Killer Connections Read online

  Dangerous Pranks

  “Have you seen anyone sneaking around this place in the past couple of days?” I asked. “Especially anyone connected with GTT?”

  “Oh, I’m sure those boys would never pull such a serious and dangerous prank.” Montgomery shook his head firmly, then hesitated. “Well, most of them, in any case …”

  He looked troubled. I was about to ask him what he meant by “most of them.”

  But before I could, I heard a piercing, terrified scream from somewhere outside that open window.

  #1 Extreme Danger

  #2 Running on Fumes

  #3 Boardwalk Bust

  #4 Thrill Ride

  #5 Rocky Road

  #6 Burned

  #7 Operation: Survival

  #8 Top Ten Ways to Die

  #9 Martial Law

  #10Blown Away

  #11Hurricane Joe

  #12Trouble in Paradise

  #13The Mummy’s Curse

  #14Hazed

  #15Death and Diamonds

  #16Bayport Buccaneers

  #17Murder at the Mall

  #18Pushed

  #19 Foul Play

  #20 Feeding Frenzy

  #21 Comic Con Artist

  Super Mystery #1:Wanted

  Super Mystery #2:Kidnapped at the Casino

  #22 Deprivation House

  #23 House Arrest

  Haunted: Special Ghost Stories Edition

  #24 Murder House

  #25 Double Trouble

  #26 Double Down

  #27 Double Deception

  #28Galaxy X

  #29X-plosion!

  #30The X-Factor!

  #31Killer Mission

  #32Private Killer

  #33 Killer Connections

  Available from Simon & Schuster

  #33 Killer Connections

  BOOK THREE IN THE KILLER MYSTERY TRILOGY

  Aladdin

  New York London Toronto Sydney

  If you purchased this book without a cover, you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the publisher, and neither the author nor the publisher has received any payment for this “stripped book.”

  This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real locales are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  ALADDIN

  An imprint of Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing Division

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  First Aladdin paperback edition March 2010

  Copyright © 2010 by Simon & Schuster, Inc.

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  Designed by Sammy Yuen Jr.

  The text of this book was set in Aldine 401 BT.

  Manufactured in the United States of America / 0110 OFF

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  Library of Congress Control Number 2009934091

  ISBN 978-1-4169-8696-6

  ISBN 978-1-4169-9900-3 (eBook)

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  1. More Bad Blood

  2. Toxic Twists and Turns

  3. Fratricide

  4. Weird Science

  5. Sneaky Dealings

  6. Sink or Swim

  7. Voices of Dissent

  8. Damage Done

  9. Bad Sports

  10. On the Run

  11. Out of Place

  12. Surprising Discoveries

  13. Dog Gone

  14. Out of Time

  15. Secrets Revealed

  16. Fur Sure

  More Bad Blood

  No!” I cried. My breath came in ragged gasps as I ran. My legs ached. My heart was pounding out of my chest.

  I shot a glance back. My pursuer was catching up. Another step and he’d be on me. His face was twisted in a determined grimace.

  But I was determined too. I had to shake him. I dodged one way, then another.

  Unfortunately, that wasn’t enough to lose him.

  “Gaaaarh!” the guy growled as he leaped forward.

  “Oof!” I hit the ground hard. The guy landed on top of me, pinning me to the ground.

  “Fourth down!” someone yelled from nearby. “Our ball, dude.”

  I groaned as I sat up. “Yo, Van,” I complained to the guy who’d brought me down. “This isn’t the NFL, you know.”

  “Sorry, Frank.” Van flashed me a goofy grin. He was a big guy. Nice, but a little quick-tempered. He tended to get caught up in things. Even if one of those things was just a friendly game of football on the Green.

  “No biggie. I think all my bones are still intact.” I climbed to my feet and traded a fist bump with him. Then I tossed the ball to another player.

  “Come on, Frank,” Spencer Thane called as I brushed the dirt and snow off my clothes. “Huddle up.”

  Was Spencer giving me a funny look? I wasn’t sure. But it wouldn’t be too surprising. He was one of the few people at the Willis Firth Academy who knew who I really was.

  See, I’m not really the exclusive New England prep school type. My brother Joe and I attend public school back home in Bayport. But for the past couple of weeks we’d been faking it at Firth. I was posing as a student. Joe was acting as handler for the school’s mascot, a German shepherd dog named Killer.

  That’s because Joe and I are ATAC agents. ATAC stands for American Teens Against Crime. Our father, Fenton Hardy, started the group. It trains teens to work undercover missions where adult agents would stick out like a cat at a dog show. Joe and I had solved tons of tough cases so far.

  But this was proving to be one of the toughest yet. Firth’s headmaster, Dr. Darity, had called ATAC after a rash of trouble on campus. There had been some graffiti, some threats, an injured swim coach, and various other things.

