The Bigtime Series (Bigtime superhero series, e-bundle)

by Jennifer Estep

  “She sounded really angry. I’m sorry I got you into trouble.”

  Johnny shrugged and put the phone back in its cradle. “This isn’t the first time I’ve forgotten to check in. Bella will get over it. Eventually.”

  “I hope so. For your sake. I always thought Bella was so cool, so calm, so collected, but she didn’t sound like someone I’d want to cross. Not even as Fiera.”

  “You have no idea. Bella can get a little worked up at times. And when she does, well, strange things happen.” Johnny ran his fingers through his thick hair. “But I’m yours for another day, at least. So, how do you want to spend it?”

  I knew exactly how I’d like to spend the day. In bed. With Johnny. I stared at him, wondering exactly how injured he still was—

  “But before we do anything, do you think I could get some real clothes to wear?”

  My eyes traced over his body, and I realized that Johnny was only wearing the white T-shirt and pajama bottoms we kept in the sick bay. The clothes were so thin they were practically transparent. More sparks fluttered from my fingertips, and I curled my hands into fists to keep them from igniting. Now was not the time to ogle Johnny. Not after I’d beaten him senseless only a few hours ago.

  “Come on,” I said. “We’ll find you some clothes, then I’ll show you around.”

  * * *

  “Are you sure about this, Fiona?” Johnny asked half an hour later. “I know this might be upsetting for you.”

  I closed my eyes. “It’s fine. Really, it is.”

  After half an hour of rifling through the suites and pitifully small closets, we’d come up with nada. Nothing came close to fitting Johnny. My father’s and Sam’s shirts and pants were too small across the chest and too long. Henry’s clothes were too short and too mismatched. Besides, I wasn’t about to make Johnny wear polka-dot bow ties with plaid sweater vests. That was just cruel. Which meant the only other place to look for men’s clothes in the manor was in Travis’s room.

  I opened the door to Travis’s suite, and we stepped inside. My heart twisted, the way it always did when I came in here. A fine layer of dust covered the coffee table and entertainment center. The bed was bare, stripped of its sheets, and the magazines and knickknacks had been removed from the bookshelves. A couple of months ago, I’d packed up Travis’s things and stacked them in some cardboard boxes in a corner of the room. I hadn’t had the heart to get rid of them or donate them to charity. Not yet. I turned the ring around on my finger. The diamond glowed under my hot hands.

  Johnny put a hand on my shoulder. “Are you sure this is okay? I really don’t mind wearing the pajamas.”

  My eyes slid over his perfect biceps. I didn’t mind him wearing the pajamas either. Or even nothing at all. That was the problem. “No, this is fine. Someone should get some use out of Travis’s clothes. I’ve been meaning to donate them to charity. I just haven’t gotten around to it yet.”

  I stepped away from Johnny and tore into one of the boxes marked Clothes. I handed him a pair of jeans and a T-shirt that featured several white, cartoon clouds. “Here. Try these. They look like they’re about your size.”

  Johnny nodded and stepped into the bathroom. He came back out wearing the clothes I’d given him. “They fit well enough,” he said, turning around. “How do I look?”

  He looked perfect, of course, just like always. But my eyes misted over just a bit. That had been one of Travis’s favorite T-shirts. I’d given it to him as a gag gift for his birthday last year.

  “Fine,” I said, dropping my eyes. “Let’s get out of here.”

  We closed the door, and I took a deep breath. Remembering Travis was always a little difficult for me. So was going into his old room and realizing that he’d never come striding into it again. Still, it wasn’t quite as hard as it had been in the past. Johnny had made it a little easier for me. I only hoped I could do the same for him and his pain over his father’s death.

  I took a step forward. My head spun, and I braced myself against the wall.

  “Hey, are you all right?” Johnny asked, his eyes bright with concern. “If me wearing Travis’s clothes bothers you that much—”

  “It’s not that. Sorry. I’m just a little light-headed. I get that way when I don’t eat enough.”

