Page 40 of Be A Detective, They Said. It’ll Be Fun, They Said

My brain raced to figure out how to fit together aliens and kidnapped paranormal geniuses. What was I missing?

And how did I get here, anyway? It was obviously due to someone who was paranormal? Could an alien transport people from place to place?

I dug around in my bag for my phone but came up empty. I must have dropped it when I was brought here. As if the Internet was going to tell me what abilities aliens had, anyway. It was all speculation. I mean, the Internet thinks vampires can’t enter a house without being invited.

Tell that to Nina…

How could I possibly drum up a suspect who might be an alien? I hadn’t seen any aliens as of late. Have you? Could aliens cloak themselves? Disguise themselves? Would we have been able to smell them, had we encountered any?

Was an alien responsible for this?

Stop. Stop speculating and get the heck out of here, Wanda Schwartz-Jefferson. Sam is missing. Nothing else matters. Find Sam.

I kept crawling along the wall, using my hands as an anchor to keep me grounded.

And then I heard it—a child’s cry.

“Help me! Please hurry! Help me! Help us!”

Us? Help us. The missing children were here. I knew it.

“Where are you?” I called out, my mouth dry, my legs shaking. “Keep calling for me! I’m coming!”

“She’s coming! I can hear her! She’s coming!”

This couldn’t be an illusion, could it? I didn’t recognize the voice, couldn’t parse whether it was a female or male voice, but I kept going, moving closer, inching agonizingly slowly along the wall.

Why couldn’t I see anything? I was a werewolf, for pizza’s sake! No manner of squinting helped my eyes to adjust. There was nothing but pitch black greeting them.

“Are you still there? My name is Wanda, who are you?”

“Help! Help! Help! It’s coming!”

It? “What was it? What’s your name?”

I began to rush along the wall, my fingers digging into what felt like concrete, aching from trying to keep myself from panicking by clawing my way toward the voices.

That was when I smacked into something hard, cracking the side of my forehead, preventing me from moving forward.

If only I could see! That’s when I remembered, I had a lighter in my purse. Nina calls it my Mary Poppins purse because I have everything but the kitchen sink inside.

I dug around and found it, yanking it out as though I’d just found the location of Noah’s Ark. I keep one in my purse for various reasons—one being quite foolish.

I’d once seen a movie where a car crashed and the woman was stuck in her seat belt while a fire raged in the backseat. She managed to burn the seat belt and escape the car.

I don’t remember the movie, nor do I even believe you could actually burn your way out of a seat belt, but some things stick with you, you know? So I always kept a lighter in my purse.

Okay?

I used my thumb, rolling it over the starter until it lit up like a Christmas tree.

Yahoo! Success!

I held it up, trying to figure out where I was and where to go next, when a tiny figure appeared out of nowhere.

Holding up the lighter, noting the wide space in front of me and all around, I cocked my head. I’d know those pointy ears anywhere.

“Mrs. Goodfellow?”

---