Missing Girl Is Safe In California -- Nicole Miller, 15, Calls Best Friend

The teenage girl who disappeared almost two weeks ago after saying she was going for a bike ride called her best friend from California and said she was doing fine and having fun.

Nicole Miller, 15, called her best friend in Seattle on Thursday evening from the San Francisco Bay Area and said she was happy and would be calling home within a few days, said her father, Stephen Miller.

"My daughter sounded upbeat, she said that she was healthy, she's fine and she was going to call me," Miller said yesterday. "As you can well imagine, I was elated to hear my daughter was well."

He said he is staying by the phone in Seattle while his former wife, Carolyn Miller, is in the Bay Area waiting for word of their daughter.

Miller said his daughter's friend called him after hearing from Nicole. Police were then able to trace the call to Pacifica, a coastal town south of San Francisco.

Seattle missing-persons detectives and FBI agents, working in Pacifica, are trying to trace the number to a specific person and find the girl, police said.

Miller said it still is unclear who his daughter is with and whether it is someone she met over the Internet who helped her or whether it's someone she met on her trip.

Nicole was reported missing Aug. 31, after heading off on her bicycle. She told her mother she was going for a ride on the Burke-Gilman Trail, and that she'd be home later.

Nicole's parents said their daughter had never run away, and that they were unaware of any reason she would want to.

For days, police scoured the trail while friends and neighbors distributed missing-person posters.

When police found no evidence that foul play had been involved with the girl's disappearance, they began to probe her computer habits. Her parents told police the Roosevelt High School sophomore had been logging significant time in Internet chat rooms and thought she may have been lured into a meeting by someone she knew from cyberspace.

Nicole's best friend said she had been advised by an attorney not to speak to the media.

The friend did say, however, that she had visited family members in the Bay Area last week but had not seen Nicole or known how close she was.

Christine Clarridge's phone message number is 206-464-8983. Her e-mail address is cclarridge@seattletimes.com