Tampered by Michele Martin Bossley

Author:Michele Martin Bossley
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: JUV028000, JUV006000, JUV050000
Publisher: Orca Book Publishers
Published: 2013-09-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Ten

“You guys want to come over?” I asked Robyn and Nick as the bus pulled up to our stop. We got off. “I have to work later, but…”

“No, come to my house,” Robyn said. “I promised my aunt I’d babysit. You guys can help.”

“Oh sure, Robyn. It’s Friday, our short day at school, and you want me to spend the afternoon taking care of little kids,” Nick said.

“They’re cute. It’ll be fun.” Robyn led us down the block and pushed open her front door. “Hi!” she called.

“Robyn! Where were you? Did you forget Auntie Cheryl was coming with the kids?” Robyn’s mom stepped out of the family room, dressed in a fancy shirt and jeans. “Hi, boys.” She smiled at us.

“I didn’t forget. We had an errand after school.”

“You’re supposed to let me know if you’re not coming straight home,” Robyn’s mom said.

“My phone’s dead.” Robyn pulled her cell phone out of her pocket and laid it on the kitchen counter. Her mom frowned and plugged it in.

“Convenient,” I muttered in Robyn’s ear.

“Very,” she whispered back. The doorbell rang, and a moment later a flood of noise and small fast-moving bodies burst through the door.

“Robynrobynrobyn!” Two little kids pelted down the short hall and threw themselves at Robyn. Nearly bowled over, she caught them, laughing.

“Hi, guys!” she said.

Robyn’s aunt Cheryl put a baby down on the floor. He was round-faced and gurgling. He rolled onto his stomach and began to chew on the nearest thing he could grab—Nick’s shoe.

“Ooh, yuck.” Aunt Cheryl pulled it away from him, handed him a squishy plastic toy and passed the baby to me. “Could you hold him just for a second?” she said. She took off down the hall.

“Uh, sure,” I said. The baby was a lot heavier than I expected, and he was wiggling. I clutched him tighter so I wouldn’t drop him, and he let out a howl. “Shhhh!” I whispered, looking around hastily. Aunt Cheryl was in the kitchen talking to Robyn’s mom, so I lugged the baby to the family room and put him carefully down on the carpet, where Robyn had set the other two up with toys. The mess was incredible— toy trucks and building blocks and dolls were strewn across the floor. The four-year-old was energetically smashing play dough into the rug. And they’d only been there five minutes!

“No, no, Grayden,” Robyn said. “If you want to play with play dough, you have to be on the mat.”

“Okay,” said Grayden, continuing to squish the play dough into a bright pancake in the beige carpet.

“Here, let me help you,” Robyn said, scraping the play dough up with her fingernails. A fair bit was still stuck to the carpet, but she got Grayden settled onto a foam mat. The little girl, Anna, sat with her lap full of toys and didn’t move. The baby drooled a puddle on a different section of carpet.

“Okay, kids, we’re going,” Robyn’s mom said. “We’ll just be a couple of hours.”

“Thanks for babysitting, Robyn,” Aunt Cheryl said gratefully.

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