Being Nikki Read online

Chapter 19

  STEVEN WASN’T IN THE MOOD FOR A party. Neither was I, actually. I mean, Steven hadn’t spent the night before at the Stark Angel dress rehearsal and investor after party, signing autographs and posing for photos with Stark Enterprises executives, pretending to be so thrilled to be there. Nor had he woken up the next day and dragged himself to school for his remaining finals, or slunk around to the teachers whose exams he’d missed the day before, begging them to let him reschedule. I was the only one who appeared to care about having missed any exams. Christopher didn’t even bother to show up at school the next day. I had no idea where he was. Probably still with Felix in the basement, hatching their evil revenge plot against Stark. Which didn’t appear to be working, because as far as I could tell, Stark Enterprises showed every sign of still going strong. Frida, whom I passed in the hallway, stuck up her nose at me and moved right along. So I had no idea if her teachers allowed her to retake the finals she’d missed when she followed me out to Brooklyn. Mine weren’t so keen on the idea. I got a lot of, “Miss Howard, do you realize how much of this semester you’ve missed already? We here at Tribeca Alternative are willing to be flexible with students who have special schedules, but you’re going to have to make up your mind. Do you want a modeling career, or do you want an education?” Um…how about both? But I understood. I took my F’s on the finals whose teachers were totally unwilling to compromise and let me do extra work to make up for missing the final exam or project. Such as Public Speaking. Well, Mr. Greer always did think a bit too highly of himself, for a guy who slept through class every day. In some cases, the F wouldn’t affect my total grade in the class too badly. I’d still end up making a C or a B. But in others… Well, let’s just say it was a good thing I had my modeling career to fall back on if I didn’t make it into college. I knew not everybody was going to think this was such a good thing. My parents, for instance, weren’t going to be so thrilled when they heard about it…if I ever told them, that is. They had no way to find out about Nikki Howard’s grades, not being related to her—nor would the school have notified them that she’d skipped school yesterday. Frida, however, was another matter. She’d gotten into some pretty big trouble for leaving school and missing her exams. TAHS had notified Mom about both, as I found out when I’d called Mom and Dad to check in—stung by Frida’s rebuke that I cared more about my “new family” than I did about my old one. Mom had been frantic about Frida’s skipping…until I told her she’d been with me at the Stark Angel fashion show rehearsal. “What?” Mom sounded stunned. “With you?” “She was just worried about me,” I said. “We had a little fight. She saw me leaving school, and she didn’t know why, and so she followed me. I was going to a rehearsal at the Stark studios. She was with me the whole time. ” This part, at least, wasn’t technically a lie. “So you skipped school, too,” Mom said. Now she sounded more bitter than stunned. “It was work, Mom,” I said. Technically, this wasn’t a lie, either. “Don’t be too hard on Frida. She really thought she was doing the right thing. ” Mom sighed. “You’re both getting coal in your stocking this year,” she said. She didn’t sound like she was joking, either. So Frida hadn’t told Mom where she’d been—chasing me to Brooklyn. What was Frida up to? Why hadn’t she told Mom and Dad where she’d been? What was going on with her? Why was she so mad at me? Surely she couldn’t really believe I was turning into my donor body, forgetting my real family in place of Nikki’s. Not for real. It was true sometimes—especially when a guy was kissing me—I felt as if I were losing control over Nikki. But forsake Frida and Mom and Dad for Nikki’s family? No. It was just that they needed me right now. And I was in a position where I could help them. Besides, I owed them. Didn’t I? Who else was going to help them if I didn’t? When I got home from school that day, I found Steven—still not in the mood for a party—looking pleased with himself. “Come with me,” he said, and guided me toward the stereo cabinet. “What?” I asked, unwinding my scarf as Cosabella jumped excitedly against my legs. “You didn’t get us a present, did you? You didn’t have to…” My voice trailed off as I saw what Steven slid back the stereo cabinet doors to show me. It sat next to our CD player, a black box with a lot of knobs on it. “Oh,” I said. “That’s so nice. But I think we already have one. ” I didn’t know what it was. We already had one of everything. “I’m sure yours is better,” I said, to make him not feel bad. “You don’t have one of these,” Steven assured me, with a chuckle. “It’s an