Runaway (Airhead #3) (19 page)

Gabriel and his band had ducked back behind the revolving set, to reappear on stage right as soon as it was their cue to begin playing Gabriel’s number one hit song, “Nikki.”

This wasn’t going to happen until the second-to-last commercial break. As I stood there waiting for my musical cue, I noticed Veronica, the model who’d hated me so much— because she thought I’d been e-mailing her boyfriend, Justin, when actually, that had been the real Nikki— standing in front of me. She was pointedly ignoring me.

Because I needed something to take my mind off the fact that my sister, at that very moment, might be dying, I tapped her on the shoulder.

“Hi,” I said. “I was just wondering. Did the e-mails stop?”

Veronica looked around. Her eyes grew huge when she saw me.

“We— we’re not supposed to be talking,” she stammered.

“I know,” I said. “But did they?”

“Yes,” she said, and turned back toward the show, nibbling on a press-on nail.

Ha. Because Nikki had better things to do these days.

Like torture Gabriel Luna.

A few minutes later, Veronica got her cue to walk— and she sashayed out onto the stage. And then I heard it.

“Nikki, oh, Nikki…The thing of it is, girl…in spite of it all…I really do think…I love you.”

My cue.

For a second, my heart hammering, I hesitated. I thought I was going to throw up. What was I doing? Who
was
I? Was I, Em Watts, the girl who wouldn’t even shower in front of other girls during PE, really going to walk out onto that runway, in front of millions— maybe even a billion— of television viewers, not to mention however many people were in the live audience, wearing nothing but a pair of panties, a bra, a set of wings, and a lot of body spray?

“It’s not the way that you walk, girl…the way that you smile or the way that you look…”

On the other hand…

…if things went the way they were supposed to, and Christopher did what he said he was going to, because of me, Robert Stark, the fourth-richest man in the world, was going down tonight. What had happened to me was never going to happen to another person again.

And there might never even be another Stark Angels lingerie show ever again.

That would certainly make my mom happy.

“It’s just the way you move me…the way that you move me…that makes me say, Nikki, oh, Nikki…The thing of it is, girl…in spite of it all…I really do think…I love you.”

“Nikki,” Alessandro whispered from somewhere in the darkness behind me. “GO!”

I walked out into the blinding lights of the stage, moving my hips in time to the music, trying to follow the markings on the runway and step exactly where they’d told me to step and not run into Ryan Seacrest.

The reflections from the diamonds on my bra were making me crazy. I could hardly see where I was going. If something were to come loose from the ceiling overhead and tumble down, smacking me in the head, I would never know it. I was completely blind.

Who would wear one of these stupid things in real life? And
why?

“Nikki, oh, Nikki…The thing of it is, girl…in spite of it all…I really do think…I love you.”

At least I had Gabriel’s voice to guide me. The weird thing was, he actually sounded sincere.

But isn’t that what musicians do? Like models and actresses, they make you believe what they’re telling you.

Unless…he really did love Nikki. Not me. But the real Nikki.

Wouldn’t that be funny? That as much as the two of them fought, they actually loved each other? They certainly seemed to be at each other’s throats enough.

But wasn’t that true of me and Christopher? We were always fighting. Always!

But then, when it came down to it, we really loved each other. At least, I really loved Christopher.

I hoped he really loved me. I thought I’d heard his love for me on the phone when we’d spoken just now. I’d know for sure the next time I saw him…whether or not he really loved me. I’d be able to see it in his eyes. I was sure of it. We may not have had the easiest of romances, but it was one, I felt sure, that was going to last forever.

If Nikki and Gabriel fell in love, it would kill my sister, Frida.

Oh, God.
Frida. Why did I have to think about Frida?

“It’s not the way that you walk, girl…the way that you smile or the way that you look…”

“Ah, look at her, ladies and gentlemen,” Ryan Seacrest was saying. “The number one supermodel in the world, Stark’s own Nikki Howard. She’s wearing over a million dollars’ worth of diamonds, ladies and gentlemen. I don’t know when I’ve ever seen anything quite so beautiful. Except possibly for the low, low interest I’m receiving on my Stark credit card. Apply now for exclusive cardmember-only sales and special financing offers throughout the year….”

Getting to the end of the runway, I looked out into the screaming, cheering audience and saw him. Robert Stark. Just sitting there, looking up at me.

