Shadows at Predator Reef by Franklin W. Dixon Page A

fired me. He’s rejected just about every piece of advice I’ve given him for months. Well, if he doesn’t appreciate my talents, fine. I may not be a famous architect, but I’ve been in this business long enough to know my way around a blueprint. I had a hunch something funny was going on during the exhibit’s construction, so I dug a bit deeper. You boys aren’t the only ones around here who can play detective.”
    I really hated being compared to a scumbag like Burris. But if the guy was going to lay out his confession, I wasn’t about to stop him.
    â€œIt’s his own fault, really,” Burris went on talking. “I’ve been warning Bradley about being more careful with his online security for years. But I’m just his PR director, what do I know about these things?” He chuckled. “It didn’t take me long to hack into his computer, and there it was, his whole plan laid out for me like an all-you-can-eat endangered turtle buffet. I’ve got to give it to him, though. For a stubborn old fool, he really is a genius. Then again, so am I. I mean, he’s the one at home sobbing into his giant fish tank, while I’m about to make a killing off his precious turtle.”
    I couldn’t take it anymore. One more word out of Burris’s smug grill and I was going to lose it. “Pretty proud of yourself, abducting a helpless animal, huh?”
    â€œYes, I am, thank you,” Burris said. “In fact, I’ve already started ordering furniture for my new office to celebrate.”
    So that was the call Burris had taken outside the aquarium. He hadn’t been discussing a client at all. This guy had been shameless, pretending to be concerned about Captain Hook one minute and buying office furniture with turtle blood money the next.
    â€œGetting a little ahead of yourself, don’t you think?” Joe said. “You know the saying about not counting your turtles before they hatch?”
    â€œClever.” Burris smiled. “But you’re right. That’s why I’m not leaving anything else to chance.”
    He held up the flare gun to illustrate his point.
    You remember what I said before about villains not confessing their plans to detectives unless they intend to permanently shut them up afterward? Well, this was the part where the bad guy tries to eliminate the witnesses—and I was pretty sure Ron wasn’t going to just send us on our way. If we were going to get out of this, we were going to have to rely on ourselves.
    â€œYou’ll only make things worse for yourself if you try to kill us, you know,” I reasoned with him, hoping he had enough common sense not to add a murder rap to his list of crimes.
    â€œKill you?” He laughed. “What kind of person do you take me for? I’m not going to kill you. I’m going to lock you in this container and ship you to the other side of the world along with our turtle friend. I don’t think the captain will mind some extra cargo.”
    â€œWe’ll suffocate if you leave us in here,” I told him. “It’s just as good as killing us yourself.”
    â€œDon’t be silly,” Ron said. “Captain Lau isn’t going to let you die. Why would he do that when he can sell you as slave labor and make a nice profit?”

SHELL-SHOCKED
17
JOE
    J UST WHEN YOU THINK THINGS can’t get any worse, the bad guy tries to sell you on the black market. I wasn’t about to go quietly, but as long as Burris had that big old flare gun muzzle between us and the door, I didn’t see how we were going to escape without being turned into fried fish.
    Burris must have sensed we were thinking about trying something, because he decided not to waste any more time.
    â€œEnjoy the trip, kids,” he said. He dragged Jonathan’s unconscious body outside the container and swung the big metal door shut.
    CLANG. That was the sound of our fates