Secret at Mystic Lake (2 page)

George winced at the sound of her real name. Nobody ever used it except for her parents. But she quickly recovered and leaned in to give him a hug. “Oh, we are,” she assured him.

Caitlin and Henry appeared in the doorway then. Henry looked relaxed as he checked his phone, but Caitlin looked slightly stressed. She put on a bright smile and said, “Bike tour participants, I have to apologize. We had a printer malfunction last night”—here she shot Henry a meaningful glance—“and I was unable to print out your tour maps. But Henry and I have maps, and I promise you're safe under our leadership!”

Zoe laughed that awful laugh. “Haw, haw. What would a map even have on it out here—‘You pass more trees here, then more trees'?”

George cleared her throat. “I think what Zoe means is . . . it's fine,” she said, shooting Caitlin a comforting smile.

Caitlin's grin seemed to become a little more relaxed then. “Great. Well, let's all go outside. It's time to get ready to roll!”

Twenty minutes later I settled myself on my bike seat and pushed off, following behind Bess, George, and four others, including Zoe.

The Faynes stood waving on the steps of the bed-and-breakfast.

“Have fun!” Mrs. Fayne called. Bess turned around and shook her head as if to say,
Like that's possible
.

George turned her head and flashed a sincere smile at her parents. “Thank you so much, you guys!”

We all kept waving and calling our good-byes until we rounded a corner out of sight. We passed a low wall of pine trees and suddenly a gorgeous vista came into view: rolling hills surrounding a glimmering blue lake. Mystic Lake. Everyone oohed and aahed.

Henry, who was in the lead with Caitlin, turned his head to call back, “This is just the beginning! You guys won't believe the beauty we'll experience on this trip.”

Bess, who was already panting behind me, let out a little sigh. “I hope we experience lots of resting, too,” she muttered, too low for most of the group to hear. But Zoe, who was in the back of the pack with us, laughed that same crazy laugh.

“Haw, haw, haw, haw! You said it. This is pretty
and all, but I'd be just as happy at home in front of last night's
Project Runway
.”

Bess glanced at Zoe with a surprised, wide-eyed stare that said something like,
You just might be my soul mate
. “Who's your favorite?” she asked, tossing her long blond ponytail.

“Angelo,” Zoe replied quickly. “Heather is too avant-garde for me. And Justin can only do pants.”

Bess nodded appreciatively. “Oh my gosh, come ride by me,” she said, gesturing to the space next to her bike. “You could be the one thing that gets me through this tour.”

I couldn't help smiling—trust Bess to find a fellow fashionista and outdoors-hater, even in the least likely of places. But then I caught George's eye as Bess pedaled ahead, making space for Zoe.

She gave me a skeptical look. “Figures,” she whispered. “I finally get Bess out of the mall, and she finds a fellow shopper.”

By the time we stopped at a still green pond for lunch, we'd seen a family of deer, two groundhogs, a bald
eagle, and something George swore was an elk but just looked like a big log to me. We'd also seen, as Henry had promised, tons more breathtaking scenery.

Still, I could feel my muscles complaining as I dragged myself off the bike and walked the short distance from where we'd left our gear by the side of the road to the picnic tables a few yards through the trees, by the pond.
It's going to be an aspirin night!
I thought.

George took in the clear, still pond, ringed by wildflowers, with a towering purple hill in the distance, and let out an appreciative sigh. “Isn't it amazing?” she asked. “This is exactly what I was dreaming of when I told my parents about this tour.”

A short, gray-haired man beside her, one of our fellow bikers, looked out at the same vista and nodded sagely. “Communing with nature makes us feel more alive,” he said solemnly.

George looked over at him and smiled. “I don't know if we've met. I'm George,” she said.

“Dagger,” he replied, nodding.

“And I'm Nancy,” I added.

“Nice to meet you both.”

Dagger was the only person on the tour we hadn't yet met. The group was made up of Bess, George, myself, Henry, Caitlin, Zoe, and Dagger. So far Dagger, Caitlin, and Henry seemed like serious bikers, while George, Bess, Zoe, and I pulled up the rear. Caitlin was very patient with us, though. She pointed out that we were all there to see the sights, first and foremost—how fast we saw them was unimportant.

We all settled down by the pond while Caitlin fished around in a cooler and brought out sandwiches and fruit. Henry walked up to the table and sat down heavily. I noticed he made no move to help his sister, who arranged eight sandwiches on the table, all in color-coded plastic bags.

“The red are ham and cheese, the green are turkey with lettuce and tomato, and the yellow are hummus and cucumber,” she said, smiling sheepishly. “I didn't know if we had any vegetarians or vegans in the group.”

“No animal products for me! I'm vegan, and I'm
starving,” Dagger said, reaching for a yellow bag. “Thanks!”

Bess seemed restless; she kept glancing back at the road with an uncomfortable expression on her face.

“Something wrong, cuz?” George asked, taking a big bite of her ham and cheese sandwich.

