happened in the last two days. There were still some
blanks, but if she played her cards right, maybe she
could get Dennis to fill them in for her.
“You've been blackmailing Mr. Lorenzo since early
October?” she asked, stepping carefully around the
hole where her boot had broken through the metal.
Seeing the surprised look he shot at her, she explained,
“I saw the note you left him, telling him that your price
was going up to fifteen hundred dollars. And his ledger
showed unexplained payments made every fourteen
days. It didn't take a genius to put the two together.”
Dennis glowered. “I deserved that money, after
what Pops did to my brother,” he said.
“Ty Brubaker?” Nancy guessed, remembering the
photograph she'd seen in his room.
“Yeah,” he told her. “He's my half brother, actually.
Ty worshiped Pops.”
“You mean, Andrew Papazian?” Nancy said.
“That's right. Pops promised to be Ty's manager
when he went pro,” Dennis explained. “He got Ty an
autographed picture of the Rocket and said he could
make Ty an even bigger star.” He frowned, testing an
icy spot on the fire escape before stepping past it. “Ty
didn't feel right about the point-fixing, but Pops talked
him into it, said he'd make sure no one ever found
out.”
Nancy tried to ignore the groaning metal as she
followed Dennis up the stairs. “He must have felt really
betrayed when Papazian skipped town.”
“Leaving Ty and the other players to take the rap,”
Dennis said, blowing out an angry breath. “I couldn't
believe it when I walked into Sports Mania and saw
him. Lorenzo looked different, but I'd seen Pops
enough not to be fooled by the glasses and extra mus-
cle. I told him right away I was going to tell the cops.”
His angry fist came down on the railing, making it
shudder and groan.
Nancy forced herself to focus on the conversation.
“What happened?” she asked. “He talked you out of
it?”
“He offered to pay me to keep quiet.” Dennis an-
gled a defiant look down at her. “Do you blame me for
saying yes? A thousand dollars, every two weeks. That's
serious cash!”
“Enough to make up for what Papazian did to Ty?”
Nancy asked quietly. When he didn't answer, she de-
cided to let it drop.
“Mr. Lorenzo made his first fifteen-hundred-dollar
payoff to you after the pre-challenge dinner, right?”
she said.
Dennis confirmed her guess with a nod.
She thought back, trying to pull all the pieces of the
puzzle together. “Is that when he handed over the
answers to the Clues Challenge?” she asked. “You were
the one who sent the computer threat about the clues,
right?”
“Bravo,” Dennis said in a sarcastic voice that rubbed
Nancy the wrong way. “Ten points for the amateur
detective.”
Glancing up, Nancy saw George and Ned watching
their progress closely from the roof. Just a little farther,
and she and Dennis would be there.
“There's still something I don't get,” Nancy said,
turning back to Dennis. “If Mr. Lorenzo gave you the
answers to the clues, why did you sabotage our team?”
“Call it extra insurance,” he said, giving a shrug that
seemed to say it was no big deal.
Nancy couldn't believe how callous he seemed. “C.J.
sprained his ankle because of you!” she said.
“Pops is the one who rubbed the stair with soap,”
Dennis corrected. “At my instructions, of course.
Anyway, C.J. deserved it, after the way he stole Dede
from me.”
“No one deserves to be hurt like that,” Nancy shot
back. “What about the rest of us? George's skis? The
tree branch that broke while I was climbing the oak?”
“Mel did a pretty good job setting up both of those
accidents,” Dennis said. “I knew you suspected me, so
I had him do it.”
As he talked, a light blinked on inside Nancy's head.
“And you set up Joy to take the blame!” she realized.
“You must have planted her glove and that file on the
roof of the administration building.” Thinking about it
made her cheeks burn. “I knew someone else was in
the building. It was you!”
“Right again,” Dennis said. “I had a feeling you'd
come running after I knocked the icicle off the roof.
When I saw Joy using the phone, I knew I had the
perfect way to throw suspicion off myself. She didn't
even hear me take her glove. And I knew you already
suspected her.”
“You had it all figured out, huh?” Nancy said,
shaking her head in disgust.
Dennis grinned. “I made sure the Sigmas got a slow
start, so we wouldn't be suspected,” he bragged. “I was
all set to make a stunning, come-from-behind victory.”
He frowned, pressing his mouth into a tight line. “Until
you showed up.”
Nancy was glad to see that they were finally at the
top of the fire escape. Just above, Ned and George
were dark silhouettes against the bright sun.
“You guys made it,” Ned said. “We were afraid the
whole thing might fall.”
Nancy shuddered at the thought. “Give us a hand
up, all right?” she said. “Dennis, you go fir . . .”
Her voice trailed off as a third silhouette appeared
on the roof, right behind Ned and George. Nancy
couldn't see the face clearly, but she didn't need to.
There was no mistaking that bulky frame.
“Mr. Lorenzo!” she said.
Ned and George whirled around—then froze when
they saw the huge metal wrench in Mr. Lorenzo's
hand.
“Nobody moves!” Mr. Lorenzo said, waving the
wrench in a threatening arc.
“Boy, am I glad to see you!” Dennis said. He
reached up his hands. “Help me up, Pops. We've got to
get out of here before the police come.”