  A lot of the trouble seemed to revolve around a certain fraternity, Gamma Theta Theta—better known as GTT. Joe and I had figured out that one of GTT’s pledges, a sophomore named Ellery Marks, was behind most of the problems. Ellery was rebelling against his father. He didn’t want to follow the old man into the frat—or into the Brothers of Erebus, a secret society within GTT. He’d been so determined to prove his point that he’d accidentally killed one of his fellow pledges and nearly disfigured another. Thanks to his family’s wealth and connections, though, the whole thing had been hushed up and most of the school still didn’t know why Ellery had left campus so abruptly.

  But it hadn’t ended there. Before Joe and I could pack up and head home, we’d found a couple of buckets of blood that Ellery didn’t know anything about. It seemed he wasn’t the only one causing trouble at Firth.

  Soon it became clear that Dr. Darit
y’s daughter, Destiny, was the second troublemaker’s target. Destiny was the only female student at Firth. She’d been kicked out of her old boarding school, and her father had convinced the trustees to let his daughter finish out her senior year at Firth.

  Destiny had quickly proved herself as a star player on the soccer team. She’d also proved herself to be spoiled, reckless, and maybe a little psycho. That didn’t make her too popular with most people. The one exception was a junior named Lee Jenkins. In the course of our investigation, Joe and I had discovered that Destiny and Lee were a secret couple. That was kind of a bummer for Joe. He’d thought Destiny had the hots for him, mostly because she kept breaking into his cottage and flirting with him. See? Kind of nuts.

  Anyway, it turned out that Casey, a student from Destiny’s old school, had a serious grudge against her. He’d transferred to Firth just to mess with her. Joe and I finally nabbed him right before a big soccer game between the two schools.

  That had been yesterday. Firth had won the game, and the team had celebrated by crowning Destiny and Lee as co-MVPs. But when the two of them had sipped some PowerUp punch from the Winner’s Cup trophy, they’d both started staggering around. The punch had been spiked with some sort of fast-acting drug. The two of them had ended up sleeping it off in the infirmary, while Joe and I sent a sample of the tainted PowerUp to ATAC for analysis. They’d promised us results sometime today.

  While we waited, we were both still doing our best to keep blending in at Firth. In my case, that meant a casual game of football on the Green. Not bad work if you can get it.

  I jogged over to join the huddle. It was a cool, crisp Sunday just after brunch. Students were playing games, wandering down the brick-paved walks, or just chilling on the Green.

  My eyes wandered toward the imposing four-story facade of Firth Hall, the largest and oldest building on campus. I was just in time to see Dr. Montgomery hobbling down the steep stone steps with the help of his cane. Dr. Montgomery was the former headmaster of Firth. He’d retired a few years back but still lived on campus and knew just about everything that went on there. For instance, he’d found out about Joe and me, though we still weren’t sure how. Probably not a big deal, considering the guy was about a million years old and couldn’t even walk without that cane. But he and Spencer weren’t the only ones who knew our true IDs.

  Thinking about that made me glance at Spencer. He’d been there when we’d taken down Ellery, so that’s how he knew. Ellery and his father knew too, of course, though they were both long gone by now. But what if they’d told anyone else? The thought made me uneasy.

  ATAC HQ had been concerned too. They’d even considered pulling us out. But Joe and I had convinced them to let us stay a little longer to try to wrap up the mission.

  Joe always says I worry too much. Maybe he’s right. I did my best to shake it off and focus on the game. Spencer had taken charge of the huddle. No surprise there. The guy was a natural-born leader. He was a senior and the president of GTT.

  Then I spotted something else that made my stomach twist. Only not from worry this time. It was Patton Gage. Patton was a junior who had been a suspect for a while, mostly because he was totally obsessed with getting into GTT. He’d been rejected the previous year, and things weren’t looking too good for him this year, either.

  Actually, he wasn’t looking too good right now. His face was still red and blistered from the acid he’d been burned by during a hazing ritual. One of Ellery’s nasty little pranks.

  Patton didn’t notice me watching him. He rushed toward another group of students farther down the Green. They were playing soccer, but Patton didn’t seem dressed to join in. He was wearing a wool overcoat with nice slacks and dress shoes showing below them. It seemed a little formal for a lazy Sunday. But Patton was kind of an odd duck, so I didn’t worry about it.

  I saw him join the soccer group and start talking and waving his hands around, looking excited. That wasn’t much to worry about either. Patton was a huge gossip. Still, I couldn’t help wondering what new rumor he was spreading to try to fit in.

  “Let’s go!” Spencer exclaimed, breaking into my thoughts.

  The others let out a cheer. I joined in, even though I had no idea what the next play was. Oh, well. Being in ATAC means being good at improvising.

  The game started up again. But the QB had barely snapped the ball when loud, angry shouts rang out from the direction of the soccer game.

  I glanced that way. My eyes widened when I saw one kid give another a hard shove. Several others were squaring off, yelling and looking upset. It didn’t take special ATAC training to recognize an argument that was about to turn violent.

