Dead Is the New Black (13 page)

Samantha had been less obnoxious than usual lately, but that didn't mean she wouldn't take her role as head cheerleader as seriously as, oh, say, Attila the Hun.

I got to the gym and lined up in formation next to Penny Edwards. She flinched when she saw me, which reminded me I'd accidentally stomped on her foot during the dance routine at the last practice. Penny had been to the salon, I'd noticed. It was hard not to. Her hair had so many white stripes in it that it resembled a barber's pole.

I thought of Rachel's hair and Cassandra's. And Chelsea's. They all had streaks, too. Was Penny the victim of a vampire or just a victim of fashion? It was hard to tell. If the popular girls had stripes in their hair, Penny would have stripes in her hair.

When I looked around, I realized the entire squad (except me, of course) was dressed in black. I looked closer and saw that they weren't entirely in black; they also wore blood red ribbons in their hair. I tugged on my dingy gray sweats and hoped Samantha wouldn't notice that I obviously hadn't gotten the dress-like-a- clone memo.

"Daisy, you're late," Samantha barked. "And what are you wearing? Where's your practice uniform?"

I sighed. It was like last night had never happened. When Sam put on a cheerleading uniform, good Sam disappeared and the Divine Devereaux, her evil twin, appeared.

Miss Foster came over and I marveled at how ... peppy she looked. Entirely too perky to be someone's well-preserved grandmother. In the light of day, my suspicions about my gym teacher seemed ludicrous.

She was carrying a neatly folded bundle of clothing, which she handed to me. "It's my fault, I'm afraid. I forgot to give Daisy her new practice uniform."

Samantha frowned. "I suppose we can take a five-minute break while Daisy makes herself decent."

The rest of the squad walked off the floor while I glared at Samantha's back.

Miss Foster followed my glare. "Beauty has its price," she said softly. "It's not easy being the best, the prettiest. Sometimes, sacrifices have to be made."

Something in her voice was giving me serious heebie-jeebies. I stared at her, but all I saw was a woman whose own beauty was slowly fading. I saw fine wrinkles at the corners of her eyes. Mom called them laugh lines, but Grandma Giordano called them crow's feet. I wondered exactly how old Miss Foster was.

Somehow, my suspicions were back. I wished I had seen the article Ryan had found with my own eyes.

"I'd better go get changed," I said. The locker room was empty when I entered. As I dressed, I felt like someone was watching me. "Hello?" I called. There wasn't a sound. I shrugged, feeling foolish, but still changed into the black sweats as quickly as I could. I crammed my clothes into my bag and headed back to the gym.

When I got there, the gym was in chaos. Trina Manahan was writhing on the floor. A clump of girls stood over her, wringing their hands. Jordan was having hysterics in the corner.

As I watched, Samantha strode over and shoved Penny Edwards aside. "Give her some room," she said "Penny, call 9-1-1. She's having a seizure."

Penny gasped, but whipped out her cell phone and punched in the numbers. As I watched in shock, Trina's body jerked and her arm flailed out. I noticed she wasn't wearing her bracelet.

"Daisy, go get Nurse Phillips!" Samantha said.

I wasn't much better. I just stood there, my mind unable to process what was happening. "But it's Sunday."

"She was just in here talking to Trina less than five minutes ago. Now go!"

I ran down the hall toward the nurse's office.

Nurse Phillips wasn't in her office, but from the heavy scent of hairspray, she'd been there recently. I followed the trail of Aqua Net at a jog. I turned the corner and nearly collided with her. I didn't recognize her at first because she was missing her usual beehive and white uniform. Instead, her blond hair was in pigtails and she wore a T-shirt and jeans.

"Trina," I panted. "Seizure. Gym."

She took off at a run. She was a pretty good sprinter, and I had a hard time keeping up with her.

We heard the sirens as we entered the gym. Trina had stopped convulsing but was unconscious. Someone had covered her with a spirit blanket and there was a balled-up varsity jacket under her head. Dread crept over me. As I watched Trina, a thick white line appeared in her shiny black hair.

Stunned, I studied the room while Nurse Phillips bent down and took Trina's pulse. Samantha knelt on Trina's other side and whispered words of comfort. At least I hoped they were comforting words and not "Get up! You're a cheerleader."

