Chapter 12

Chloe's mother started to recall some very embarrassing child memories of Chloe. As usual, Chloe’s face turned very red, and for some reason, Tria’s face was turning even brighter of a shade.

Chloe grabbed a kleenex and clapped it to her nose. “I’m all good! I’m all good! But now Tria and I are going to go up to my room.” “Yes, YES! YES!” Tria agreed quickly. “Oh, no. You could stay just a little longer to hear the story about Chloe and the spider.” She started laughing loudly, hysterically, and crazily.

“We’ll just be going now…” Chloe said and grabbed Tria’s arm. They sneaked past Chloe’s wildly laughing parents and they ran upstairs. Chloe locked the door right after she shut it behind her. She looked very awkward, just staring at Tria and Tria just staring at her.

“Okay, let's do this!” Chloe said in a deep voice. And she marched over to her computer.

“I-I got this new book called Land Of Lions…” Tria said out of the blue, realizing how random it sounded.

“That’s a silly name!” Chloe exclaimed.

“Silly? How is it silly?” Tria asked.

“You don’t know?” Chloe said. “It spells L.O.L.!”

“Oh…” Tria said slowly, still processing the joke. “Oh… oh Oh OH OOHH! HAHAHAHAH!”

The girls broke out into a weird laughing fit. Don’t worry, it was not nearly as bad as the laughing from the couple downstairs who were still laughing. Tria patted Chloe’s back and said, “Ok, we should probably get down to business now.” “Yes,” Chloe said and pretended to wipe dirt from her nose. All Tria could do was smile at her because the little motion made no sense.

“Aaaaaaaaanyway…” Chloe said, stretching back in her seat. “I found out that after each robbery, he leaves behind a hat. On the corner of the hat will be a little symbol. The fourth latest  burglary where he broke into the greenhouse, he left behind a hat with a symbol of a strawberry on it. Then, he robbed Mr. and Mrs.Berry and left behind a hat with a coin picture on it. Then, he robbed the bank. But since then - the last two - he’s left a hat behind with a picture of a bread on it.”

“Well,” thought Tria out loud. “He’ll rob Bill’s Bakery!”

“That’s the funny thing,” Chloe sighed. “He hasn’t robbed it yet.”

“Anything else?” Tria asked.

“Well, one thing… On both bread symbol hats he had wrote HOME in black marker.” Chloe explained.

“Interesting,” Tria stated, sounding deep in thought.

“Yes, very. Tria, that’ll give you enough to ponder about for the day won’t it?” Chloe said brightly.

“Quite enough,” Tria said and exchanged smiles.

Tria had been pondering about the hats to help her fall asleep. Just before she fell into a dreamless sleep, something in her brain clicked. Now she knew.