The Runaway Bride (9 page)

M
IDORI'S GAZE
was fixed on Mad Dog. “Let go of her,” she said sharply. “She's my friend.”

Nancy was flooded with conflicting feelings—happiness, shock, relief. “Midori!” she burst out. “You're
okay!
But what are you doing here?”

Mad Dog loosened his grip on Nancy, but he didn't release her completely. “What if she's one of them?” he asked Midori doubtfully.

“She's
not
one of them,” Midori replied tersely. “Now, please, Mad Dog—”

Mad Dog finally relented. “Are you all right?” he asked Nancy gruffly.

Nancy rubbed her shoulders. “I'll live,” she murmured, then studied Midori with concern. The Japanese girl appeared to be unharmed, and yet she was even more haggard and pale than she
had been on Friday. She looked as though she hadn't slept in ages.

“What's going on, Midori?” Nancy demanded. “Who is ‘them'? We've all been so worried.”

At that moment George came tearing up the stairs and down the hall. Her raincoat was dripping wet. “Nan, are you okay—” she began breathlessly, then stopped. She caught sight of Midori. “What on earth!” she gasped. Her eyes traveled from Midori to Mad Dog to Nancy. “What did I miss?” she asked.

“A lot,” Nancy replied, managing a weak grin.

“I followed him, just like you said, but then I lost him in the rain,” George admitted sheepishly. “I headed back here as soon as I realized it.” She turned to Midori again. “Wow, Midori, am I ever glad to see you!”

Midori nodded. Her amber eyes were brimming with tears. “I've caused everyone so much trouble,” she whispered hoarsely.

Nancy went up to her and put an arm around her. “Why don't we go inside and talk about it?” she suggested gently.

“Okay,” Midori agreed, sniffling.

Once inside, the three girls sat down, and Mad Dog went to the kitchen to make tea.

Mad Dog's studio came as a surprise to Nancy. She'd expected it to be dark and moody, like its owner. Instead it was full of light and color and whimsy.

At one end of the enormous loft was a living room area. Instead of the usual furniture, there were hammocks hanging from the ceiling, vinyl lawn chairs, and TV trays that had been papier-mâchéd with American comic strips. In a pot near one of the many windows was a palm tree decorated with hundreds of small origami cranes.

At the far end was Mad Dog's painting area. Nancy could see that it was crammed with canvases, buckets, and brushes.

Midori followed Nancy's gaze. “Mad Dog is a terrific artist,” she said. “He combines oil paint with all sorts of organic stuff—green tea, soy sauce, old vegetable peels.” She pointed to a large painting on the wall behind them. It depicted a samurai warrior riding a motorcycle. “That's his.”

“It's very Mad Dog,” George remarked.

Nancy spotted the skinny black cat from the day before. It was crouched on a windowsill, watching everyone suspiciously.

“So that's Mad Dog's cat?” Nancy said to Midori. “We saw it outside when we came by yesterday.”

“Mad Dog took him in this morning because of the rain,” Midori explained. “He's a stray.”

Nancy frowned. “Midori, if you decided you cared more for Mad Dog than for Ken, don't you think you—”

Midori sat up suddenly and interrupted. “No, Nancy. You've got it all wrong. Mad Dog and I are just friends.”

“Friends?” George echoed.

“Yes,” she went on, clearly desperate to convince them. “He took me in when . . .” Midori's voice trailed off.

“What,
Midori?” Nancy said, leaning forward. “I know you're upset, but you've got to tell us about what.”

Midori brushed at her eyes with the back of her hand. “It was an awful thing I did, running away from my wedding,” she began shakily. “But I had no choice.”

“What do you mean?” Nancy asked.

“It started last Thursday night,” Midori said.

Nancy glanced at George, remembering Ken's account of that evening. “Go on,” she told Midori.

“I went by Nakamura Incorporated at about five, to meet Ken.” Nancy noticed the agony on Midori's face when she spoke his name.

“He came out to the reception area to tell me he was just finishing up an important meeting in his office,” Midori continued. “He asked me to wait for him in the executive conference room.”

