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“Aw, man.”
Julia groans. “Okay. The sooner we solve this case, the sooner the bad guy will be put behind bars, so I guess I’m in.”
“You have got to be kidding me,” Tilly says. “I let you all into my house and this is what happens?”
“Should’ve seen it coming,” Sana says. “Come on, it’ll be fun. Don’t be such a lawyer, Tills, it’s boring.”
Tilly slumps in his chair. “Selena is going to be so pissed.”
“She got him the whip,” Vera whispers loudly to everyone.
“She means to say Selena’s got me whipped, not that Selena gifted me a whip,” Tilly says quickly, his face turning red.
“Whatever you say,” Sana says.
They begin discussing all of the information that Vera has shared with them. Oliver raises his hand.
“Yes?” Vera says.
“I spent quite a bit of time with Millie,” he says. “As friends. It was my bad, actually. I thought we were just hanging out as friends, but Millie had different ideas and we kind of had a falling out.”
“Oof,” Riki says. “That sounds tough.”
“Yeah. Ah, at one point, I saw her get on the bus from Vera’s.”
Vera claps with excitement. “Which bus? Someone get a Google Map, now!”
Riki takes out his phone and opens the Maps app. He keys in the bus number and they all lean forward to look at the route.
“She went in that direction,” Oliver says, pointing at an area of the map.
“Oakland?” Riki says.
There’s silence for a moment. “Do you know where Millie lives?” Julia says.
Vera shakes her head.
“She could’ve gone anywhere. She could’ve just jumped on thefirst bus she saw to get away and then made a change later on,” Sana says.
“Oliver, what else you know about Millie?” Vera says.
Oliver ponders the question. “We joked around quite a bit. She told me she likes to stargaze, and Thomas used to fold paper flowers for her to put in a vase on her windowsill. Oh, she calls her mom and dad ‘Mother’ and ‘Father.’ ”
“That’s…kind of creepy,” Sana says.
“Yeah. I asked her about them once, and she clammed up. I got the sense that she was kind of scared.” Oliver grimaces. “In hindsight, I should’ve questioned it more. It’s becoming obvious to me now that she wasn’t okay at all.”
“No use looking at your behind,” Vera says. “Look forward. So, we think this Millie’s parents are hurting her maybe?”
“Well, hang on,” Sana says, “didn’t she tell you she came from China? Did her parents come with her?”
“You know what?” Oliver says. “She said something like, ‘My parents grow all sorts of crops on their farm.’ She said, ‘grow,’ present tense. So, maybe her parents are back in China?”
“Let’s say they are,” Julia says. “Where does that leave us?”
Vera sighs. “You kids are hopeless. Too much time is wasting. I better call for backup.”
Twenty-Seven