Bess grimaced. “It's just—is it really safe to leave our stuff by the side of the road like that?” she asked. “I know we're in the middle of nowhere, but it feels wrong.”

Caitlin laughed. “We're in a beautiful, rustic spot—not quite the middle of nowhere,” she said, gesturing to the pond. “Would nowhere have scenery like this?”

Bess looked unamused. “It's very pretty,” she said, “but you know what I mean.”

Zoe spoke up. “It feels a little weird to me, too, Bess—it must be a city girl thing!”

George glanced at me and rolled her eyes.
We're all city girls,
she mouthed.

Zoe went on, “But who's going to take our stuff out here?”

Henry nodded. “Exactly—it's totally safe, guys. If anyone happens by, it will be another hiker who knows how precious that gear is. They'd never steal.”

Bess shrugged. “Okay—if you say so.” She sat down and we all dug in to our sandwiches, making polite conversation about where we were from, what we did, and what had brought us to the tour. Dagger was a bookkeeper from Chicago who wanted to feel closer to nature, and offered to lead us all in meditation just after dawn the next morning. Henry and Caitlin were recent high school graduates from the nearby town of Taylorville. Zoe was a college student who was spending the summer with her parents in nearby Cedar Village.

“I only came on this tour,” she said, dramatically waving her orange section, “because my friend Gemma made me.”

Caitlin raised an eyebrow. “Oh, great,” she said. If she was being sarcastic, Zoe didn't pick up on it.

“I'm really not a nature person,” she went on. “I like comfy beds, and good sheets, and manicures, and cable TV. But Adventures and Company said my deposit
was nonrefundable, so I'm doing my best to be a good sport. Like, I brought a ton of nail polish, so if anyone wants a manicure tonight, you know where to go.”

Bess raised her hand. “Me!” she said cheerfully. “I want a manicure tonight.”

Zoe smirked at her. “We can complain to each other about all the good TV we're missing.”

Caitlin bunched up her lunch bag with a loud crinkling sound. “Anyway,” she said, “we have another twenty miles or so before we get to our campsite, so we'd better get going.”

Everyone stood, and when I struggled to get to my feet, I fully realized how stiff my muscles had gotten during our short rest—and how sore I would be that night. Oh well. I was really enjoying the ride and the scenery so far. Caitlin led the way through the trees back to our bikes and gear, but stopped short when she got to the road. “Oh . . . oh no,” she murmured.

“What is it?” Zoe asked, crashing through the trees behind her. “Is something wrong?”

Caitlin was staring at the ground. “That's strange,”
she said, turning to look at Henry with a confused expression.

“What?” Zoe asked again.

Henry looked where Caitlin was staring, and his face paled. “Uh—it looks like . . . ?” he said, glancing at his sister.

“Exactly,” she said to him. “Weird, no?”

Bess held up a hand, like she was in class. “Can someone please tell me what's wrong?” she asked.

Henry turned to her, clearly trying to look calm. “Oh, it's no biggie,” he said, adding in a tense chuckle. “It's just . . . one small problem . . .”

Caitlin shook her head, then pointed at our packs—where, I noticed suddenly, there seemed to be slightly less gear than there was before.

“A bunch of our stuff is gone,” she said in a hollow voice. “It looks like . . . our tents are all missing.”

ZOE PUSHED HER WAY FORWARD
, shoving Caitlin aside to take in the empty spot where our tents had been. “Our tents are missing?” she asked. “Are you kidding?”

Caitlin looked pained. “I mean . . . I'm pretty sure they were all right here.”

Zoe moved forward and started pushing aside the backpacks, peering around like the tents might be underneath. “Who would steal our tents?”

Henry moved forward to join her and Caitlin, poking at the backpacks and furrowing his brow. “I . . . hmmm.”

Bess cleared her throat behind me. “Should we go back?” she asked.

“No!” Caitlin replied, turning to frown at Bess, at the same time as her brother murmured, “Well . . .”

But I was still focused on the
what
, not the
what now
. “Can we go back to Zoe's question?” I asked. “Who would take our tents? It's not like they were that far away, and it's pretty quiet around here. But I didn't hear anyone come up while we were eating.”

George nodded. “Yeah—and it's not like this is an easy spot to get to. To get to our stuff without us hearing, a person would have to be on foot. But I guess, on foot, they couldn't have gotten very far.”

Henry raised an eyebrow. “That's a good point. Maybe this is a prank.”

For some reason this made Caitlin turn to him with an exasperated look. “A prank? Henry, if you—”

But Henry cut her off by raising a hand. “I had nothing to do with it, I swear. I'm just saying, that makes a lot more sense than any other explanation I can think of.” He gestured back to the rest of us, still
standing in the trees. “We didn't hear anybody ride or hike up. But each of us left the group at one point to use the bathroom or get supplies.”

We all looked at one another uncomfortably. He was saying one of us took the tents. Awk-ward.