Mad Dog reappeared with a steaming teapot and some cups. He set them down on one of the TV trays. “Are you certain you should be telling them this?” he asked Midori worriedly.

“It's okay, Mad Dog, really,” Midori assured him, smiling slightly.

He cast doubtful glances at Nancy and George. “Whatever you say,” he said. He poured the tea, handed everybody a cup, then sat down on the chair next to Midori's.

Nancy was struck by Mad Dog's protectiveness toward Midori.

“So then what happened?” George urged Midori.

“I went into the conference room,” Midori said after taking a long sip of her tea. “It was empty, except for a big flat package sitting on the floor wrapped in brown paper. It looked like a painting, and I got all excited. I knew Ken's uncle Seiji collected art, and I thought it might be a famous work.”

“So she wanted to peek at it,” Mad Dog spoke up.

“I knelt down and started unwrapping part of it,” Midori explained. “I figured a quick look wouldn't hurt anybody—I really just wanted to see what it was. But then Mr. Nakamura's assistant walked into the conference room, and he yelled at me to get away from it.”

“Connor Drake,” Nancy said, recalling Seiji Nakamura's cold, brusque assistant.

“I apologized to him, and then I asked him what the painting was,” Midori said. “Either he didn't hear my question or he pretended not to.
He just picked up the package and rushed out of the room.”

“That's weird,” George commented.

Midori wrapped her hands around her teacup, as if trying to gather strength from its warmth. “I waited in the conference room for a few more minutes, alone. But Connor had upset me, and I wanted to talk to Ken. I decided to go to his office to see if his meeting was over.”

She paused and took a deep breath. Mad Dog reached over and squeezed her shoulder encouragingly.

“The door was closed,” Midori went on. “I pressed my ear up against it, to see what was going on before I knocked.”

“Could you hear anything?” Nancy asked.

Midori stared at her for a long moment before replying, “Ken and Connor were in there. Ken was saying something like, ‘Are you sure?' And Connor answered, ‘Midori didn't see anything. But even if she did, so what? We can take care of the little troublemaker.' And then . . . Ken said . . .”

Midori covered her face with her hands and began to sob. “He said, ‘We'll need to do more than scare her, though,' ” she choked out.

“What!” Nancy gasped. She couldn't believe what she was hearing. “Midori, that's
awful!”

Mad Dog handed Midori a paper napkin.

She took it from him and blew her nose. It was
a moment before she could go on. When she finally spoke, her voice was ragged.

“It was a nightmare,” she whispered brokenly. “Two days before our wedding I find out that my fiancé is involved in something that is probably illegal—and that he's willing to do more than scare me because I happened to peek at a stupid painting!” She paused to blow her nose again. “I went straight home and locked myself in my room. Ken kept calling, but I had my mother tell him I wasn't feeling well.”

“You must have been in total shock,” George murmured sympathetically.

Midori nodded miserably. “I was. I thought about going to the police, but what could I tell them? I didn't have proof of anything. I didn't even know what Ken and Connor were up to. And I was so scared. I kept thinking, I couldn't do anything to make those guys suspicious, or I might get . . . they might . . .”

She dabbed at her eyes. “That's why I couldn't bring myself to tell my family or to cancel the wedding. I was afraid Ken and Connor would get wise to me.”

“Did you think about just
talking
to Ken?” George asked.

“How could she?” Mad Dog cut in hotly. “I mean, how could she trust him? He betrayed her. For all she knew, something terrible would happen to her the second she said a word.”

Nancy cradled her teacup in her hands. “So you decided that you had to go through with the wedding?” she asked Midori.

“I didn't see any way out,” Midori replied. “I got as far as getting into my kimono. But then it occurred to me to just run away. It seemed to be the perfect solution—the
only
solution.”

She glanced at Mad Dog and gave him a sad little smile. “I called Mad Dog. I knew he would help me. He came right away and whisked me back to his studio on his motorcycle.”

“Good thing the traffic cops weren't out,” Mad Dog mumbled. “I must have been going twice the speed limit both ways.”

“You left the villa through the exit at the back of the property, right?” Nancy asked Midori. “We found a gold cord—your
obi-jime
—caught on the gate.”

