Adventures In Murder Chasing (Funeral Crashing #3) (10 page)

Ariel looked shocked at my outburst. "What? I just..."

"Sorry," I said automatically.

"No, I..." Ariel started and then after a moment continued, her face brightening, "Well, so, you're on another case! Tell me about it!"

Why was... Okay, I was starting to get paranoid because I was questioning everything Ariel was doing. Why was she suddenly fake excited that I was working on a new case? Where was my evil ex-bff? Did she have a split personality or something? What was going on with her? Why was she trying to be supportive of me funeral crashing and murder investigating and not making fun of me instead? I mean, even if she was faking the happy voice, why bother? I really, truly didn't know what to make of this girl standing in front of me. Who was she? More importantly, what did she want?

I couldn't think about it, "We have to go Ariel. We're going to be late for class."

"But the bell hasn't even rung yet," Ariel was looking at me with a quizzical expression.

I noticed Ethan watching me too, but he didn't say anything. He had gotten good at following my lead.

"We just have to go," I said, shutting my locker, and walking away as quickly as I could, dragging Ethan along with me.

When we were a significant distance from Ariel, Ethan stopped me. "So, what was that about?"

"What?" I asked, innocently.

"You running away from Ariel?" Ethan asked.

"Oh, that," I said. "I always run from her. It's a habit."

Ethan frowned. "You don't always. I've seen you stand up to her plenty of times and she actually seemed like she was trying to be nice and not fuel a fight."

"Oh, but she's never nice," I started and then stopped. "I mean, unless she has an agenda. Only this time I can't figure out what that is and it's totally freaking me out."

"She can't just be being nice because she's trying to be nice?" Ethan asked.

"No. Ariel cannot be nice to be just nice. Not when it comes to me," I said.

"You're sure?" Ethan asked.

"Positive," I said.

"Even if she was trying to be your friend again?" Ethan asked.

I gulped. I had a murder case to think about.

"We're going to be late for class," I said and grabbed Ethan's hand again, dragging him down the hall. Ethan was nice enough not to mention the fact that the first bell still hadn't rung yet.

I spent the next few hours trying not to think about Ariel being weird and I definitely didn't get a chance to think more about my investigation until American History Class. We were in the computer lab doing research on articles about the president's last election. We were supposed to compare and contrast the last election with the earliest presidential elections, which we had discussed in class. How were they similar? Different? It was only supposed to be two pages, which was pretty short.

I finished most of my assignment about ten minutes before class was over. I could probably have finished the entire thing and not had homework, but I was aching to do more internet research on the case and Nico. I had been distracted all hour with the internet at my fingertips. As long as we didn't look up anything inappropriate and we were finished with our assignment, my teacher was okay with us surfing the net.

Okay, I wasn't quite finished with the work and that was supposed to be a perk of getting your work done quickly, but I couldn't help it! My brain wanted to focus on the case and not American History! So, I gave in. I'd lie and turn in what I had if I got caught. It was pretty much done. Regardless, I'm not sure what the protocol was on murder investigating at school. If anyone asked, though, I was writing a human-interest piece. I told myself to act and stay calm and I'd be fine. I wouldn't have to lie if I didn't get caught. Still, I felt oddly paranoid as I looked up Nico's name on the internet.

There really wasn't too much about Nico on the search engines besides the obituary. He hadn't helped sick kids like Gabe, so there were no news articles and he obviously hadn't been a high school sports star or anything either because they were always getting mentioned in the local paper. Social media wise, I only found a Facebook page and a Twitter account in Nico's name. The other Nicos that came up so weren't him and there were definitely a few of them. I scanned through about ten pages before I gave up on the general internet search of his name.

I clicked on Nico's Facebook page. Darn. It was private. That was so not helpful. Man, the internet totally sucked sometimes. Yeah, I got the whole point of privacy settings. I mean, all of my stuff had been set to private ever since I figured out how easy it was to find out personal information on people with the click of a button, but still. It didn't help me when the person I was investigating had the same settings in place. I looked at Nico's Twitter account, but there were only a few entries that were totally meaningless. It looked like Nico had set it up, but never used it.

I clicked back to Nico's private Facebook profile. How did I get in to see it? I needed to take a look at his friends list. It would give me a start in my investigation and on my suspect list.

I stared at the screen, lost in thought. There had to be a way in. I thought about asking Fiorella. Surely she was friends with Nico, but how did I explain to her why I wanted to see his friend's list without telling her why I wanted to see it? I couldn't tell her just yet. She was already grieving and I wanted to be sure Nico was murdered before I said anything to a family member.

I wondered if Troy was Nico's friend. He had to be. I pulled out my phone and hid it under the desk in front of me since we weren't supposed to use cell phones during school. I almost paused to think better of it, but sent Troy a text anyway:
Hey, are you friends with Nico on Facebook?

I ignored the gnawing feeling in my stomach that Ethan might not approve of me texting Troy. It had to be done.

A second later I got a response text from Troy:
Yes.

I looked at the phone. I needed Troy to sign into his account for me. That meant I'd need him to come to my house after school. Did I worry about what Ariel would think? I mean, she might be a little weirded out that her boyfriend was invited over to my house, alone. I could invite Ariel over too, but wouldn't that be awkward too? Ethan wouldn't care if Troy came over would he? The warning gnawing in the pit of my stomach gave me a definite answer. Wow, this boyfriend girlfriend...well, even ex-best friend stuff was all so complicated. Still, I was sure that in the end, Ethan would understand. It was in the name of the investigation after all. Ariel, I wasn't so sure. Then I reminded myself, as far as I knew we were still very much ex-bffs.

I sent Troy another text:
Any chance you can come over and log on to Facebook at my house so I can see his page? I get home around four.

A moment later I got a response:
Text me your address. I can be there around seven.