Grinning. Grinning the way only someone who knows he’s won can smile.

Why was he grinning like that? What had he done?

Gotten away with murder, that’s what.

Except he hadn’t.

Not yet. Not if I could help it.

Frida,
my heart was crying the entire time I was out there.
Please let Frida be okay.

I made it off the runway without tripping or anything falling down onto my head. Only my heart hammering in my throat.

And no one, I was certain, had even been able to tell that much.

Because I was a professional now.

I was Nikki Howard.

It wasn’t until I got to the Stark Sky Bar a half hour later— the diamond bra and panties handed back over to the security guards who’d been assigned to guard them, the angel wings put away, and my street clothes put back on— that all hell broke loose.

Twenty-One

THE SKY BAR, WHICH WAS A HUGE, circular restaurant at the top of the Stark Building, the walls made of floor-to-ceiling windows all the way around, so you had an unimpeded view of the sparkling lights— or, in this case, the crowds at Times Square, and the New Year’s ball drop— was crowded. Ryan Seacrest was there, along with his agent and his manager, enjoying some Dom Perignon. I spied Rebecca there as well, hanging on to Brandon like they were attached at the hip— gross— and Gabriel and his band.

Everywhere else I looked were celebrities from the party at Robert Stark’s house, as well as the shareholders I’d met.

The same ones who’d been bidding on “donors” for their brain transplants. Of course they didn’t know that I’d filmed their little auction and smuggled that film out and that two computer geniuses were (hopefully) at this very moment doing whatever it is those kind of people do with that kind of thing.

What
were
they going to do with it? I wondered.

“Hey,” Gabriel said, coming up to me with a glass of sparkling water a few minutes after I’d walked in. He was a welcome sight. I’d been surrounded by Stark shareholders wanting to chat with me some more.

I knew what they really wanted, of course. To talk to the Project Phoenix prototype, a living, breathing, actual brain transplant recipient. They didn’t say as much, but it was totally obvious. They were dying to know what it was like to die… and then be resurrected as someone totally hot.

If they’d come right out and just asked, I could have told them: It was hell. And heaven. At the same time.

Would I do it again?

Not a chance.

“Glad we’re not down there,” Gabriel said, indicating one of the many flat-screen TVs that hung from the ceiling, showing close-ups of Anderson Cooper reporting live on the impending ball drop from Times Square. It was so cold, you could see Anderson’s breath.

“Me, too,” I said.

“Have you heard anything?” Gabriel wanted to know. He wasn’t talking about the ball drop.

“I don’t have a phone,” I reminded him.

“Right,” he said, wincing. “Sorry, I forgot. I haven’t heard anything, either.” His gaze drifted toward Robert Stark, who was laughing at something Rush Limbaugh had said, and slapping him on the back.

“Nikki!” Robert Stark cried, having spotted me over Rush’s shoulder.

I winced. Brandon’s dad held an arm out, beckoning for me to come over, a big smile on his face. Surrounded by adorers, he was holding court. Everyone was smiling and holding champagne, clearly enjoying themselves.

And, of course, there was a bunch of photographers there, itching to take some publicity pictures for tomorrow’s papers.

“Oh, no,” I said, under my breath. Gabriel looked sympathetic.

“Here she is, the star of the night,” Robert Stark called, waving to me again to come over. “Nikki Howard, ladies and gentlemen. Wasn’t she lovely this evening? Didn’t she look beautiful in all those diamonds?”

I had no choice but to go over to him. What else could I do? I tried to plaster the nicest smile I could onto my face. I knew what was going on.

And I knew the role I had to play…at least until I found out whether or not Frida was safe: Robert Stark was showing me off. I was his finest product.

I was the original Phoenix.

When I got to his side, Brandon’s dad slipped his arm around me. It was like being embraced by a python.

“Such a great girl,” Robert Stark said, hugging me to him. “So glad to have her in the Stark family.”

I kept the smile plastered on my face. Flashes went off. The photographers said encouraging things like “Great! That’s just great, Nikki, Mr. Stark. Over here, now. Sir, could you put your chin up? Chin down now. Nikki, look over here. Great. Fabulous. You two look great together. Thanks so much.”

But the whole time, all I could think about was how much I wanted to throw up.

When the purple splotches from the flashes faded, out of the corner of my eye I thought I saw some people coming into the restaurant. I had to do a double take, not sure I believed my eyes, before I registered who they really were….

