else. But if you want to throw it away, everything we’ve worked for, fine. Be a quitter.”

My face burned.
Quitter.
He knew I hated that word. But I stood my ground.

As he opened the window and put one leg over the sill, I stared at his shaved calf muscle. I stared at it for the last time. Never again would it brush over my own leg. Then I saw a constellation of red blisters on his ankle. I pointed. “What is that?”

“What? Oh. I had a little brush with poison ivy.” He slung that leg over the sill. “I’m not sure why the hell you care.”

My stomach seized. Could
Jake
have stolen Juan Carlos’s bike and left it for the fence? I looked at him, hard. Was he the kind of person to steal something like that—or anything?

“Jake,” I said. “Wait.”

He paused, one leg over the sill.

“Did you see Juan Carlos’s spare bike in the woods when we were cutting through?”

“For real, Tessa? Is that a serious question?”

“It’s a serious question.”

“
No
. God no. If I’d seen it, I would have stopped and looked, same as you.”

“Did you
put
Juan Carlos’s spare bike in the woods?”

“You mean, did I steal his spare bike from the team trailer? And hide it in the woods?”

“Yes. And did you leave it for that guy I ran into? The fence?”

“Of course not! That’s ridiculous!” he burst out. “You were with me the entire time.”

I glanced at my door. “Shh. You’ll wake up my parents. And no, I was
not
with you the entire time. You rode off to get your sports drinks from the car. Remember? We were apart for almost fifteen minutes.” I looked closely at him. “Did you really go get those sports drinks?” I wished I could remember seeing bottles on his frame. I’d been so freaked out about Juan Carlos giving me his necklace, and then about the guy in the woods, I hadn’t bothered to look.

“Of course I did,” he said. “And how would I have had time to get back to my car and then go steal and hide a bike?”

He had a point. Then again, Jake was a champion racer. Maybe he could have accomplished all that in ten or fifteen minutes.

“You still think I did it? Tessa. What would I want that asshole’s spare bike for?”

“I don’t know. To sell to some black-market sports collector? You said sports memorabilia from famous athletes are worth a lot of money.”

He let out a long breath. “Wow. Just, wow.” He smirked. “If I were in that business? I might have waited until Juan Carlos was dead. Then the bike would be worth a lot more.”

“Look, I’d almost understand if you did.” I used the voice I always used during the doping scandal. Soothing and vaguely cheerful. “I know things have been tight financially. I know you need money for UMass. I know your mom works two jobs.”

“Great. One rash on my leg, and now I’m a bike thief?” Jake’s eyes blazed. “And an impoverished one? I don’t need your pity party. I thought you were on my team.”

“I didn’t call you a thief. Don’t put words in my mouth. I just want to find out—”

“Oh. Sorry. Isn’t that what you like? Other people’s scripts?” he shot back. “Sorry you lost your job, by the way. Heard about that. Maybe now you’ll know what it’s like to be a regular person who isn’t handed everything on a platter.”

“Get out.” My voice shook.

“My pleasure,” he shot back.

I turned my back. I heard him lift the window, then the soft thud of his jump to the ground. Bike wheels churning on gravel. Then silence. It was over.

I felt something lift off my chest. I felt like I was at a higher altitude. Like the air was crisp and clean and, finally, I could breathe.

I sank into my desk chair, trembling. Now I couldn’t rule out Jake as a suspect. I glanced at Bianca’s Qualities of Good Investigative Reporters #6: Having a Passion for Truth and Justice.
Good investigators are committed to looking at all sides of a problem and working tirelessly to uncover the truth
. And quality #5: Thinking Logically.
Organizing and thinking through ideas and rationales is key.
I picked up a pen and a notebook and wrote my rationale.

Bike Theft Suspect: Jake

1. He could have asked me to do the ride with him as a cover. He was away from me long enough to do the job.

2. He could have stolen Juan Carlos’s spare bike from the Team EcuaBar trailer. He’d know where to find it.

3. He could have hidden the bike in the woods, thinking he’d pick it up later, after the ride, and sell it. Or Darwin could have paid Jake a flat fee for the job.

4. Even if Jake was the thief who originally took the bike from the trailer, that doesn’t mean he’s the one who intercepted it from Darwin. Or that he knows who intercepted it.