acoustic noise generator. And don’t ask where I got it, because you’re better off not knowing. It works by injecting noise on all the frequencies on which you might be bugged. In your case—” He pointed upward. I cocked my head. “But…I can’t hear anything. ” “Right,” Steven said. “That’s the point. You’re not supposed to know it’s here. And neither will they. All they’re going to know is that they can’t hear you anymore. They’ll probably send someone in to try to find out why. But they won’t be able to figure it out. They’ll never have seen one of those before. It’s for military use only. ” I stared at him. “Which is why I’m not supposed to ask where you got it,” I said. “Right?” “Right,” he said. “Or ask where I got this. ” He handed me a small black handheld device, not much bigger than my bug detector. “It’s a portable audio jammer,” he said, in response to my inquisitive look. “It only operates on two frequencies, but it will stop any surveillance microphones operating within a distance of a hundred and fifty feet of you from picking up normal conversation. And soundlessly. ” I looked down at the sleek black device in my hand. I was touched. “This is so nice of you, Steven,” I said, feeling my eyes grow moist. I’d been so paranoid for so long about Stark overhearing my every word. And now, suddenly, I didn’t have to be. And it had all happened so fast. “But I…I didn’t get you anything. ” “What?” Steven looked incredulous. “Yes, you did. This was the least I could do. ” I shook my head. I couldn’t believe I was getting teary-eyed. Then again, I always had been a giant geek. I guess this was proof that what Frida had accused me of wasn’t true—I wasn’t turning into Nikki Howard after all. I’m pretty sure she wouldn’t have been impressed by gifts of an acoustic noise generator and an audio jammer. “What do you mean?” “The TV stations that ran interviews with you say they’ve had hundreds of calls,” Steven said. “All from people who think they’ve seen Mom. ” “Are any of them credible sightings?” Lulu, using some of her Law and Order jargon, came into the loft suddenly. She was helping Katerina with the caterers, who’d begun arriving in advance of her party. “No. ” Steven closed the stereo cabinet hastily. “Not yet. But I have a feeling we’re getting close. ” “Fantastic!” Lulu smiled brilliantly at him, then pointed an imperious finger at a guy carrying a carved-out pumpkin in which some kind of liquid was going to be poured. “No! Katerina, where does that go?” “Here!” Katerina took over, looking physically ready to move the guy holding the pumpkin, if not the gourd itself. “So it’s okay with you,” I asked, looking nervously at Nikki’s brother, “that I did all those interviews?” “Okay with me?” Steven shook his head. “We should have thought of it sooner. But is it going to get you in trouble with—?” He raised his gaze to the ceiling where the performer from Cirque du Soleil, wearing very little except a nude-colored bra and a pair of panties and a long red scarf, was testing out a newly installed trapeze with her weight. Not far from the trapeze were the round holes I’d noticed in the ceiling a few weeks earlier. Steven wasn’t avoiding the word Stark for fear of being overheard by my employer…not anymore, thanks to his gifts. He just didn’t want to bring it up in front of Lulu while she was in such a party mood. “I don’t know,” I said with a shrug. “I guess we’ll see. ” “I can’t believe all the fuss she’s going to for this,” Steven said, looking at Lulu as she flitted from one table to another, making last-minute adjustments. She had already changed into her party finery, a poofy-skirted black cocktail gown. She looked like one
of her favorite movie characters, Holly Golightly, from the movie Breakfast at Tiffany’s. All she needed was a long cigarette holder. “It’s important to her,” I explained. “She doesn’t have any family. Her friends are her family. ” I looked at him. “You’re part of that family, too, now. ” “I am?” He looked a bit startled. I was pretty sure he didn’t fully comprehend what I meant—at least so far as Lulu having an enormous crush on him went. I highly doubted it had occurred to Steven Howard that Lulu Collins, of all people, thought he was hot. He just didn’t have a high enough opinion of himself. Look at the struggle the two of them had had over his outfit for the party. He’d wanted to wear his normal clothes—T-shirt and jeans—and Lulu had wanted him to wear an ensemble she’d put together for him at Barneys. Lulu had won, in the end, by pouting. But Steven looked as uncomfortable as a jock at a Comic-Con. Not that he looked bad—exactly the opposite. I just wasn’t used to seeing him resemble such a typical New Yorker, in a striped button-down shirt with dark-rinse jeans and a fitted jacket with frayed stitching that I knew had to have cost at