Lulu, in her outlandish black cocktail dress with its bright red crinoline, sassily striding up to the bar and demanding a cocktail, pulling Steven Howard—
Steven Howard
— in her wake…

Steven’s sister, Nikki, with her jet-black hair and matching black corset, sashaying up to the bar behind her brother like she owned the place…

And Christopher—
my
Christopher— escorting a very young-looking girl with curly hair who was peering all around the place with her mouth slightly ajar in the manner of someone who seemed
way
too excited to be there…

Frida.
My sister, Frida.

I’m pretty sure some throw-up
did
come up into my mouth when I saw that. Frida? They’d brought
Frida
here? Were they crazy? Hadn’t they registered the part where I’d told them Robert Stark had threatened to
kill
Frida?

“Um,” I said, ducking out from beneath Robert Stark’s arm. “Will you excuse me?”

“Of course,” he said, looking a bit confused as I darted away.

I raced toward Frida until I was able to grab her by both arms and spin her around— she’d been pressed up against one of the vast windows, looking down over Times Square at the crowd below.

“Frida,” I cried frantically. “You’re all right?”

“I’m great,” she said, pushing away some of the hair I’d caused to fall into her eyes by the violence of my gesture. “What do you think? Those guys came and got me. Em, what’s going on? No one will tell me. Is everything okay? And what happened to Nikki? She’s all hot now. Also, have you seen the way Gabriel looks at her? It’s not fair, I saw him first—”

I hugged her to me.

“Never mind about Gabriel,” I said into her hair. “He’s too old for you, anyway.”

“What?” Frida said. She was hugging me back, but obviously had other concerns. “He’s only, like, eight years older. That’s nothing.”

“Seriously.” I pulled her away from me and looked down into her eyes. My own were filled with tears. “There will be lots of boys your own age who are going to be crazy for you. So just shut up.”

Christopher had come over, holding two glasses of soda. “Problems, ladies?” he asked lightly.

“None at all,” I said, turning my tear-filled gaze toward him. “Is everything—”

“Oh,” he said, handing one of the glasses to Frida. “It’s all good. Look up.”

“Up?” I looked up, not knowing what he was talking about. But all I saw were the flat-screen TVs hanging overhead.

“That’s right,” Christopher said. “Keep watching. Hey, has anyone talked to Brandon?”

“Brandon?” I took the sparkling soda he offered me. I’d lost the one Gabriel had given me a long time ago. “Why?”

“Because he just might want to prepare himself for—”

That was when all the television screens in the room started showing that the Times Square ball was beginning to drop. And everyone began hurrying toward the windows to see it for themselves.

“Ten,” everyone began to chant. “Nine…”

Everyone, that is, except for Nikki— the
real
Nikki. She walked right up to Robert Stark with a great big smile plastered across her bright red lipsticked mouth.

“Hello again,” she said, grinning at Robert Stark.

He seemed a bit startled to be interrupted while counting down to New Year’s. But not unpleasantly so, because Nikki was one hot little number.

“Well, hello there,” he said, grinning back at her. “Miss, er… Prince, is it?”

“That’s right,” Nikki said. “Good memory. But that’s not actually my real name.”

And she lifted the remote she’d snagged from the bar and turned up the sound on all the TVs.

“Five,” everyone was screaming. “Four…”

“It’s not?” Robert Stark asked, seemingly only interested for politeness’ sake. “What is it, then?”

“Nikki Howard,” she said. “You should have just paid up, Robert.” Then she cocked her head to look at him a little bit harder. “On second thought…I should have just turned you in in the first place.”

“Happy New Year!” everyone screamed.

Over by the bar, I saw Lulu throw her arms around Steven and kiss him. Rebecca and Brandon had already wrapped themselves into such a tight clench, I had to look away, a little shocked. Even Nikki scampered off from a confused-looking Robert Stark to go up to Gabriel Luna, who was hugging his bandmates, pull him away by his shirtfront, and plant a huge kiss right on his lips…much to the dismay of Frida, who let out a faint whimper at the sight.

Christopher, meanwhile, was grinning down at me. He looked more devilish than boyfriend-like. I was so alarmed by everything that had just happened in the past five minutes, I took a step away from him. I really wasn’t sure how much more I could take.