Trina could end up just like Rachel or, worse, like the dead girl in the morgue. I saw something gleaming from the floor. Her ankh bracelet. It must have fallen off while she was stretching.

Trina's best friend, Alyssa Garfinkle, started sobbing. Everyone's attention swung to her. Nurse Phillips was still doing something to Trina.

My hand inched closer and I hooked a finger on the bracelet. I glanced around. No one was looking. I slipped the bracelet into my pocket.

A couple of minutes later, the paramedics arrived and Samantha and I got out of their way and sat on the bleachers. I flashed back to the club. It was a frighteningly similar scene. As they wheeled Trina out, Ryan rushed into the gym, dressed in a sweat- stained T-shirt and shorts.

Relief crossed his face when he saw me. "Daisy, what happened?"

After I explained things, I asked, "What are you doing here, anyway?"

"Lifting weights," he replied. "Coach wants me to bulk up a little."

"Is Sean here?" Samantha asked.

"Nah," Ryan said. "He decided to sleep in. Wyatt's spotting me."

I noticed Ryan wouldn't look me in the eye. Ever since that night at the diner with Cassandra, he'd been so distant. Sure, we were both busy with practice, but you'd think he'd make some time for me. Even last night when he came over, he admitted it was only because Nurse Phillips told him not to drive. Something was definitely wrong, but I had other things to worry about. There was a monster on the loose, one who seemed to be targeting the Nightshade High cheer squad.

The parents started to come by to pick up the girls. I looked on as the gym began to empty of hysterical cheerleaders and their equally hysterical parents.

"I heard it was a drug overdose," Alyssa's mom said in a horrified whisper. She should know a thing or two about that, since rumor has it that Alyssa just got out of rehab last summer.

"I heard she has anorexia," Nicole's stepdad insisted.

"Cutting," Mari Lopez's mom said. "I read an article about it."

It wasn't any of those typical nightmares for parents: pregnancy, pills, or pain. It was something worse. For a second, I thought about saying it out loud—telling everyone that it was the vampire.

Which meant that the vampire had been here, right under my nose. Who had been near Trina? I glanced at Samantha, who was at the other end of the bleachers filing her nails with a bored expression on her face. The pendant gleamed from her neck. Why was she the only one who rated a pendant? Everyone else had bracelets.

"Daisy?" I realized that Ryan was staring at me expectantly. I'd zoned out and missed half of the conversation.

"Sorry," I said. "My mind was somewhere else. What did you say?"

"I asked you if you wanted to grab a coffee at the diner," Ryan said. He sounded serious.

He wouldn't break up with me at the
diner,
would he? He knew it was my favorite place.

I glanced over at Samantha, who was studiously pretending not to listen to our conversation. She'd been a pain lately, but Ryan wouldn't break up with me in front of an audience.

"Can I invite Samantha?" I said.

He sighed audibly, but nodded.

"Daisy, what are you doing?" she hissed as I walked over. "He wants to be alone with you."

"I don't want to be alone with him," I said in a whisper. "Please come with. I'll totally owe you."

There was a knowing look on her face. "I was nervous with Sean, too. Just don't let Ryan push you into anything you're not ready for," she said. "Of course I'll go, but you're going to have to be alone with him eventually."

What was Samantha talking about? It was like we were having two completely different conversations. It didn't matter, as long as she came along.

"I'm inviting Sean," she said, already taking out her cell.

"The more the merrier," I said. I smiled in satisfaction.
Try breaking up with me now, Ryan Mendez,
I thought. But breaking up was the last thing on his mind.

Chapter Sixteen

We rode to the diner in Ryan's car. Samantha chattered away on her cell phone, but Ryan and I were quiet.

Part of me knew it was unreasonable (okay, crazy) to assume that he was going to break up with me, but I had issues. Disappearing dad, remember? And as my mother had painfully reminded me, I had been Dad's favorite. Look where that got me.

Slim's was packed. Half the cheerleading squad was in a booth in the rear of the restaurant. Miss Foster sat in the middle.

Sean was already there, holding a table for us. He must have broken land speed records to get to the diner ahead of us. Ryan immediately went to join him.

Jordan waved us over. "Samantha, over here!"

"Hi, Sam. Hi, Daisy," Penny chirped. "Miss Foster decided to take us out for lunch."