least a thousand dollars. I doubted Steven knew that, however. “Nikki, people are coming soon,” Lulu cried when she saw me sitting on the couch, petting Cosy and talking to Steven. “Are you going to change or what? I mean, you’re not wearing that, are you?” I was still in my school clothes, having been too exhausted to slip into something else. “I’m changing,” I said. “I’m changing. ” I slunk off to my bedroom to find something to wear, relieved to be out of the way of Katerina and the party caterers. Cosabella looked relieved, too, and hopped into her little basket to curl up and go to sleep. In Nikki’s closet was an endless supply of couture, most of it still with the price tags attached. I never had to go shopping, because stylists just gave Nikki things to wear right off the racks from the shoots I went to. I found a slinky black evening gown, made of some kind of sparkly material, that tied like a halter around the neck. It was cold outside, but inside the loft it was hot because Lulu had a blaze going full blast in the fireplace. She’d turn the air-conditioning on and open every window to combat the body heat from all the guests later…We’d had a few gatherings in the past. I took off my clothes and slithered into the dress, which was the kind you couldn’t wear with underwear or the lines would show, then spent a half hour messing around with my makeup. I was never the type to care about makeup before, but it was very soothing if, for instance, you were upset about a guy—say, a guy like Christopher—to screw around in the mirror, trying to give yourself a smoky eye, while waiting for him to call, and telling yourself it would be a really, really bad idea to call him. I mean, after all, Christopher prefers a dead girl. What did I want to hang out with a guy like that for, anyway? Right? I suppose I had zero chance of that relationship ever working out…which was just as well, I guess. No guy needed to tangle with someone as messed up as me. Christopher was better off without me. Maybe I should just step aside and let McKayla Donofrio have him, that lactose-intolerant, National Merit Scholarship-winning, Business Club-founding, tortoiseshell-headband-wearing little cow. My eyes ended up looking more haunted than smoky. I could see I’d put on too much liner, and had to start over. By the time I came out of my bedroom, it was late, and the first guests—the early ones, Lulu had assured me, were always wannabes and losers—had already arrived. I used the opportunity to grab some food—no need to worry about getting it while it was still hot, since Katerina, in the kitchen, was supervising the caterers to make sure everything stayed exactly the temperature at which it was supposed to be served all night—so I wouldn’t faint with hunger later on when it all ran out. Meanwhile, DJ Drama had arrived and was setting up. I went over to chat with him. He seemed shy. Or maybe he was just uninterested in anything a seventeen-year-old girl stuffing her face with sushi had to say. Above our heads, while we chatted, the Cirque du Soleil performer was doing unbelievable contortions, a detached look on her face. I wondered what it would be like to be her. Better, I figured, than it was to be me. The loft kept filling up with more and more people, some of whom I recognized from the pages of Lulu’s copies of Vogue and Frida’s copies of Us Weekly and some of whom I’d never seen before. DJ Drama got the music pulsing and soon was too busy to speak to me—but that was okay, because Nikki’s friends had started crowding around me, telling me how great I looked and leading me toward the bar, where they’d all begun ordering some of the exotic drinks the astrologist bartenders were mixing. I couldn’t help it. I started having fun. Okay, my life was in shambles. The guy I loved didn’t love me back. The mother of the body my brain had been transplanted into was missing. And I’d flunked half my finals because I’d missed them. But it was hard not to have a good time when there was so much good music, good food, and so many happy people around. Even Steven, I saw, wasn’t having a bad time. I spotted him dancing with Lulu—if you could call what he was doing dancing. Mainly, he was standing still while Lulu cavorted all around him like a crazy wild woman. That’s when he happened to catch my eye. He saw me staring. And he looked toward the ceiling. Not like he was glancing at the Cirque du Soleil performer. But like he was saying, Can you believe this? But also, he was smiling. So his glance toward the ceiling was sort of saying, I know, right? This is crazy…but it’s kind of fun, too. And that’s when I realized maybe things weren’t quite that bad. At least I had a connection with someone who thought about things the same way I did. It was just surprising that it was Nikki’s brother, Steven. Maybe, I