“We?” Midori became alarmed. “Who's ‘we'?”

“Don't worry—it wasn't Ken or Connor,” Nancy assured her. “You see, as soon as Mari figured out you were gone, she asked me to find you. She and George and I came across the
obi-jime.”

“Oh.” Midori sounded relieved. “Anyway, I've been staying here since Saturday, and Mad Dog's been taking care of me. That's why he was so rough with you in the hallway, Nancy. He was afraid you were one of Ken and Connor's spies.”

Mad Dog looked at Midori a little guiltily. “I
didn't tell you that your friends showed up here yesterday. I didn't want to worry you.”

Nancy asked him straight out. “You didn't deliver a batch of poisonous fugu to our
ryokan
room? Or push me into the bonfire at a Bon Matsuri festival?”

Mad Dog's eyes widened. “Never.”

“Somebody did these things to you, Nancy?” Midori asked anxiously.

“Yes,” Nancy replied, and told her and Mad Dog about everything that had happened since Saturday.

When she got to the part about the stolen diary, Mad Dog held up a hand. “I'm guilty of that. Midori asked me to sneak into her house late Saturday night and get the thing.”

“I'd written some stuff about Ken and Connor in it,” Midori explained hastily. “I didn't want them to get hold of it.”

“That explains why there were no signs of a break-in,” Nancy said, nodding. “You gave Mad Dog your key.” She paused, then added, “The guy who delivered the fugu and pushed me into the bonfire was Japanese and had a crew cut. Since Ken doesn't have a crew cut, he and Connor must have somebody else working for them.”

Midori acted confused. “But why would they try to hurt you, Nancy?”

“They must not want me to find you,” Nancy
said, her blue eyes flashing. “They probably think that your running away was connected to last Thursday night somehow. So either they're looking for you themselves, or they're hoping you'll stay in hiding and keep your mouth shut.”

Midori shuddered. “I understand.”

“The key is that painting,” Nancy went on. “It must be a really valuable work, or Ken and Connor wouldn't be making such a big deal out of it. Did you recognize it, Midori?”

“I saw only a small part of the right side,” Midori replied. “All I can tell you is that it was a medium-size oil, about two feet by three feet. It looked like an Impressionist or Postimpressionist landscape to me—lots of sky blue on top, bright colors on the bottom, fluttery brushstrokes. Oh, and I saw the end of a signature—the letter
T
in red.”

“That's a start,” Nancy said. “Listen, Midori. You'd better stay here for a while. We don't want Ken and Connor to find you. George and I will try to track down the painting.”

Mad Dog leaned forward and grinned at her. It was the first time Nancy had seen him happy. “Hey, that would be great,” he said gratefully. “I wasn't sure how I was going to watch over Midori and find a way to nail those guys at the same time.”

Midori clasped Nancy's hand. “You're such a good friend, Nancy,” she murmured. “But I don't want to put you in any more danger.”

“I can take care of myself,” Nancy told her. “But what should we do about Mari? Should I tell her where you are?”

Midori thought for a moment, then said, “Yes, and tell her that I'm okay. I don't want her to worry about me.” She paused. “But tell her to keep the information to herself, and that she shouldn't call me or come here, no matter what. I don't want to involve her in any of this or risk having anyone follow her here.”

“So you don't want us to explain to her about the painting, or about Ken and Connor?” Nancy said.

“That's right,” Midori replied firmly. “The less she knows, the better.”

“In this situation, ignorance is definitely bliss,” George agreed.

• • •

“You've got a gleam in your eye, Nancy Drew,” Mick said. “What's up? I know you didn't ask me out to lunch just to hear me talk about the wonderful world of investment banking. You've got something on your mind, don't you?”

Nancy and Mick were sitting at a corner table in a sushi restaurant. George had gone back to the
ryokan
to get in a quick jog. The morning's storm had stopped, and through the open window Nancy could see a beautiful rainbow.

“You're very clever, Mick Devlin,” Nancy replied, chuckling. “If you ever get sick of your
job, you should consider a career in detective work. I'd be happy to give you a reference.”