I took a deep breath and sent Troy my address. For some reason I felt a little nervous about him coming over to my house. I tried to redirect my thoughts. I still had homework to finish up for the end of the day. My brain should worry about that instead.

I finished my homework in record time when I got home from school. I did not want a repeat of the night before. In fact, I still had an hour to look up more information on Nico's case after I was done before Troy came over. I focused on Antonio. Between what Fiorella told me about him and my own first impression of him, I already knew most of what I found on the internet about him. Still, Antonio's Facebook page did lead me to the name of his girlfriend. Her name was Aryana Baker. I assumed she was the one he was with on the day Nico died. I might check into his alibi. Yeah, I definitely would, there was no might about it. I wrote her name down. I assumed that she too was a student at Landale College. Her profile was sadly, private. Still, there were enough photos of them on Antonio's page, that I'd recognize her. Other than that, I got a vague impression of Antonio. He was a macho guy. You know the type. I wrote it all down in my notebook. Yeah, I'd definitely be checking up on Antonio once I delved further into the case.

Sigh. I just needed to know more about Nico first before I started looking into suspects. I glanced over my notes on Ed Patawak. I was still at a dead end with him too. I had about twenty minutes before Troy arrived. I debated calling the police station to ask if Ed was in jail, but I felt really weary about it. I didn't want Detective Dixon getting wind of what I was doing just yet. I knew I could call anonymously, but couldn't the police trace that stuff? Maybe I was in their called ID as teen sleuth pest or something. I wondered if I could get Ethan to call or better yet, Suzie or Kyle. Surely they weren't on the police's radar.

So that was another dead end for now. I just really needed to start with Nico and that meant I was stuck until Troy came over. I felt frustrated. What time was it? I tried not to pace, waiting for the clock to strike seven.

Troy arrived about five minutes after seven. I'll admit it. I was sitting in the living room, staring out the window and waiting for him. I couldn't help it. I was climbing the walls with impatience.

I waited for Troy to ring the doorbell before I answered the door. From where I was sitting in the living room, I wasn't completely visible to the outside world. I didn't want Troy to think I was waiting for him with bated breath or anything. Then he might think I like liked him or something and that so didn't need to get back to Ariel or Ethan for that matter. Troy coming over to my house was probably going to be drama enough when they found out.

I opened the door. Troy was dressed in a button down shirt that matched his blue eyes and jeans. His blonde hair just slightly curled above the top of his shirt. I expected him in a t-shirt. I was suddenly glad that my dad was stuck late at a meeting. He might get the wrong idea about why Troy was coming over. Wait. Did Troy think I liked him? Why was he dressed up? Or was I totally overreacting because I knew in my head that Ethan would freak out? Breathe.

"Hey," Troy smiled at me.

"Hey," I said, still trying to remember to breathe, "Come in."

I let Troy into the house and led him into my bedroom. Okay, yeah, Ethan was definitely going to be mad at me. Even just thinking about having another guy in my bedroom that wasn't Ethan made me uneasy. Ethan would kind of have a right to be anxious about it, although he should totally trust me. I wasn't going to make out with Troy or anything, even if he did look cute and was all dressed up for some reason. Sure, that had almost happened once, but that was weeks ago and Ethan and I hadn't even been dating then. I mean, I barely knew Ethan or Troy then. Plus Troy was dating my ex-best friend and who wanted to cross that line, like ever? Definitely not me.

I walked over to my computer and sat down, waking it up from sleep mode. I motioned for Troy to sit on my bed, which was next to my desk. He pulled over a chair from the other side of my room instead and sat down right next to me. I pulled up the sign in page.

"Let me sign into my account," Troy said and typed in his information, leaning over me.

I looked away, not wanting to look like I was trying to figure out his password.

"Done," Troy said and I looked back to find that he was smiling at me.

I smiled back, "Cool."

Troy had already pulled up Nico's main page. Like anyone else I had cyber stalked, Nico had a billion friends. Well, okay, like a hundred and fifty. Still, that was more than enough for me to spend a lot of time going through it. I grabbed my already open case notebook and started writing down names.

"This could take awhile," I said. "Do you need anything to drink or eat or anything before I start?"

Troy shook his head, "I'm good. Do you want my help?"

"I'm okay," I said. "I'd rather just kind of look through it all first. I'll ask you about anyone I'm curious about. If you just want to chill..."

"Alright," Troy said. "You do your thing. I don't want to get in the way of your process or anything. Do you mind if I look at your books and movies and stuff?"

"No," I said. "And feel free to grab something to drink or whatever out of the kitchen if you want. I just need to write some things down and then we'll talk. I promise."

"Okay," Troy said, but he was already looking through my movies. "Let me know if I can help you in any way."

"Okay," I said, my eyes already wanting to become glued to the computer screen, but I glanced at Troy first.

I felt a little guilty ignoring him, just minutes after he arrived. Troy didn't seem to mind, though. He had picked up one of my DVDs and was reading the back of it. It was
Aliens
. I liked a good sci-fi horror movie every once in awhile. I focused back on the computer. I had a lot of work to do and I didn't want to waste too much of Troy's time.

A little over an hour and a half later I was done. I had clicked on everyone's profile and tried to get a quick idea of how they knew Nico. Some people were easy. They shared a common school. Other people were old, so they were probably relatives. I looked over to see what Troy was doing again. I felt bad. I had gotten so absorbed in my research that time had flown by in an instant. Troy had probably been bored stiff. He had fallen asleep on my bed, reading one of my books -
Lord of the Rings
by J.R.R. Tolkien. I had seen the movies, but never read them. My dad was the one that bought it for me, but I had never been able to get into the books. Maybe one day I would. The movies were great. I guess Troy felt the same way since he was asleep and practically drooling on the book.