thought to myself, Frida was right. Just a little bit. Not the part where she’d accused me of turning into Nikki Howard, but the part where she’d implied I’d found a new family. Maybe, like Lulu, I was making a new family…one that included my old family. But that wasn’t as surprising as what happened next: The crowd parted a little, and I saw something I never in a million years expected to see. And that was a member of my old family—my sister, Frida—dancing with Brandon Stark. I had no idea what she was doing there. Clearly, she’d invited herself, since I certainly hadn’t given her the okay to be there. Worse, she was wearing a tiny dress—no bigger than two handkerchiefs sewn together (I might be exaggerating, but not really)—and gyrating her hips like she thought she was Miley Cyrus or someone. That was not cool. It was so not cool that I was stalking over to give her a piece of my mind when I heard a familiar voice say, “Nikki,” and I turned around. There wasn’t a person in the world who could have distracted me, at that moment, from killing my sister. Not a single person. Except the second-to-last person I’d expected to see at that party, after my little sister: Christopher. What was he doing here? I had never invited him. How could I, now that he’d gone to the dark side? And I had already given him everything he had asked for. What more could he possibly want from me? Then I glanced into his face, and my shock gave way to concern…Christopher looked white as a sheet. What was the matter? Then it hit me: Oh, God. Felix had been arrested. I knew it. Just knew it. They’d overheard us in Christopher’s apartment. Of course they had. I hadn’t had the audio jammer then. And they’d be coming for Christopher next. He was on the run. And he’d come to me for help. And in that minute I knew…as much as I’d told myself I didn’t care about Christopher anymore, as much as I told myself McKayla Donofrio could have him, I’d been lying to myself. I loved him. I always would. I’d do whatever I had to do to hide him from the cops. Even if he never, ever gave me the time of day. Because that’s what you did for people you loved. Even people who didn’t love you back. “Can I talk to you for a minute?” Christopher asked me. He had to raise his voice almost to a shout to be heard above the pounding music. “What’s going on?” I asked him, fear clutching my throat. It was a different kind of fear than I’d felt for Frida when I’d seen her in her handkerchief dress, dancing with Brandon. That had been more like annoyance, actually. I knew she couldn’t really get in trouble when Lauren Conrad was dancing in front of a camera crew right beside her. “Is—” Christopher seemed to have read my tho
ughts. He shook his head. “Everything’s fine,” he said. “Well, I mean, relatively. I’m probably going to flunk out of school. But other than that. And I’m sorry to crash your party like this. I just really need to talk to you. Look, can we go somewhere a little quieter? Where’s your room?” “It’s over there,” I said, pointing. “Good. ” Christopher reached out and wrapped his hand around my wrist. The next thing I knew, he was pulling me through the crowded loft toward the door to my room. He didn’t seem to care how many people he bumped into along the way—caterers serving drinks, models from the Stark Angel fashion show whose numbers Brandon had evidently gotten and summoned to come along, fashionistas, Karl the doorman, improbably dancing with Katerina, both of them having had too much to drink. He evidently just wanted to get where it was quieter, and get there as soon as he possibly could. And when we were in my empty bedroom, he dropped my hand and turned to face me. He didn’t even bother turning on a light, just settled for the glow from the city that shone in from the floor-to-ceiling windows. I stood there looking at him, a little out of breath from how quickly he’d pulled me. It was a lot quieter in my room. The music was still thumping unbelievably loudly out in the loft, but at least you could hear yourself think. The building, having once been a police precinct station, had decent enough soundproofing from room to room. I guess the old-timey cop higher-ups hadn’t wanted to be able to hear the prisoners scream as they were being tortured back in their prison cells. “So what’s so important,” I asked him, “that you couldn’t tell me out there?” And the next thing I knew, without uttering a single word, he was reaching up, cupping both my cheeks with his hands, and tilting my face until it was just inches from his. And then he was kissing me. Christopher Maloney was kissing me. It wasn’t a possessive kiss or a greedy kiss. He didn’t smash his lips up against mine the way some guys—okay, Brandon—did when they got a chance to kiss Nikki Howard, like they wanted to own her or drive themselves