Read INTRUSION (Whitney Holmes Series) for Free Online Page B

located and It was still there.
    The photographer immediately started taking pictures of it at different angles. When he was finished, the police officer took out a measuring tape and bent down and measured the footprint. He measured the length and the width. He wrote down something in a little notebook. When he was finished, he asked us if we wanted to go in the house to talk.
    “ Yes, we would,” my father said.
    I wanted to go in because it felt creepy to be out here where the stalker had been just hours before.
    When we got inside, my mother asked everyone if they wanted some coffee. Both the photographer and the officer said they would. Just black coffee, no cream or sugar.
    My mother left to go get the coffee and my father asked everyone to sit down. I sat at the end of the couch, hugging myself.
    “I know you have been through this before, but could you tell me what is happening?” the officer said.
    “ Whitney, do you want to tell him or would you like me to?” my father asked.
    “ Please tell him,” I said.
    “ Someone has been either playing pranks on my little girl or he is serious,” my father said.
    “ What sort of pranks?”
    “ Giving flowers, sending weird texts, destroying hundreds of dollars’ worth of books, putting strange notes in her school backpack, and now this footprint,” my father said.
    “ What did he write in the text message?” the officer asked.
    “ One time she went to the movies and some guys were bothering her and that night she got a text saying that the person was glad she didn’t sit by them,” my father said.
    “ Okay, did you see who sent the text?” the officer asked.
    “ No, it was blocked. They first tried to call me and I didn’t take the call because it said unavailable,” I said.
    “ Did anything else happen?” the officer asked.
    “ He put a flower in my locker, then when I threw it away, I got a note saying it wasn’t nice for me to throw it away,” I said.
    “ It was put together in magazine cut-outs,” my dad said, “like a ransom note.”
    “ After that, we called the police and I got a text message calling me a Witch,” I said, embarrassed.
    “ Anything else?”
    “ Later, I got a note saying he forgave me,” I said.
    “ Sounds like a stalker,” the police officer said. “Do you have a boyfriend?”
    “ No,” I said, and felt the heat rising to my face.
    “ Do you have an ex-boyfriend or anyone you may have rejected?”
    I was even more embarrassed. “There’s a boy named Brendan. I was going with him for a while, but I broke up with him a few months ago.”
    “What’s his last name?” the officer pressed.
    “ Please. It’s not him. He wouldn’t do that. We are still friends. We say hi every day.”
    “ You’re sure?”
    “ Yes.”
    “ Why did you break up with him?”
    I put my palm over my face in humiliation. “If you must know, he’s such a sports fanatic that he didn’t have a whole lot of time for me. I was like number five on his list of things he was interested in. If not number six.”
    The officer laughed. “Okay, it’s not Brendan. Sorry to embarrass you. We just have to figure out who would stalk you. I don’t think it’s an adult, unless it’s a teacher or someone else who works at the school.”
    “ I agree,” I said.
    “ Has any teacher or school employee ever made you uncomfortable or asked you to meet them anywhere off campus?”
    I was affronted. “No, I trust my teachers. Completely. And if anything seemed off about a teacher, I would tell my parents.”
    “Sounds like you have thought this through.”
    I nodded. “It’s a student, sir. Someone I have classes with, probably.”
    “Do you have any idea who might be behind this, any idea at all?”
    “ No, sir. I don’t. I’m stumped.”
    “ Has anyone ever bullied you at school?”
    “ No. I’m in honors classes, mostly. Everyone is too busy studying to be mean to anyone else.”
    “ Does my family need to worry?” my father asked