DISCLAIMER: I do not own the Nancy Drew series or any of the characters. This is based on the original series written by Carolyn Keene who was smart enough to make the whole thing up.

Chapter 01

"Whoo! Thank God for long weekends, huh?"

George Fayne whooped happily from the front seat of her best friend's vintage convertible. She futilely tried to brush the short strands of black hair from her pretty face. She liked her boy's name and took pride in it. George had always been a tomboy and would always remain a tomboy. She was eighteen, thin and athletically built, outspoken, courageous, and utterly sarcastic. With George, what you saw is what you got. She grinned rebelliously as her hair whipped forward again.

Nancy Drew, the owner of the blue vintage hot rod, smiled and shook her head. Her own shoulder length strawberry-blond hair was held back by a head band. Nancy was also eighteen, slim and attractive. She had bright blue eyes and a gorgeous smile that knocked boys off their feet. She was a responsible girl, something George used against her whenever she accused Nancy of acting too old for her age.

"Well," Nancy said. "You don't have to sound so excited to be out of school."

"No, you have to be more excited to be out of school," George prompted, giving her friend an exasperated look. "Jesus, it's almost like you like it there."

"I like it there," Bess Marvin spoke up from the back seat.

Bess was blond and pretty, George's cousin. Her hair was long and wrapped into a ponytail. She had clear, powder-blue eyes and a beautiful face. Bess, although extremely good-looking, had a lot of hang ups. She was constantly checking on her hair and makeup. At the moment she was making sure to hold down her hair so it wouldn't get puffy and tangled. She was also eighteen, though the youngest of the three, and was an obsessive dieter, even though she was terrible at it.

"I'm going to miss it," she said, looking out at the gorgeous scenery passing by.

George snorted rudely. "You would."

"Oh, come on, like you aren't?" her cousin retorted.

"Yeah," Nancy added. "What about volleyball?"

"Ah, volleyball. There'll be volleyball in college a couple of months from now. But, for the meantime, I plan to waste away in front of my TV set and enjoy my summer before I head off to a higher education," George said, ending in a mocking tone. She looked at Nancy who was staring blankly ahead of her, her brow furrowed. "What are you so worried about?"

"What?" Nancy replied, snapping out of her trance. "Sorry, just thinking about that little girl at the carnival this morning."

"Poor girl," Bess murmured, curling the end of her ponytail around her finger.

"Yeah, I mean, who names their kid Honey anyway?" George asked. "Leave it to the Swedes."

"You jerks, I'm serious," Nancy laughed. "I can't get how sad her mother was."

"I thought you said charity made you feel good inside," Bess taunted.

"Nah, that was Bobby Ridgeway," George put in and Nancy slapped her arm with a laugh.

"It does, but she didn't like us paying for everything. She let us do it because of her daughter. I just can't believe that girl's dad would just take off like that after promising to send them money."

"People skip out on their families all the time," George said.

"Yeah, but these Swenson's seemed pretty old school, I get a feeling that a guy who brought up a family like that wouldn't just bail. I wish I could do something."

"Well, we can try to help out Mrs. Swenson and the girl until some word comes around. There's volunteer work for you, Nance," Bess suggested

"Yeah, I guess," Nancy sighed and the girls feel into a comfortable silence as they drove back to their home town, River Heights.

"Man, it's really nice out here, huh?" George said after a while. "Those are some beautiful, big houses."

"Big is an understatement," Nancy said.

"Mostly country estates," Bess sighed. "Oh, look! Isn't that one gorgeous? If I had to pick any, it'd be that one. I love to live in it. Wonder who owns it?"

Nancy opened her mouth to reply, glancing at the white country mansion, but didn't get a chance to say anything. A huge explosion rang out suddenly from the house and it burst into flames. Glorious tongues of fire lapped at the sides of the house through the shattered windows.

"Holy shit!" George cursed, cringing as the house seemed to explode outward. "What the hell was that?"

"What happened?" Bess asked, dumbfounded and staring.

"There could be someone stuck inside," Nancy said, her mouth set into a grim, hard line. She spun the car around violently and roared off towards the driveway of the house. It was set back far from the road.

"Are you freaking nuts?!" Bess asked. "What are you doing?"

"I'm going to go help, what does it look like?" Nancy snapped.