up against her or whatever. It was a sweet kiss. It was almost…well, if I didn’t know better, I’d have said it was a loving kiss. But Christopher didn’t love Nikki Howard. Christopher loved Em Watts. Still, I felt his kiss from my lips all the way down to my painfully throbbing—in my too tight Jimmy Choo shoes—toes. My lips were tingling as if they’d been stung by a thousand tiny bees. Or been slathered in a ton of Lip Venom. My God, was all I could think. Christopher was kissing me. Christopher Maloney was kissing me. And the thing was, even though people always say dreams never stand up to the reality, this totally did. Christopher kissing me felt exactly as I’d always imagined it would…as warm and as right and as electric as I’d dreamed—when I’d been idiotic enough to dream of Christopher Maloney kissing me, before the accident, before I’d given up all my dreams. Because after the accident, of course, there’d been no point in dreaming…None of those dreams had a chance of ever coming true. But now…now. The dream I’d fantasized about most often of all as I’d sat in Public Speaking was coming true right in front of me. Not only was Christopher kissing me, but—because my legs appeared to have given out from the shock of it all—he was lifting me up…no, really, he had scooped an arm up under my collapsing knees and was lifting me up—and carrying me toward the bed. Wait—was this really happening? Except that it had to be. Because I could feel the metal rivets from his leather jacket biting into my skin through the thin material of my dress. Surely I couldn’t be dreaming that. And I could feel the soft poofiness of my down comforter behind my back as he laid me gently down on top of it. And then I could feel the hardness of his body as he, in turn, lay down on top of me. Surely all these things had to be happening. I couldn’t be imagining them, or the steady thump-thump-thump of the music from the next room, which seemed to be going exactly in time with the rapid thump-thump-thump of my heart… Or the way his lips, so close to mine, murmured the word Em before he kissed me again, this kiss so long and so hungry that I really couldn’t have described it as sweet. Not this time. Not when every inch of skin on my body was so tingly and aware of every place it was in contact with his…not when suddenly I realized he was lying on top of me, with one leg insinuated between mine. Not when all that was separating us was a few scraps of material and some leather. And that was when it hit me, the word he’d said, that single syllable finally trickling down through my kiss-addled brain. “What did you call me?” I asked, wrenching my lips away from his. “I know,” he said. Since I’d pulled my head away, he couldn’t reach my mouth. So he settled for kissing my neck. Needless to say, this was hugely distracting. It also felt really, really good. Better, even, than having my neck massaged. His voice, when he spoke again, was a deep-throated growl, it was so rough with emotion. “I know it’s you, Em. ” “You what?” I was positive I was in some kind of dream now, and that I was going to wake up any minute, like I always did. Maybe this time I’d be at the bottom of the ocean in St. John. Maybe I’d never really left there after all, and everything that had happened after that was just one long, McKayla Donofrio-filled nightmare. “Your file,” Christopher murmured, against my neck. “I read it. The Stark Institute for Neurology and Neurosurgery didn’t do its due diligence when selecting an offshore IT consultancy. ” Okay. That didn’t sound like part of a dream…or something I’d imagine. “What?” I said intelligently. “Stark cut corners,” Christopher said. His lips were still on my throat. “Not a wise move when it comes to your network. ” Wait a minute. “I’m surprised no one’s found out about those whole-body transplants they’ve been doing before now. ” Christopher’s voice was still a low, gravelly rasp. “It’s really just a matter of time before the press discovers what they’ve been up to. ” Wait. Christopher knew? He knew? “It’s not…I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said. Even as I was saying it, I thought, confusedly, No, wait…the acoustic noise generator. Stark can’t overhear me anymore. I can tell him. I can tell him the truth now. But old habits die hard. “Em. ” Christopher’s lips traveled up my neck to my mouth again. “It’s all right. I know. I know you couldn’t tell me. I know you tried. But I’m here now. Everything’s going to be all right. You know I always loved you. ” It was fantastic, what his mouth was doing to me. The things he was saying were even more amazing. It was everything I had ever wanted. It was all just incredible. “You always loved me?” I echoed. “Of course I did. ” Christopher looked down at me. His expression, which moments before had been