I opened my email on my phone and typed in “Dad.” An email he’d written to me popped up. Good luck at your game today. I’ll be there as soon as I can! Love you, kiddo. Tears sprang to my eyes. I knew I had to have this email. I needed to fold it up and put it in my pocket.

I hit the print button. The sound of the printer springing to life made me jump, which was crazy since I was the one who’d started it. I hadn’t really expected it to still be there. But a printer was pretty utilitarian. It wasn’t like it was storing anything. I opened the door to the closet that held the printer—and then I screamed absolutely bloody murder. It was definitely the loudest scream of my life. I heard Chloe yelling “Iris!” as a man in a mask caught my eye, just for a moment. I don’t know how my reflexes were so fast, but, like I had done a bazillion times before, I held my thumb on the picture icon on my phone’s lock screen, it popped open, and I started snapping.

I screamed at the top of my lungs again, knowing I was done for. I had broken the rules, and now I was going to get murdered. The man put his hand up to his eyes and dropped something. Probably to strangle me. But he didn’t strangle me. He grabbed up the papers lying on the floor and ran past me, toward the stairs.

My fight-or-flight must have been broken because I took the time to bend down and pick up a piece of paper he hadn’t grabbed. At a glance I could see that it was a broker statement from one of the mutual funds Dad’s company invested with. Well, to be more specific, it was my broker statement. Totally ordinary. Why would someone steal that? The creepiest feeling washed over me as I realized that those statements were stored in my room, in my desk, which meant that he had been in there. Dad’s office was the closest room to mine, so the robber must have hidden in here when he heard us come in. My whole body turned cold, and I dropped the statement on the desk like I’d been scalded.

Finally, realizing that our lives were in danger, I ran toward my room, calling, “Dabney, Chloe, get out of there! Now!”

My bewildered friends walked toward the hallway. “Come on!” I screamed, panic setting in. “Now!” I sprinted down the stairs and clambered out the window and didn’t even look behind me until we were halfway back to Chloe’s house.

When I finally stopped, Chloe asked, out of breath, “What is going on?”

“A man,” I panted. “In a mask. In Dad’s office closet.”

Four eyes went wide. “We have to tell someone!” Dabney said.