Haunted Waters Read online

  Thanks to the sets of twins who consulted with us on this series, especially Alex and Angela Wood.

  Visit Tyndale’s exciting Web site for kids at www.tyndale.com/kids.

  TYNDALE is a registered trademark of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.

  The Tyndale Kids logo is a trademark of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.

  Haunted Waters

  Copyright © 2005 by Jerry B. Jenkins. All rights reserved.

  Cover and interior photographs copyright © 2004 by Brian MacDonald. All rights reserved.

  Authors’ photograph © 2004 by Brian MacDonald. All rights reserved.

  Designed by Jacqueline L. Nuñez

  Edited by Lorie Popp

  Published in association with the literary agency of Alive Communications, Inc., 7680 Goddard Street, Suite 200, Colorado Springs, CO 80920.

  This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the authors’ imaginations or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of either the authors or publisher.

  For manufacturing information regarding this product, please call 1-800-323-9400.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Jenkins, Jerry B.

  Haunted waters / Jerry B. Jenkins ; Chris Fabry.

  p. cm. — (Red rock mysteries)

  Summary: The Timberline family makes a weekend getaway for a visit to a gold exhibit but it leads to a search for a stolen gold nugget and danger for the entire family.

  ISBN 978-1-4143-0140-2 (pbk.)

  [1. Fathers—Fiction. 2. Stepfamilies—Fiction. 3. Twins—Fiction. 4. Christian life—Fiction. 5. Mystery and detective stories.] I. Fabry, Chris, date. II. Title.

  PZ7.J4138Hau 2005

  [Fic]—dc22 2004026369

  This book is for Kristen Rebecca Fabry.

  Contents

  Prologue

  Part 1

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Part 2

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Part 3

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67

  Chapter 68

  Chapter 69

  Chapter 70

  Chapter 71

  Chapter 72

  Chapter 73

  About the Authors

  He didn’t want to kill them. He just wanted the evidence back. If they made it to the police with the picture, he was dead. Back in jail.

  If only those annoying kids hadn’t forced this. Twins. A boy and a girl. And their little brother and dad. Now they would all have to pay.

  He could see the fright in the kids’ eyes when he pulled beside their Land Cruiser. The boy held a cell phone to his ear.

  He rammed his vehicle into theirs and sent them swerving. The dad got the Cruiser under control and sped up.

  He matched their speed and pulled beside them again as they approached a lake. This was it. He would take care of the problem right here. He turned and forced them off the road.

  The Land Cruiser hit a patch of snowy grass. Taillights flashed, but it was too late. The SUV flew into the air and plunged into the lake. Water engulfed the vehicle and it slowly rolled to one side like a sunning sea lion, then sank.

  He slowed to watch frigid bubbles rise. No one could survive this. Some mother would cry tonight.

  He clicked his radio as he drove away. “The situation’s under control.”

  Chapter 1

  I didn’t want to move to Colorado. I didn’t want my dad to die or my mom to ever get married again either. And I sure didn’t want her to get religious all of a sudden. But all those things happened to my brother and me, so I guess you’ll just have to get used to it like we did.

  My name is Ashley Timberline, and my younger brother (by 57 seconds—but he’s still younger) is Bryce. We’re almost 14, if 217 days is almost. Our last name used to be Bishop, but our new dad adopted us, so now we’ve got his name. Good thing Mom didn’t name me Fern or Tabby. Imagine that with my new last name. Mom said we didn’t have to take the new name, but I would have felt bad hurting our stepfather’s feelings.

  My youngest brother, Dylan, who is four, was born before our real dad died. He’s a pain, but he’s a lot cuter than Bryce, and I can get him to do stuff just by offering him a couple of Smarties.

  We also got a big sister thrown in with our new dad. Leigh’s 16 and learning to drive. She has a boyfriend named Randy, but Bryce and I call him The Creep. He’s actually kind of cute, with hair he never combs and big muscles. But we give her a hard time about him anyway.

  Randy played on the varsity football team in the fall and now varsity baseball this spring. He’s always getting his name in the paper, and once there was a picture of him making a big tackle. I wrote “The Creep takes down his opponent” underneath it, and Leigh got mad. Not as mad as the time Bryce dipped her hairbrush in the fish tank, but mad enough to tell her dad. He came in and sat on my bed and grinned for about five minutes, then left.

  The hardest thing we’ve ever done is move from Illinois. When we drove away from our little house, it seemed like we left every friend we’d ever had. The new people were already moving in, which was sad. We’d written our names in the cement by the driveway. Half of Dylan’s car collection is still buried in the backyard. The cheap swing set my mom bought at a garage sale is still under that big, leafy tree.

  My friend Carolyn said she was jealous of me getting to move out west, making a new start. I would have traded places with her in a second. There were enough new things going on without having to move 1,000 miles. Mom said “the Lord” was guiding her even back then before she knew him. But whoever the Lord was, he wasn’t doing anything but making me cry myself to sleep in the backseat of our Ford Taurus Wagon.