Mr. Lorenzo shook his head. “You've become too
expensive, Dennis,” he said in a frigid voice that made
Nancy shiver. “You'll have to go with everyone else.”
“G-go?” George echoed. “What do you mean?”
“I'm not about to let a couple of kids send me to
you're all about to suffer a tragic fall from this dan-
gerous old fire escape.”
16. A Desperate Plan
“You can't!” Nancy gulped, glancing down at the snow-
covered ground five stories below.
“Oh, yeah? Watch me,” Mr. Lorenzo said. He
turned to Ned and George. “Get down there with your
friends,” he ordered.
George glanced helplessly at Nancy, then began to
climb over the side. Mr. Lorenzo kept a close watch on
her.
“Randy went to call the police,” Ned said. “They'll
be here any minute.” He took a step forward
, then
jumped back when Mr. Lorenzo swung the wrench in
his direction.
“I'll be gone by then,” Mr. Lorenzo said. “You kids
should have kept your noses out of my business. You
and that reporter.”
Nancy grabbed the brick wall as George dropped
onto the fire escape next to her and Dennis. “You be-
long in jail, Mr. Lorenzo. Or maybe I should call you
Mr. Papazian.”
The store owner's eyes blazed red. “So you figured it
out,” he said. “I thought so. It's a good thing I decided
to follow you after you left the Sports Complex.”
He jerked his head toward Ned. “Now you. Down
with your friends,” he instructed.
Ned crouched down at the edge of the roof. Nancy
saw his eyes flicker briefly toward the vents at the
center of the roof.
“We actually believed you when you said you liked
to support college athletes,” Ned said, shaking his head
in disgust. “The only thing you care about is yourself.”
Ned looked carefully at Nancy, meeting her gaze.
Then he let his eyes flicker behind Mr. Lorenzo again.
He was trying to tell her something, she was sure of it.
“Mr. Lorenzo?” Joy's voice came from somewhere
on the roof. “What are you doing up here?”
Mr. Lorenzo turned, scowling, to look behind him.
In that second, Nancy jumped into action.
“Get him!” she shouted.
Ned launched himself toward Mr. Lorenzo, catching
him in a tackle that sent the big man flying face-first
onto the snowy roof.
Using the rusted fire escape railing for footing,
Nancy hoisted herself up onto the roof. She saw Mr.
Lorenzo twist out of Ned's grasp and reach for the
heavy wrench, which had dropped into the snow beside
him.
“No!” she cried, vaulting forward. She reached the
wrench a split-second before he did. Nancy kicked it as
hard as she could, sending it skittering across the
snowy rooftop. The heavy wrench stopped just a few
feet from where Joy stood watching, her eyes wide with
shock.
By the time Nancy turned around again, Ned and
Dennis had Mr. Lorenzo pinned to the ground with his
arms behind his back.
“The police are here!” George announced.
“Wh-what's going on?” Joy asked.
and-white squad car pull to a stop on the road. Randy's
Jeep was right behind it. Joy's sorority sisters stood on
the snowy ground, looking curiously from the police
car to the rooftop of the old theater building.
“It's a long story,” Nancy said. “And before we tell it,
there's something I have to do.”
She strode over to the wooden crate where Dennis
had been when she found him. Opening the top, she
reached inside and pulled out the blue-and-white
Clues Challenge banner.
She held up the banner, letting it flutter in the cold
winter wind. “There's a new Clues Challenge winner,”
she announced. “Omega Chi Epsilon!”
“I still can't believe Grant and I were stuck scaling
the wrong theater building while you guys saw all the
action,” C.J. said that evening.
Nancy grinned down the long table at the Eatery
where she, Ned, George, C.J., Grant, and Dede sat.
The rest of Dede's sorority sisters, as well as everyone
from the Delta Tau and Sigma Pi teams, were also
there.
The only ones missing were Dennis and Mr.
Lorenzo.
“I still can't believe Mr. Lorenzo was on the run
from the police for three years,” Dede said. “And that
Dennis was blackmailing him.”
“We're still in shock about that,” said Philip, leaning
over from the table where he sat with the other guys
from Sigma Pi. “I mean, Dennis was our friend.”
Philip's brother, Jake, shook his head slowly back
and forth. “We should have known something was up
when Dennis bought that new computer. I knew it cost
a bundle, but I never figured he got the money from
blackmailing someone.”
“Dennis and Mr. Lorenzo had a lot of people
fooled,” Nancy said. She leaned back in her chair,
looking out over the platters of pasta, chicken, and
grilled fish on their table. “The important thing is that
they're both in jail now, where they won't be able to
hurt anyone else.”
Joy stood up at her table and clinked her glass with a
spoon. “I'd like to make a toast,” she said. “Here's to
the new Clues Challenge champs.”
Nancy cheered along with everyone else.
“Of course, next year will be a different story,” Joy
went on when the noise died down. She grinned at her
teammates. “Right?”
“Absolutely,” Krista spoke up from her table. “Next
year the Kappas are going to win!”
Taunts and challenges flew from table to table, but
Nancy didn't join in. Leaning close to Ned, she gazed
into his warm brown eyes.
“We just solved a three-year-old mystery and got
two criminals off the street,” she said. “I think that
makes us all winners.”