5. Jake isn’t a strong enough lead (yet) to refer Darwin to. Much as I’d love to get revenge.

I sighed and set down my pen. I ate the Jungle Gem EcuaBar Jake had brought me, and concentrated on Bianca’s Qualities of Good Investigative Reporters #3: Being Flexible.
If you hit a dead end, be prepared to take a turn with your research and your questioning
.

Other people had been around the starting line that day. People who might have seen suspicious activity. People who might have been able to cover a lot of ground.

I knew just who I needed to talk to.

18

COMPASS BIKES,
taking up most of a warehouse, was one of the biggest and busiest bike shops I’d been in. Gripping the handlebars of my scraped-up Bianchi, I breathed in the strange stew of smells: leather, rubber, metal, grease. Aisles of bike frames stood at attention. More hung from the walls. All around me, people were checking out equipment or browsing for clothes and accessories. Conversations and laughter echoed off walls, punctuated with the sounds of chains whirr-ing, tools grinding and clicking. It felt like standing inside a machine. Everyone had a place to be, a role to play.

Except me. I was an outsider to this world. Anytime I’d needed work done on my Bianchi, Jake had done it for me. The one time I’d needed something bigger fixed, Jake had asked his team mechanic for free help.

His team mechanic. Gage Weston. I remembered something Mari had said about him: he was now the manager of Compass Bikes, where I, a known bandit, probably wasn’t welcome.

I glanced out the window at my mom’s departing car. If I ran now, I could catch her, and she’d be all too happy. “I don’t love this neighborhood,” she’d said when we first arrived in the stark industrial area near MIT. “Why don’t I wait outside while you ask about bike repairs and volunteer opportunities? Better yet, I’ll go in with you.”

“Mom. I’m blocks away from the Kendall T station,” I’d argued. “There are MIT summer session students everywhere around here.”

“I don’t know, honey. . . .”

“
Mom
. This is a great chance for me to get some ideas for a vlog I want to start. About volunteer work. You know, like for college applications.” I told her about my brainstorm idea that morning: starting a vlog about teen volunteering. I didn’t need GBCN to keep doing what I was already good at: talking to people and listening. The vlog would help restore my public image and also get me closer to people who’d known Juan Carlos.

Volunteer work. College.
Those two key words had instantly won me a day of freedom.

So there was no turning back now. I pushed my bike deeper into the store, desperate to find Mari without attracting the attention of Gage.

I remembered Mari’s strong reaction to the news that Juan Carlos had crashed. It made me think she knew him personally. So she might have some insight into who would want his bike. And Mari had swept the whole Chain Reaction route in a support van, passing the woods more than once. Maybe she’d seen something or someone odd.

I reached under my lightweight scarf and squeezed Juan Carlos’s necklace for luck, then arranged the fabric to conceal it. I didn’t want to answer questions about it.

I scanned the crowds. Most people were in the mechanics shop area, behind the counter. They were clustered around bike repair stands or putting together parts strewn out on the floor.

Where was Mari?

Backing up to get a better view, I knocked over a display of water bottles.

As I scrambled to reconstruct the Great Pyramid, I looked up and saw a girl glaring at me, hands on her hips. She had grease streaks on her face, and a blue bandanna holding her bangs off her forehead. But even without the name tag on her Compass Bikes T-shirt—
MARISOL VARGAS, ASSI
STANT MECHANIC
—I knew who she was.

Mari smirked. “You. The bandit rider.”

“My name’s Tessa, actually. Tessa Taylor. I think I told you it was Teresa, but—”

“I know who you are now. My little sisters used to watch your show. They always liked your character. Said you were like Dora—older, of course. And better dressed.”

“Dora?”

“Dora the Explorer. The cartoon? They said you were like Dora for big kids. The way you always listed information in threes. And the map gimmick—locating the volunteers on that little map by spinning around—three times, right?—and throwing a dart in it? They thought that was cute.” She smirked. “Dora the Explorer, she has a map, too. And a backpack.”

“I’m not a character,” I informed her. “That was really me on the show.” The comparison to Dora—a character who amused preschoolers—that stung. I was Bianca Slade now, here to ask tough questions.

“Well, whatever. It doesn’t really matter now, right?” Mari shoved her hands in her jeans pockets and regarded me with a trace of amusement.

I could tell she’d heard the word on the street. She knew I was media roadkill.

“So. You hijacked the cancer ride, and now you’ve come to trash our store?” She raised an eyebrow as I placed the last water bottle back on the top of the wobbling pyramid. “How nice of you to include us on your wanton path of destruction.”

