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4:37pm

4:37 pm, September 9th

            Mom got through to Sergeant Daniels, and yelled at him until he finally agreed to come back over and interview the neighbors right away. He would also re-dial the restricted number and try to find the bomb.

            While Mom was calling, Dad had come back home, and we filled him in on the new details.

            While we waited for Sergeant Daniels to arrive, Dad gathered everybody and we sat in the living room. Time for a talk.

            Dad got it going. “What are we going to do about this?”

            “Personal bodyguard?” Riley wasn’t helping much. But he’s only seven, so it didn’t matter.

            “Dad, I have no idea. Once Daniels gets the statements from our neighbors, then a case will open and they’ll find this guy.”

            Mom suddenly looked worried. “I asked Sergeant Daniels on the phone if anybody had called reporting a gunshot, other than Chase. And he said no.” She glanced at Dad, then at me.

            “That’s not possible, it was so loud! How could anybody NOT hear that?” I was starting to panic. If nobody heard a gunshot, how was a case going to open, or even worse, would anyone believe what had happened?

            I tried to calm everybody down. Well, mostly myself. “I’m sure people have, they just haven’t been put through properly, or Daniels just hasn’t received the notices yet.”

            My parents exchanged looks. “We’ll see when he gets here.”

            “You don’t believe me now, do you? You saw what happened to my laptop. How else could that have happened?”

            “Chase, we didn’t say that we didn’t believe you! It’s just that if there is no witness, it can’t legally be proved. There is no case without witnesses.”

            The sound of a fist on wood broke the conversation.

            “That’s him. Go answer the door Chase.” Mom gestured to the door.

            I got up and opened the door for Daniels.

            “Sergeant Daniels, thank you for coming back so quickly.” Mom shook his hand.

            Not that he had much of a choice. I walked around them and sat back down.

            “Yes ma’am. Now, what can I do for you?”

            “There have been some more strange things happening since you left!”

            “What things?”

            “Chase, you tell him.”

            Daniels turned his attention to me.

            “I’ve gotten two phone calls from this guy. One right before you came and one right after my Mom got home.”

            He seemed interested. “What did he say?”

            I recited what I could remember back to him and included the part about the bomb in my phone.

            He reacted to the bomb part.

            “A bomb threat is very serious. When go back to the station, I’ll take your cell phone with me back to the station and see what we can find. Now, what was the main reason you called me?”

            “To ask our next door neighbors if they heard anything. You know, gather witnesses?”

            “Alright, I’ll go question your closest neighbors.” He headed for the door. “And when I’m done, I’ll stop back in and give you the final review of what’s going to happen, and what ISN’T going to happen.”

            He left, and nobody said anything for a minute.

            Riley piped up. “What do we do now?”

            “We wait until he comes back. Then we’ll know what to do.”

            I gulped. I hated waiting.