“Oh,” I said, holding up both hands to ward him off, my heart having begun to stutter. “No…”

But it was too late. He’d already caught me around the waist and hauled me back toward him, crushing my body to his and then dropping his mouth over mine.

I think I let out a whimper that was not unlike Frida’s— only for different reasons, of course— before I found myself melting, as always, at the touch of his lips. Why couldn’t I resist him? It was so infuriating! Was this how it was always going to be between us? We were always going to be making each other mad, then kiss and everything would be fine…
more
than fine, actually?

Christopher had his arms around me, seeming to be in no hurry to finish our New Year’s kiss. Not that I minded.

Who knows how long we would have stood there kissing (and in front of poor Frida! I did feel bad about that) if right then every single television in the room hadn’t flashed the same orange message:
Breaking News,
and a news anchor hadn’t come on to say, urgently, “We’re interrupting our New Year’s Eve coverage to inform you of a breaking story out of New York City concerning Robert Stark, the entrepreneur who founded Stark Enterprises, known worldwide for its chain of large discount department stores.”

A ripple of excited chatter went through the Stark Sky Bar when this announcement was made. Rebecca and Brandon actually disattached themselves long enough to pay attention to what was going on. The Stark shareholders all stood looking up at the television screens in confusion, some of them weaving on their feet a little, because they’d had so much to drink.

Robert Stark stood absolutely still, staring in shock at what he was seeing.

I reached for Christopher’s fingers with one hand and Frida’s with the other. Frida glanced at me and asked, in a whisper, “Em. What is this?”

“Just watch,” I whispered back. I’d be lying if I said my heart wasn’t hammering a little, though.

“This evening,” the news anchor went on solemnly, “CNN has exclusively obtained video— video CNN can verify is authentic— that proves that Stark Enterprise shareholders, including Robert Stark himself, have been knowingly participating in a highly experimental surgery known as a full-body transplant—”

Somewhere in the room, a woman screamed and dropped a glass, which smashed to the floor.

“—in a secret laboratory in Manhattan called the Stark Institute for Neurology and Neurosurgery. Here’s CNN chief medical correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, to explain this controversial —not to mention illegal— procedure.”

“Thank you, Wolf,” a new voice said. “In a full-body transplant, a patient’s brain is completely removed from his or her body and placed into a new body, usually from a donor who has been declared brain-dead. In the case of something the corporation was calling Project Phoenix, however, living donors were being handpicked from—”

“What is this?” Robert Stark thundered, whirling around to glare at the rest of us. “What is this? Turn it off. Did you hear me? I said turn it off!”

No one moved to turn the televisions off, even though I was pretty sure the bartenders had the remote controls. In fact, I saw Nikki lift one of the remotes and deliberately turn the volume up.

“—in this exclusive video, representatives from the corporation can be seen auctioning off the profiles of young people who, it is alleged, will be placed into a vegetative state at a later date so their bodies can be harvested for the highest bidder, to have their brains transplanted into them when—”

The footage I’d shot at the auction began to play as the news announcer went on. I have to say, that Stark brand cell phone had done a pretty good job of capturing what I’d wanted it to. The images of Kim Su, the Frenchwoman presenting her, and the shareholders bidding on her were clear as day. You couldn’t really see their faces, but you got the gist of what was going on really well.

And the sound, after I’d had to slide the cell phone into my bra to hide it?

Still crystal clear.

Hey, Stark:

Can you hear me now?

“You,”
Robert Stark raged, whirling around to face me as the recording of him— recognizably the deep voice of Robert Stark— was saying,
They’ll be living their own lives, just with new bodies…. And it will be worth it, not to have to wake up every morning with creaking joints, to have to take nine different kinds of heart medications
—
believe me, it will be worth every penny to them….

I stumbled back a step. He looked angry enough to lift me up and throw me bodily out one of the plate-glass windows that were all around us, like in one of the
Die Hard
movies. I totally wouldn’t have put it past him.

I wasn’t the only one who noticed, either. Christopher moved in front of me, placing himself as a human shield between me and the billionaire who wanted to kill me.

If that wasn’t love, I don’t know what is.

“You,” Robert Stark growled again, completely ignoring Christopher.
“You
did this! I destroyed that phone! How is this even possible?”

On the television screen, our voices went on— his and mine, with a written transcript provided for the viewer, in case anyone couldn’t understand what we were saying on the tape.