supremely confident, now seemed confused. “You know that. I mean, you saw what a mess I was after your funeral. Em, when you died…it nearly tore me apart. When I found out you were alive, I can’t even describe to you—” I didn’t know why I couldn’t just lie there and enjoy what was happening to me. I didn’t know why I couldn’t just accept what he was saying and forget that he’d never said he loved me back when I had that snaggletooth and didn’t look like the goddess that I did now. I mean, I was still the same person on the inside then that I was now. So what did it matter? Except… It mattered. I pushed him away from me. He moved, seemingly dazed by what I was doing, then watched as I wriggled out from beneath him, rolled off the bed—careful not to step on Cosabella, who’d come trotting over to see what was going on—then went to one of the windows and wedged it open, letting in the sound of the traffic below, as well as a blast of fresh winter air. I knew there was no danger of us being overheard by Stark. Not anymore. I just needed some air to help me think. “So if you loved me so much,” I turned around to demand, “why didn’t you ever try to kiss me when I was in my old body?” “Oh, my God,” Christopher said, in a different voice, more like his normal one, no longer deep and gravelly, blinking at me from the bed. Even he couldn’t believe what was happening. “Are you seriously going there? Now?” “Yeah,” I said. “I am. I mean, you never even noticed I existed until I died. Except as someone to play Journeyquest with. You never noticed me as a girl. I don’t think it’s unreasonable that I ask for some kind of explanation for that.
And just what do you mean Everything’s going to be all right? How is everything going to be all right? You’re going to sweep in and take care of everything because you’re some big man and I’m just a delicate little girl and I can’t handle the situation? I can assure you, Christopher, I’m handling the situation. ” “Oh, yeah,” Christopher said, sitting up. “First you get your head cracked open with a plasma screen TV. Then you get your brain transplanted into a supermodel’s body. You’ve been doing a great job so far, Em. ” As great as it felt to hear him calling me Em again—as transporting an experience as that was—I wanted to smack him across the head for his sarcasm. “Oh,” I said. “You’re one to talk, with your stupid idea to hack Stark Enterprises. Like that’s going to work. ” “As a matter of fact, it is working. I found out the truth about you, didn’t I? And at least I had an idea,” Christopher said. “What’s your plan? Throw a party and invite Lauren Conrad and DJ Drama?” I crossed back over to the bed until I was standing in front of him. “That wasn’t my idea. And I’ve been slightly preoccupied, trying to find Nikki Howard’s missing mom. ” “Did it ever occur to you,” Christopher asked, ignoring me, “that those two things might be connected?” I threw him a startled look. “What are you talking about?” “Nikki’s mom disappearing,” Christopher said, “and what happened to you. ” I stared at him. This was something I, too, had considered. But I’d never thought anyone but me would take the notion seriously. Well, and Steven. “I’m sorry,” I said. “But I think you had one too many lycheetinis. ” “I didn’t have any,” Christopher said, looking devious, the way he used to when we were younger and we’d try to pool our money and buy games marked ADULT ONLY from Kim’s Video down on St. Mark’s Place. “And maybe Nikki’s mom found out something she wasn’t supposed to know. Have you ever considered the fact that maybe Nikki did, too?” “Nikki?” I tilted my head to look at him in the dim half-light that was streaming in through the massive windows. “You think Nikki—what are you talking about, Christopher?” “I’m saying there are no accidents, Em. ” His blue eyes searched my face intently. “Does anyone really know what happened to Nikki that day? She went down and never got back up again. Stark says it was an aneurysm…but how do we know? Felix and I checked everywhere, but we couldn’t find a medical file on her…only the one for you. ” I opened my mouth. It seemed so strange to be having this conversation in my room with Christopher, of all people. I’d missed him so much, and now, here he was, and finally, finally what I’d never thought could happen was happening… …and we were having a fight. “Of course, we don’t know the truth about what happened to Nikki that day,” Christopher went on, before I had a chance to speak. “Maybe we never will. We have to accept Stark’s word for it. ” I shook my head. “What are you saying? That she didn’t have an aneurysm? Christopher, that’s insane. ” Except that Steven had said the exact same thing. Christopher shrugged. “There are no accidents. Nikki was the Face of Stark. They invested millions in her. She was too important