The Case of the Absent Answers: Mickie McKinney: Boy Detective, #1

By R.L. Fink

The name's McKinney. Mickie McKinney. I'm a gumshoe, a private eye to those

who speak my lingo and a detective to those that don't. I'll find your cat or bust the monster under your bed, and I ain't afraid of the dark either. But I'm getting ahead of myself. I was sitting with my size six shoes propped up on the corner of my battered desk, watching the bubbles from my pipe floating toward the water-stained ceiling above my head, when a slender, feminine figure slipped in – her form a silhouette framed by the light of the hallway.

Blonde, blue-eyed, she was prettier than the soap bubbles over my head, but the tear in her eye said that she was a damsel in distress and needed my help.

• Language: English
• Publisher: R.L. Fink
• Release date: May 27, 2022
• ISBN: 9798201049850

R.L. Fink

R.L. Fink grew up in Topanga, California as the eldest of three. An avid listener, then reader of detective stories, the only thing better than writing detective novels would have been to become a character in one. But since that never happened, R.L. Fink chose to write a detective series based on a middle school experience that never happened, but would've been fun if it did, with friends that never existed, but would've been fun if they had.

Book preview

Published by Faux Fiction Audio

https://www.fauxfictionaudio.com

A Dedication

For Lucas, Leann, and Violet, who brought Mickie, Burners, and Sam to life.

Chapter 1: The New Kid

The name’s McKinney . Mickie McKinney. I'm a gumshoe, a private eye to those who speak my lingo, and a detective to those that don’t. I'll find your cat or bust the monster under your bed, and I ain’t afraid of the dark either. But I'm getting ahead of myself. I was sitting with my size-six shoes propped up on the corner of my battered desk, watching the bubbles from my pipe floating toward the water-stained ceiling above my head, when there was a knock at the door and it opened to reveal the client; her slender form a silhouette framed by the light of the hallway.

Any other guy would’ve fallen for her the instant she stepped timidly in the room, and I must confess my heart beat a little faster as she spoke to me for the first time.

Mr. McKinney? she breathed. Blonde and blue-eyed, she was prettier than the soap bubbles over my head, but the tear in her eye said that she was a damsel in distress who needed my help.

I LEANED FORWARD, A little breathless myself, waiting for her next words.

Can you tell me what year Maple Ridge was founded and its main source of income?

Definitely not what I was expecting.

My client rapped her knuckles on my desk and the dingy office I was sitting in melted away as my daydream was replaced with reality. The peeling wallpaper of my dingy office was replaced with a chalkboard, the city outside my window turned back into a collection of badly drawn maps from different artists.  My scarred oak desk shrank to less than a third of its size and my well-worn suit transformed back into the jeans and t-shirt I had put on that morning before school. My damsel transformed into the stern Miss Caverly, my seventh-grade history teacher, and I could suddenly hear the snickering of my classmates at Maple Ridge Middle School.

A young damsel she was not. Miss Caverly was wrinkled as a prune and skinny as a scarecrow, with a short crop of blond hair on her head the same color as straw. With her beak-like nose only a foot away from mine, I could smell her breakfast of sardines, avocado and prune juice, a combination that usually required a bathroom break during class.

Dressed in green cardigan and slacks, Miss Caverly looked comfortable, like an eccentric aunt you wouldn’t mind introducing to your friends. And as long as you didn’t get on her bad side, she was an okay gal. Too bad for me, I’d been caught daydreaming in class, and she was not happy.

Mr. McKinney, she said, crossing her scrawny arms, "I asked you to name the year when our town, Maple Ridge was founded and its main source of income.

Perhaps instead of daydreaming in class you should pay attention so you can answer the ques—

Maple Ridge was technically founded in 1880 when the first Maple syrup factory was built by Theodore P. Burns, I answered before she could finish. From 1880 until now, the main source of income for Maple Ridge, Vermont is Maple-based products. I was a dreamer, but I