“Actually, I’m here to get my bike fixed.”

“Urgently? We’re finishing our bike drive today and have to process these donations.”

“I guess it’s not so urgent. Hey, why don’t I donate my bike instead? Can you use it?” I pushed it toward her. It’s not like I was ever going to ride it again. And the donation could win me points. I might get more information from Mari if I proved we were on the same side.

She walked around my bike, inspecting it. “The spokes are hopeless in front, but the wheel can be replaced. Nice steel frame—no obvious cracks or dents, but we’ll have to take a closer look before we can donate it whole. If there’s any doubt, for safety reasons, we’d strip it for parts. It’s a good bike. You’re not serious about giving it up.”

“It has bad memories.”

“Because of Chain Reaction?”

“Because of my boyfriend. I mean, my ex.”

“Ah. The ex-boyfriend and also the ex-racer, right?”

“Right.” I was about to ask her if she’d seen Jake before the race without me, but she kept on talking. “That’s a little extreme, don’t you think? I mean, you can ditch a guy anytime. Another one comes along eventually. Right?”

“Sure,” I said, looking away. Would another come along?

“My advice?” she went on. “Lose the guy. Keep the sport.”

“Thanks. Duly noted.” My Jake wounds were still too raw, too exposed. I didn’t want to go there. I changed the subject. “Where are all these bikes going anyway?”

“Ecuador.”

“Why Ecuador?” I asked, trying not to betray my excitement. Mari
must
have known Juan Carlos personally! “Don’t they have bikes there?”

“They do, but they need more
decent
bikes, and parts,” said Mari. “Like in poor sections of Quito—that’s the capital city—and in villages. There are places in the rain forest where kids stop going to school because they can’t get to the middle schools or high schools that are ten miles or more away. But if they have bikes, they can get to school, finish their education, and avoid taking crappy jobs or getting married and pregnant at age fifteen. Bikes change lives.”

She spoke so passionately, I knew I’d found a safe topic, a way to get her to put her anger toward me to the side and to open up. At the same time, I felt something stirring inside
me
. I wished I could do something so helpful myself, instead of always interviewing everyone else about their visions, their causes. What would it be like to find a cause of my own?

“So we’ve got a forty-foot shipping container coming tomorrow afternoon, and we have to get the donated bikes prepped and loaded by Thursday afternoon,” Mari went on. “We’re hurrying to get this shipment down there.”

“Why the hurry?”

“It’s in honor of Juan Carlos. This was a project he started.” Mari blinked, her eyes glassy. “And of course we want to get them there in time for the Pan-American Cycling Tour.”

The PAC Tour. When we’d talked at Chain Reaction, Juan Carlos had mentioned leaving for Bogotá soon. “Isn’t it in Colombia?” I asked.

“It starts there, but it goes to three countries. Colombia, Venezuela, and Ecuador,” said Mari. “Plus, Ecuador’s capital city, Quito, is doing a big cycling exposition timed with the tour. We want this delivery to be a beautiful thing, the unloading timed with the bike tour finish and the expo. Good advertising for Vuelta, and a fitting tribute to Juan Carlos. That was Gage’s idea.”

Now I understood the fast-paced mechanical dance going on in the shop, the choreography among bikes and people, parts and tools. Time pressure.

“The bikes that are damaged or too old we’re stripping for usable parts,” Mari went on. “And the good bikes have to be partially disassembled for shipping. We have two days to prep and pack four hundred bikes into a box.”

“That’s a lot of work.” It looked like interesting work, actually, but I tore my eyes away from the busy mechanics and got back on track. “So, um, did you know Juan Carlos pretty well?”

Her face suddenly closed. “Why so many questions, Dora?”

“I’m starting a vlog about young adults who do volunteer work.” My mind whirled. “And I want to profile Juan Carlos on it. As a kind of memorial tribute thing.”

Mari tipped her head. “Huh. That’s nice,” she said cautiously. “Okay. He’d been volunteering with our Earn-a-Bike program. Don’t you want to take some notes?”

“No. I’ll remember. Go on. What’d he do with your program?”

“He dropped in, even after he went pro, whenever he had time. He loved teaching bike mechanics to kids and helping them build their own bikes.”

“He adored children,” I remembered out loud.

“Yeah. He really connected with the kids.”

