The accusations from those seven women was really crushing me at the moment. Annelie and Kristina have been with us longer than anyone, except for Kat and Jennifer. Penny is a good friend from back in high school and Honey is a young woman that Sky and myself had rescued and then adopted. The others are more recent additions to The Investigators, although Chantelle has been around for quite a while too.

And why is Baldwin accepting their accusations without question? That is not like him at all. The ghosts and I were just sitting silently right now, thinking about how this could have happened. Muffin and Storm were pacing back and forth on the bed, periodically growling and hissing. Then Amerie came walking into the bedroom with her usual bright smile. “What is with all the sad faces?” she asked as she sat on the bed beside me.

Muffin and Storm sat and growled at her. “Hey, why are you growling at me, what have I done?” she asked again. I then told the cats to stop, so they moved to the other side of the bed and sat down, and Jennifer told Amerie what had happened. “That is like, like, totally ridiculous!” she exclaimed, “How is Steve going to get time to do such things? All the time, day and night, he has bodyguards, so how can he do this?”

“Apparently he does it while you bad girls and I are his bodyguards,” said Jennifer, “because we won’t say anything.” That made Amerie quite angry. “I love my big brother,” she said, “but I would not help him do such things!” She then left and went straight to Baldwin. She had a “conversation” with him and he then told her she was no longer welcome on the team and she had to leave when Jennifer and I did. She went straight to her friends, then the rest of the Bad Girls.

They voted to stay with Jennifer and I, after which they came to our bedroom to let us know. Kat then called her Wildcats together and they also voted to to stay with us. That meant that a lot of the cats would be staying with us as well, actually, all of the cats decided to stay with us. All of this did help to encourage Jennifer and I. Meow, meow!= See? We start over and have best investigationer team in whole world! I didn’t really like the idea of starting over again, but at the moment it seemed like it was the only way.

A few of the other girls joined us as well, including, Hannah, Carolyn, Dr. Samantha, Bridgette (one of our nurses and our vet), and Matt’s daughter Sapphire. She had tried talking to her Dad, but it was no use, he would not listen to reason. Aari, John, Clarence, Alfred, Mac, Oskar, Cal and Burk also joined us, as did Trapper and his friends, plus Delphine. Right now most of the team has decided to stay with us, and that was good, though 26 have decided to stay behind.

I think it is now time to call Mandar and hopefully get some advice from him. I just hope he won’t be against me too. How did all this happen anyway? Someone would have to pay these women a lot of money for them to turn against me with such lies. Unless they were hypnotized perhaps, but how could that happen? Hmm, I wonder if that odd laser weapon had something to do with all of this? That was one of Jazzy’s weapons that Toledo had invented.

Could that have been used to mess with their brains so all of this would happen at just the right time? Richard then answered the phone and asked how things were going. “Couldn’t be worse Richard,” I said, “is Mandar busy?” “Actually, you missed him by just one day Steve,” he said, “he is on a business trip. His first business trip of the year is his most important one too. I am only allowed to contact him on matters of extreme importance.”

“Oh, well, guess it will have to wait then,” I said quietly. Jennifer said no to that right away and she got on the phone instead. Richard told her the same thing, then he spotted Misty and Cristy coming in so he called them over to listen in to the call. Jennifer then explained the situation to them all. “That’s crazy!” exclaimed the twins together, “Anyone with any sense at all would be able to see that is just a setup! But you all need to get out of there right away, no waiting for the 48 hour deadline. Who knows what might happen during that time.”

“Yes, I agree,” said Richard, “I will send one of Mandar’s jets over so you can all leave at the same time. We will put you in safe house CR03 for now until I can contact Mandar. I can have a plane at the airport in 4 hours.” “Sounds good,” said Jennifer, “we will be there waiting for it.” While flying to London I began to shake terribly, so they pulled out one of the beds so I could lie down. Samantha figured it was just all the sudden stress that was doing it, so she gave me something to relax me.

Meanwhile, “I wonder if I should call Mandar?” asked Richard. The twins stood there looking at him. “What would you two do in this situation?” he asked them. The twins stood there looking at him. “I’ll call Mandar right away,” he said. “Great idea!” the twins said at the same time, “We knew you would get things figured out.”

“What?!” exclaimed Mandar, “Why didn’t you call sooner? What’s going on? I go away for a couple of days and everything falls apart! What is Baldwin thinking anyway? Where are you putting Steve and his remaining team?” “In safe house CR03,” said Richard, “the twins will be meeting their plane and taking them out there immediately.”

“Perfect,” said Mandar, “they will be in charge of looking after Steve and his team for now, let them know that. They are the best choice for the job. Give Steve and his team everything they need. I will call Steve first chance I get, then I will call that idiot Baldwin! He should be able to see through those false accusations and realize that someone is attacking The Investigators!”

The twins were already on their way to the airport so Richard called them and repeated what Mandar said. They were more than happy to be given the task of looking after us.

To Be Continued.

©2025 Steve McLeod.