  I stopped sobbing when we hit the Illinois/Iowa state line and snorted myself to sleep. I woke up long enough to eat in Missouri, then cried again after dessert—a Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup Blizzard. Bryce didn’t sleep at all and said I didn’t m
iss much on the drive, except a guy hitchhiking near Salina, Kansas. Bryce said the guy had a beard longer than we were tall and he was sitting by a dead deer with a banjo. (The guy had the banjo, not the deer.)

  When we got to Colorado, the first thing Dylan did was throw up. That made me think things were going to be really yucky here, but Mom said it was only the altitude—living so far above sea level where the air is thinner. Less oxygen for some reason. If you ever come here, you might throw up too.

  A year later Mom fell in love with The Cowboy, as we called Sam back then. They were married, and we moved to his place. Then Mom became a Christian, and not because of our new dad, because he wasn’t—and isn’t—one. Bryce and I thought Mom was just going through a holy phase, but when it stuck, we got interested too. Finally, Bryce and I became Christians.

  I thought I’d always been one, but that’s another story.

  Chapter 2

  My cell phone vibrated with only a few minutes left in my last-period class. I pulled it out and hid it under my desk, because you’re not supposed to use cell phones during class. I looked at my sister Ashley a few rows from me. We have first and last periods together—band and English.

  The screen on the front read “Bryce’s Phone,” showed the time as 2:14, and had a little envelope telling me I had a text message. I coughed as I punched the Read button so the teacher wouldn’t hear the beep, then scrolled through the message.

  Bryce,

  Surprise for you and Ashley. Come home as fast as you can. Also, move snow shovel from porch. Somebody’ll get hurt.

  See you soon.

  Sam

  Sam is my new father. Ashley and I haven’t felt right about calling him Dad since our real one died. Sam said if we never call him Dad, it would be okay, but if we wanted to it was all right too.

  Those last six minutes dragged so slowly I could hardly stand it. Giving a kid English during last period ought to be a crime, punishable by torture if you have gym right before it.

  Mrs. Ferguson went on and on about how important next week was for us. “As you know, you have the day off tomorrow and then the CATs begin Monday. Make sure you take advantage of the long weekend.”

  We’d been hearing about the Colorado Aptitude Tests for a whole year, since the last time we had taken them, so this was not news.

  “Get plenty of sleep Sunday night,” she continued. “Try not to do anything that would sap your energy. We want you all bright-eyed Monday.”

  Ashley rolled her eyes at me.

  I held up the little beanie cat that had been passed around the room to motivate us and grabbed it around the neck.

  Ashley looked like she was fighting a smile.

  I glanced at the clock again. I think when the sun gets high in the sky, it loses some kind of gravity pull and everything slows down. Whatever, the seconds t-i-c-k-e-d by in agony until the bell finally rang. I tossed the cat to Mrs. Ferguson, and it landed on her desk next to her big, yellow thesaurus.

  “Have a nice weekend, Bryce,” she purred.

  “You too, Mrs. Ferguson.”

  Ashley followed as I raced into the halls of Red Rock Middle School. I threw my books in my locker. CATs kept teachers from giving us homework—that’s about the only good thing about them. I slammed my locker and saw Aaron Heckler at the end of the hall.

  Chapter 3

  Bryce froze when Boo Heckler called his name. The big eighth grader stood at the end of the hall under one of the stuffed cats the school had hung there for the assembly earlier in the week. The drama teacher had even dressed up in one of the costumes from the musical Cats for it.

  Everyone calls Aaron Heckler Boo because that’s what he yells at every sporting event. Every referee, umpire, or official hears his boo waft over fields and through gymnasiums. He boos when the referees are introduced. He boos when someone calls a time-out. We heard he even booed at a spelling bee his first year of middle school.

  “Hey, Timberline!” Boo boomed through the hall.

  To say Boo is scary is like saying the Grand Canyon is deep or Mount Everest is tall. He’s bigger than most of the teachers and has long, apelike arms that dangle like tree limbs. His hair always hangs in his face, except for once or twice a year when he gets it cut. He has yellow fingertips, and Bryce says that’s because he smokes. His teeth look like a multicolored Popsicle—green at the top, yellow in the middle, and orange at the bottom.

  Several boys usually hang around with Boo, probably because they’re afraid of him too. I couldn’t imagine what Bryce had done to flash on Boo’s radar screen.

  “Saw you and your sister ride up on those four-wheelers today,” he hollered.

  “Great,” Bryce muttered.

  “Let’s get out of here,” I whispered.

  “Hey, sis,” Boo called, walking toward us.

  Kids on the way to their buses hung around as long as they could. I guess to see what would happen. A couple of my friends gritted their teeth and stared at me. It was like watching a train wreck. You didn’t want to see what was about to happen, but you couldn’t turn away either.