I followed Mari’s gaze to a glossy photo of Juan Carlos, tacked to a wall near the door. It was an official team portrait, autographed. Beneath it, attached to a memorial poster that people were signing to send to his family in Ecuador, was a collage of snapshots taken in the store. I bent closer to see. Juan Carlos helping a little girl oil a bike chain, the girl looking up at him with adoration. Juan Carlos showing a teen guy how to true his wheel.

I felt a pang inside me. A sour plucked string from a broken part. Juan Carlos had been a force for good. The kind of person I was before Jake. The kind of person I wanted to be again.

One snapshot showed him standing with younger riders, against a background of rolling green hills and snowcapped mountains. “Wow, gorgeous,” I murmured.

“Wasn’t he?”

“I meant the place. Where was this picture taken?” I tried to ignore Mari’s slip, but I couldn’t. She’d liked the guy. A lot. That was clear.

Mari flushed. “Oh. Right. Quito. That’s his hometown.”

“Have you ever been there?”

“Not yet. But I have cousins there—my dad was born there and moved here when he was a kid. I’m flying there this weekend, actually. As a Vuelta volunteer.”

“Vuelta! Juan Carlos was involved with that group, wasn’t he?”

“Yeah. And they’re a big deal. They’ve helped turn Quito into this huge biking city.”

“So you’re going there. That’s awesome. What are you going to do with Vuelta?”

“Teach bike mechanics to girls and women.” She couldn’t hold back her proud smile.

I marveled at her confidence. She was someone making her own way in the world, without pushy parents or coaches behind her. I wondered what that must feel like, to be so committed to something big, so sure of where you were going. To be able to say, “It’s my life” and know exactly what that meant. Nobody had scripted those words for her.

Mari reached behind the front counter and handed me a bilingual brochure. “You should mention Vuelta in your vlog.” She smiled briefly. “Put that in your backpack, Dora.”

My face burned at the Dora reference again. But I just said, “I’ll mention it,” and slid it into my tote bag.

“Hey, can I ask you something else?” I said. The store was getting even busier. I couldn’t lose my chance to ask the most important question of all. “You were driving that support van yesterday. At Chain Reaction. Did you notice anyone near the woods on Great Marsh Road, or anywhere near the woods, before the ride?”

She thought a moment. “No. Why do you ask that?”

I almost told her about the stolen bike in the woods, and about Darwin and his threatening texts. But Gage appeared behind the counter and was now looking our way. Because he was a ride official, probably involved in the investigation, I had to watch what I said. “Where were you from about eight in the morning till the start of the race?”

“Oh my God. Do you think I did something? What are you getting at?”

“No! I’m just curious. I heard there was a crash scene investigation.”

But her pause made me pause. Could Mari—not Jake—have been the bike thief working with Darwin? Maybe. I listed reasons in my mind. She had a van—the perfect place to hide a bike, and the perfect cover if anyone caught her. She needed money to finance her Ecuadorian adventure. If she’d stolen the bike for a fee, working for Darwin, that money could go a long way. Literally.

I thought of a test I could run. Darwin had said something on the phone in the woods when he made that second phone call. Something about fruit—mangoes. Yes. Maybe the mango thing was a way to identify his contact person.

“You know, mangoes are best at this time of year,” I ventured, watching her carefully.

“Good to know,” she said, staring at me like I’d lost my mind.

I realized my test was stupid. If Darwin’s statement was some kind of code, I didn’t know the desired response. “Sorry. Just stating, um, a random mango fact. I do that sometimes. It’s like a tic.”

Mari shrugged. “Whatever, random mango girl.” Her eyes flicked to the photos of Juan Carlos again, and I immediately erased my suspicion. Mari had strong feelings for Juan Carlos, that much was clear. Why would she have taken his bike?

Still, she might have seen something. I asked again where she was before the race.

“I was in my van that whole hour before,” she said. “Why are you asking all this?”

I glanced at Gage and lowered my voice to a near-whisper. “I heard a rumor he might have been missing his spare bike,” I explained. “And Preston Lane said in a TV interview that Juan Carlos was late for the ride. I’m trying to figure out why.”

“So you think he was looking for a missing bike?”

“Maybe.” If he’d gotten my half-finished text, which had just enough information to go on, he could have. Crap. Maybe he’d gone back for the bike himself. Maybe
I’d
made him late for the start, by texting him. Fresh pangs of guilt stabbed at me. If he’d started on time, with his team, and not back with the recreational riders, he’d never have been affected by my crash. He’d still be alive.