"I thought the girls could use a little treat after that upsetting incident," Miss Foster said. "Won't you join us?"

Penny kicked Jordan in the leg in her eagerness to make room for Samantha. Jordan gave her a dirty look.

"No thanks," Samantha said. "Sean has a table for us already." She gave him a little wave, and he practically bounced in his seat when he saw her.

I followed Sam back to the booth. "I ordered you an extralarge coffee with cream and sugar, one splash of vanilla syrup," Ryan said.

Just the way I liked it. I smiled at him as I slid into the booth. I couldn't help it. He was just so cute.

I said, "Remind me to thank you later"—before I realized that it might have sounded ever so slightly suggestive, at least from the curious way Samantha was looking from me to Ryan.

It wasn't what I meant. At least I didn't think it was.

From the way Ryan smiled, it hadn't occurred to him, either. I relaxed and leaned into the curve of his arm.

"Are you hungry?" he asked.

And even though the place was packed, Flo was there in a twinkling to take our order.

"Starving," I said. I ignored Samantha's tiny headshake. Ryan and I had been friends way before we started dating. It wasn't news to him that I liked to eat. I ordered a cheeseburger and fries.

With a shrug, Samantha said, "I'll take the same. Make it rare. As bloody as possible."

Sean looked at her like she'd grown a second head.

"Is there a problem?" Samantha asked him coldly.

"No, no," Sean said. "It's great. It's just, I've never seen you order anything but salad."

"I'm ordering it now." She smiled at me. "It sounded delicious."

I wondered why Samantha was in such a good mood, especially after what had happened to Trina. I also wanted to know why she hadn't bothered to wake me up to get to practice on time, since she had spent the night at my house. Did she have something to take care of and didn't want me to interfere?

"So, did I miss anything before I got to practice today?" I asked her. "How did Trina look when she showed up?"

"Not good," said Samantha. "In fact, Miss Foster took her to Nurse Phillips's office when she first arrived."

"Nurse Phillips?" I repeated, alarmed. I had dragged Rachel to see the nurse the day Rachel collapsed in gym, and she was still down for the count. I was getting an idea and I didn't like it.

"Yes," Sam said, "she wasn't feeling well, but Trina didn't have a fever or anything so Nurse Phillips okayed her to practice. Miss Foster made sure she drank a whole bottle of water before we started."

I looked over at Miss Foster in her booth across the diner. She chatted happily with the other cheerleaders. Maybe I had been wrong in suspecting her. Maybe the picture Ryan saw had been a fluke—after all, he had taken a blow to the head that day. If Miss Foster really was the vamp, she would have had ample opportunity to take out the entire squad by now.

But Nurse Phillips had plenty of opportunities, too. Trina had been to see her only minutes before she had her seizure. What was the motive? She was a nurse, someone sworn to save lives, not take them. But then I remembered the headlines I'd seen about nurses who killed their patients, and I wasn't so sure. Was Nurse Phillips a cold-blooded killer?

The jukebox suddenly kicked on again. I hadn't noticed anyone feeding it quarters, but I wasn't exactly surprised.

"Evil Woman" was the song of choice. Was it trying to tell me something?

I decided I'd feed it a few coins and see if it changed its tune. I dropped them in the slot and punched a few random selections—B5, C10, and A1—and waited to see what happened.

"Evil Woman" cycled through again. It
was
trying to tell me something. If I took it literally, there was an evil woman somewhere on the premises. Unless it thought I was an evil woman for lusting after Ryan so obviously.

I passed by a large table and noticed Nurse Phillips herself was sitting there with a bunch of people.

I waved at her as I passed, but she called my name. "Daisy, come meet some friends of mine."

"Evil Woman" cut off in the middle of the song and was replaced by "Rock 'n' Roll High School" by the Ramones. The last time I heard that song was at the Black Opal. What was that possessed pile of tin trying to tell me?

"This is Camille." She pointed to a brunette in her thirties who was trying to pass for a fan girl of fifteen. "Bert," a skinny guy with a goatee and a streak of red running through his hair, and "Vinnie," a short dark-haired guy wearing a Speed Racer T-shirt.

"Hey, what about me?" the remaining guy said.

Nurse Phillips sighed. "And this is Jeffrey," she said.

Jeffrey was a short, stocky blond with rings on every finger and a large mole on his nose. I shook hands with him.