"What could you possibly do to help? Call 911 for Christ's sake and let them deal with it!"

"By the time they get here, it'll be too late!"

"Nancy's right. Stop being such a coward, Bess," George yelled back at her cousin.

Nancy squealed to a stop some distance from the fire and turned to look at her scared friend in the back seat. "Bess, call 911 and tell them to get the hell out here, now!"

Nancy jumped out of the car, George following and slamming the door shut as Bess dialed frantically, hands shaking. Nancy and George ran towards the front door and were struck by a wave of thick smoke. Coughing and hacking, they waved the smog away and raced forward. There was a blast of heat as they neared the front door. The girls reeled back.

"How are we going to get in?" George wheezed. "And if we get in, how are we going to get anyone out?"

"Well, we can't get in through the front, there's too much smoke and we'll choke."

"Crap! What do we do?"

Nancy thought for a minute. "Look, you go back to the car with Bess. Move it back towards the road a bit, for all we know it could get crushed pretty soon. I'm going to go around the back."

"Yeah… right," George stammered, somewhat dazed.

"George, look at me. Go!"

George nodded faintly , then turned and raced towards Bess and the car. Nancy stumbled out of the smoky air, coughing, and sprinted around the side of the house. The smoke was clearing up and her vision wasn't as blurry. She stopped suddenly as she saw a man about to crawl through the back bushes, running from the burning house.

"Thank God," she murmured to herself. "Sir! You okay? Did you come from inside the house?"

The man seemed to hear her, but he turned his head to look back as something crashed inside the house. He was in his late thirties, early forties, blond and ruddy with a square, defined jaw line. His eyes were hazel and she could have sworn she saw them before. He cringed from the house, glanced around, but still didn't see her, and barged through the bushes to disappear.

He wasn't hurt or burned from what Nancy saw and he was running from the house, not to it. Could he …? Nancy shook the thought away and focused on the bigger picture. She stopped again as she heard sirens screeching to the front of the house and men yelling suddenly. She raced back to the front of the house.

George and Bess where explaining to an official waving at the house. Neighbors from the surrounding houses had begun to flood in and even the small amount of traffic was piling around the driveway to get a good look. Police officers were soon set up to direct the traffic away, but a huge jam was created already. Firemen worked fast to contain the flames, though they couldn't save anything. The neighbors were all conspiring amongst themselves.

"What happened?" one of the braver spectators asked Bess and George.

Bess shrugged, slightly hysterical. "I don't know, it just… exploded! God, I hope no one's in that hellhole."

The woman shook her head. "I doubt it. The Raybolt's haven't been here all summer, so I'm guessing no one is inside."

"I hope not," Nancy said, watching the action.

"Watch it!"

"BACK UP!"

"The roof is caving!"

There were shrieks and yells as the roof collapsed inward and a shower of sparks flitted towards the ground. A gigantic cloud of smoke eclipsed their sight and had everyone coughing. Nancy blindly stumbled out of it, knocking into something hard.

"Shit!" she cursed, and rubbed her eyes to look. She kicked the side of the empty dog house. She had semi-circled around the house and as she was about to turn back, stopped. She bent and picked up a small, leather-bound book. It must have been dropped recently because it was still in good condition and it had poured the night before. She turned it over in her hands and jumped back as another shower of sparks rained down. She stuck the book into her pocket and ran to the front of the house again.

"George? Bess? George!" Nancy called, but the cousin's had disappeared. She made her way through the crowd of people, tiptoeing to get a better view over the people's heads.

"Huh," Nancy overheard one of the neighbors snort. "Raybolt's going to have a fit when he finds out his house burned down."

"That's for sure," another responded, rolling her eyes. "Don't worry, he and his oh so charming wife will get over it. Those assholes are rolling in money. Can you believe what a stuck up prima Donna that woman was?"

"Tell me about it. That couple was never very friendly. If you ask me, the skeezeball deserved it."

"You can say that again."

Nancy had listened interestedly to the conversation and was brought out of her racing thoughts as an ember passed extremely close to her face and landed on the grass. She stamped it out before it could do any damage.

"May car," she remembered suddenly and ran towards the lower part of the driveway. Maybe George and Bess were there waiting for her. She bit her lip and looked through the crowd of cars for her electric blue convertible.