  “You two splashed mud on my friend,” Boo continued, nodding at someone behind him, his big feet clomping toward us. “We’re lookin’ for payback.”

  “I don’t remember passing anyone this morning,” I said.

  A boy about half Boo’s size stepped from behind him with a few mud splatters on his shirt and pants. Some of them looked fresh, which was strange if we’d splashed him hours before. I started to say something, but Bryce put a hand in the air and said, “I-I’m sorry your c-c-clothes got mud on them. We ride through the pasture, so I’m not sure how we could have—”

  “You callin’ my friend a liar?” Boo said, stepping closer. He had a small scar above his right cheek, and his socks stuck through holes in the sides of his sneakers. If he wasn’t so mean, I would have felt sorry for him.

  “It was him and his sister,” the smaller boy said, pointing.

  Bryce, looking pale, folded his arms. He stutters sometimes, especially when he’s nervous, but it doesn’t seem to bother him. “W-what do you want me to d-do about it?”

  I was ticked that Bryce wouldn’t let me talk, but I figured he was protecting me. And that made me madder.

  I turned and walked away, hoping to find a teacher.

  Chapter 4

  I was glad when Ashley left. Nobody wants his sister to watch him get beat up. I didn’t want her to see me cry or bleed.

  The longer I faced Boo, the drier my throat got. It was hard to breathe, and I could feel my heart thumping.

  I’d never been in a fight. I’d been in shoving and shouting matches where nobody really gets hurt, but I’d never been in a ball-your-hand-into-a-fist-and-start-swinging kind of thing. This was quickly turning into a get-smashed-like-a-bug fight.

  I kept thinking of Jesus saying to turn the other cheek. But turning the other cheek to this guy could mean a short life or at least plastic surgery. Did Jesus ever get into a fight when he was a kid? I wished Boo was a money changer so I could turn over his tables.

  “Hit him, Bryce!” somebody shouted. It was my friend Duncan Swift. He’d been in more fights than Mike Tyson and always had a few bruises.

  “L-look, I-I-I don’t want to fight you,” I said.

  Boo and the other kid laughed. Boo said, “Did you hear that? Sounds like h-h-he can’t figure out whether he’s a b-b-boy or a g-g-girl. Your sister’s more of a man than you are.”

  A few people ran for their buses, but there was still a crowd. I locked eyes with Boo and tried to stare him down.

  “Let us take your four-wheelers home for the weekend,” Boo said, steely eyed. “We’ll bring ’em back Monday and call it even.”

  Sam had told us not to let anybody, no matter how trustworthy, ride our ATVs. I was catching on to Boo’s game. They’d faked the mud splatters to get our bikes.

  “No way,” I said. “My dad won’t let—”

  Boo lurched forward and ja
bbed his finger hard into my shoulder. “Your dad won’t know unless you tell him.”

  I heard a commotion down the hall. Ashley ran toward us with Mr. Micelli, our science teacher.

  Boo gripped my shoulder and turned me around. “We’re gonna get those four-wheelers. You don’t let us ride them and you’ll be sorry.”

  “What’s going on?” Mr. Micelli said.

  Boo turned and walked away.

  Mr. Micelli put a hand on my back. He didn’t have to say anything. He had to know I was scared.

  “You should have hit him, Timberline,” Duncan said, grabbing his backpack and leaving. “Bigger they are, the harder they fall.”

  More likely, the harder I’ll fall.

  I tried to think of something snappy to say to get everybody to laugh, but my bottom lip twitched, and everything I thought of was kind of mean.

  “Come on,” Ashley said, taking my backpack.

  Chapter 5

  My ATV, the Ashleymobile, is one of the best things about moving to Colorado. My friends back home can’t believe I actually get to ride it to school, except when it’s raining really hard. Kids under 16 shouldn’t ride them, but Mom and Sam say we’re pretty responsible. Sometimes Mom sends us to the grocery store for milk or bread, and we’ve found a way there without going on too many streets. We even drive to the gas station and fill up by ourselves.

  I reached Mrs. Watson’s barn first, strapped on my helmet, and fastened my backpack to the rear carrier. We always park our ATVs a few blocks from the school at Mrs. Watson’s. She knows our stepfather, and Bryce mows her yard. She says she loves having us around.

  Bryce’s eyes were puffy and red. You can tell a lot about people just by looking at their eyes, especially when they won’t look at you.

  Mrs. Watson waved and offered us a snack, but Bryce yelled that Sam wanted us home for something. After we started the four-wheelers, I glanced across the road and punched Bryce’s shoulder. On the hill above the school stood Boo and his muddy little friend.

  Bryce took off up Mrs. Watson’s driveway toward the open pasture, and I followed.

  Boo shouted something and waved, and I hoped Mrs. Watson didn’t have her hearing aid in.