for them to lose. As you know only too well. Especially with them doing this massive rollout of PCs with the new software and new version of Journeyquest. But they didn’t hire her for her brains, did they?” I bristled. “Modeling isn’t as easy as everyone thinks,” I snapped. “It’s really hard work. You try pretending you’re comfortable in a pair of skintight leather pants under a bunch of hot lights for hours on end—” “Look, Stark Enterprises…that whole organization is out of control. ” Christopher’s gaze on me was unsympathetic. I guess anyone’s would be. Getting paid thousands of dollars to stand in a pair of leather pants under some hot lights for a few hours wasn’t that big a sacrifice. You do tend to lose your perspective pretty quickly after a while. “…unsecured wireless system, the whole network totally misconfigured. It just makes you wonder. ” I thought about the computer I’d found in Nikki’s bedroom when I’d first arrived. It had been infected with spyware. So, when I’d checked it, had Lulu’s. I hadn’t unpacked the new PC that Robert Stark had just given me from its box, but who knew what might be wrong with it. “You don’t think…” I could barely breathe. “I don’t know what to think,” Christopher said. “Except that there’s something going on. Something they don’t want anyone to know. Something I think Nikki—and now maybe her mom—found out about. And Stark tried to shut both of them up. And you were in the right place at the wrong time. ” “Wait a minute. ” I felt cold, and not just because the wind was blowing in from the open window. “You think Stark killed Nikki? Because she knew something she wasn’t supposed to?” “They didn’t kill her, did they?” Christopher smiled at me grimly. “Because she’s sitting right in front of me. ” I shivered. “You know what I mean. ” “I know exactly what you mean,” he said. “And in answer to your question, I think it’s possible…even likely, that they had her brain conveniently removed. ” “My God,” I breathed. It was so weird to be talking to Christopher again. Not that I hadn’t talked to him lately. I had, obviously. But he hadn’t known it was me. Now he did. He’d even touched me, knowing it was me. And he wanted to touch me again, I could tell, from the way his hand kept lifting and then at the last minute he’d sweep his fingers through his hair or mess with the comforter on my bed instead. I knew how he felt. But I wasn’t going to go rushing into anything. I had too many questions, the first of which he still hadn’t answered. “But you think Nikki’s mom is alive,” I said. “That’s what Felix told Steven. ” “There’s no reason to think she’s dead,” Christopher said. “So where is she?” I asked. “Out there,” he said, nodding toward the bright city lights shining beyond my open window. “No one can just disappear forever. It’s really hard. Even when they give people in witness protection programs new identities, they feel compelled to reach out to friends they knew before, at the risk of their own lives. It’s force of habit. Everyone messes up eventually. You did it, with the dinosaur stickers. I was just too stupid to get it. ” I felt myself blushing. I still couldn’t believe I’d done that. And now his words triggered a memory deep in the back of my brain. It’s force of habit. Everyone messes up eventually. Only what? What was I thinking of? “The thing is,” Christopher said, reaching out to take my hand. “You’re right. I was a jerk before. A jerk not to see what a great thing we had. I guess I just didn’t know it until you were gone. And then…seriously, Em, part of me died, too. All I could think about after that was getting revenge on Stark—” “But now that you know the truth,” I said, pulling my hand gently from his, “you see that you can’t. You can’t do anything to them, Christopher. Because they’ve got my family in a stranglehold. And if what happened gets made public, Stark will take it out on my parents. ” “We’ll figure it out,” Christopher said. He stood up and put both hands on my bare shoulders. “I told you. I’ll take care of everything. ” I wanted so badly to believe him. It would have been bliss to have allowed myself to, to relax and let him take care of everything. As he pulled me toward him and laid the gentlest kiss on my forehead, I inhaled the scent of his leather jacket, felt the heat radiating from his strong body. It felt so nice, just for that minute or two, to have his arms around me, and to feel his heart beating against mine. For the first time in what seemed like the longest time, I knew I was protected and warm and not—well, alone. Then a cold wind swept in from the open window, sending shivers up and down my spine. A second later, the door to my room burst open, and a very male, very surprised voice asked, “Nikki?” And I turned my head and saw Brandon standing there, staring at us in the half-light.