  Spencer saw it too. “Whoa,” he said. “What’s going on over there?”

  He dropped the football and hurried over. I was right on his heels, along with most of the others.

  When we got there, the shouting was louder than ever. The soccer players were so caught up in their argument that it took a moment to get their attention. But finally Spencer broke through. Natural leader, remember?

  “What’s up, you guys?” he demanded.

  One of the soccer players was a senior member of GTT. He answered first. “These jerks are ragging on Lee,” he spat out, glaring at some of the others.

  “What do you mean?” I asked, instantly on alert. Lee had never been a serious suspect in the mission. But he had been a victim. His grades had been messed with in the school’s online system. Neither of our culprits had fessed up to that one. Then there was the Winner’s Cup incident, of course….

  “We just found out who poisoned the Winner’s Cup,” a hawk-nosed blond kid said. “It was Lee!”

  “What?” Spencer exclaimed. “That’s crazy. Lee got sick from drinking that stuff, remember?”

  “That’s what’s so sneaky about it.” Hawknose narrowed his eyes. “He wanted GTT to feel sorry for him so they’d let him in.”

  “Are you nuts?” Another GTTer shook his head. “Lee was a shoo-in anyway.”

  “Yeah. Plus, he’d never do anything like that,” Van put in.

  “How can you say that?” Another kid frowned. “Lee’s not really one of us. You never know what someone like that will do.”

  “Someone like that?” the first GTTer challenged him, fists at the ready. “What do you mean?”

  “What do you think I mean? I always thought it was a stupid idea to let in a bunch of grubby scholarship kids.”

  I winced. Lee was one of the few Firth students who wasn’t filthy rich. He was a working-class kid from Boston. Dr. Darity had arranged a scholarship fund for a few deserving kids who couldn’t afford prep school tuition. So far Lee was the star of the program. Straight-A student. Top athlete. GTT pledge. And as Joe and I had witnessed, he was the newest member of the Brothers of Erebus, too. Whatever that meant.

  The argument was deteriorating again. There were taunts, insults, cheap shots, and a few shoves. I shot an irritated look at Patton. He’d started all this; I wondered if he was enjoying it.

  But Patton didn’t even seem to be paying attention anymore. He was checking his watch.

  “Look, guys,” Spencer was saying loudly, doing his best to step between a couple of guys who looked ready to kill each other. “Let’s just calm down and—”

  “What’s going on here, lads?” asked a loud voice with a heavy British accent.

  I spun around. A man was standing there holding a microphone in one hand and a camcorder in the other. His blocky, ruddy face wore a smarmy smile. The rest of him wore a shiny tan suit. His collar was open halfway to his belly, revealing a carpet of chest hair.

  “Now, I heard things were getting fraught and freaky here at fancy Firth,” the newcomer said, flipping his gelled blond hair out of his face with a practiced move. “But I had no idea it was this frenzied!”

  Toxic Twists and Turns

  Come on, boy. Please?” I stared at Killer. He stared back from halfway across the room. I lunged forward. He dart
ed away, staying just out of reach.

  “I always thought I loved dogs,” I said through gritted teeth. “I’m starting to rethink that.”

  Clearly the feeling was mutual. Killer stopped and sat down. Still out of reach.

  I sighed, trying not to let my annoyance show. That would just be letting him win.

  “This is all your fault, you know,” I informed him as I edged closer. “If you hadn’t rolled in something gross during your morning walk, I wouldn’t have needed to take off your collar to wash it. Which, by the way? So not what I signed on for. I mean, it’s bad enough that Aunt Trudy makes me help with my own laundry back home. Now I’m doing laundry for a dog?”

  Killer didn’t show much sympathy. In fact, if I hadn’t known better, I might have thought he was laughing at me. Man’s best friend? No way. At least not when it came to me. He loved just about everybody else. His former trainer, Hunt Hunter. The majority of the Firth students and faculty. Perfect strangers. And most of all …

  “Anybody home?”

  It was Frank. Killer changed instantly. He leaped to his feet, racing over with happily wagging tail and lolling tongue.

  Typical. Killer might be a tough, super-disciplined former police dog most of the time. But he was putty in Frank’s hands.

  “Don’t let him out the door,” I warned Frank. “His collar’s off, and he’s been enjoying his freedom a little too much. If you know what I mean.”

  Frank grinned. “You giving Joe a hard time, buddy?” He rubbed the dog on his furry ruff while Killer practically drooled with delight. “Come on, playtime’s over, okay? Now sit.”

  Killer instantly dropped to his haunches. Frank grabbed the collar out of my hand and snapped it on.

  “Good boy,” he told the dog. Then he shot me a sly look. “So what’s the big deal?”

  I ignored that. “Where have you been since brunch? Making snow angels?” I asked, noting that his clothes weren’t exactly fresh out of the dryer. I guess I still had laundry on the brain.

  “Some of the guys invited me to play a little pickup game of football on the Green.”