  Johnny stared at me. “Really?”

  My stomach chose that moment to let out what amounted to a plaintive wail. Feed me…feed me...feed me now, it whined.

  Johnny’s eyes widened. “I didn’t know a person’s stomach could make that particular sound. Especially for that long.”

  “Fiery metabolism,” I explained. “I have to eat quite a bit every couple hours or I get light-headed and weak. As you can tell from my complaining stomach.”

  “Don’t worry about it. I could use a little something to eat myself. Food first. Then, we’ll explore. Deal?”

  My stomach rumbled again. “Deal.”

  I led Johnny to the underground kitchen and cracked open the refrigerators. I pulled out almost everything that was in there. Johnny started making some turkey-and-Swiss sandwiches. I couldn’t wait any longer, so I grabbed a frozen pizza and tore off the cellophane covering. I wiggled my fingers, and flames covered the dish. Thirty seconds later, the pizza was done. I put it on a plate, folded the pizza over, and prepared to sink my teeth into the cheesy, greasy concoction.

  “Can I have some of that?” Johnny stared at me, a knife in one hand and a fork in the other.

  “Sorry,” I said, putting down the pizza. “Everybody around here’s pretty used to my, ah, habits. Sometimes, when I’m hungry, I forget my manners around other people, including how to share my food. Here. Have some. Please.”

  Johnny cut himself off a large slice, while I inhaled the rest of it. We sat there in silence, munching on pizza and sandwiches. After about twenty minutes, Johnny pushed his plate away. I kept eating.

  My eyes zeroed in on the half-eaten sandwich on his plate. “So, are you going to eat that?”

  Johnny shook his head and laughed. He slid his plate over to me. “I seem to be doing this a lot around you.”

  “Oh? What’s that?”

  “Missing meals.”

  I rolled my eyes at his bad joke. Johnny chuckled, and the tension between us lightened. Soon, we were laughing and talking and joking just like we had before we’d discovered each other’s secret identities—and our confrontation at Oodles o’ Stuff. We were having such a good time I almost forgot that less than twenty-four hours earlier, we’d been at each other’s throats. Almost.

  “I know this must have come as a shock to you,” I said, polishing off a bag of chocolate chip cookies. “Our secret lair. Me having superpowers. Especially the superstrength. That freaks a lot of people out, especially guys.”

  “Actually, I think I always sort of knew,” Johnny said.

  “Really? How?”

  “I’m not quite sure. When I was Angel and I ran into you guys, I thought you looked very familiar. That you reminded me of somebody I knew. I just couldn’t quite put my finger on who it was.”

  I narrowed my eyes. “You don’t happen to have an inner voice that whispers to you, do you?”

  Johnny shook his head. “Sorry. Psychic powers aren’t my forte.”

  Good. We had enough mind readers around here. It was getting to where a person couldn’t even think anything in private. Especially anything naughty.

  “And there was the food, of course. You ate so much and were so thin I thought maybe you were anorexic or something.”

  “You’re not the only one.”

  Johnny continued with his story. “Plus, that night we had dinner with Bella and Grandfather, when we were looking at the portraits, your body was...warm, hot even. Unnaturally so.” A rueful grin crossed Johnny’s face. “I thought it was me at first, but I guess I can’t take credit for that now, can I?”

  “Oh, it was mostly you,” I said, blushing just a bit as I remembered my outrageous behavior. I’d begged Johnny for more...a
nd more...and more.

  “Really? Well, then, I’ll have to remember that.”

  And there he was, standing in front of me. “And exactly how I went about doing it.”

  Johnny lowered his lips to mine. I closed my eyes, reveling in the sensation. His tongue licked the corner of my mouth, and I opened it. Johnny plunged his tongue inside even as he pulled me toward him. His hands ran up and down my back. I tangled my fingers in his hair. I breathed in, letting his spicy scent make my head swim.

  But I couldn’t fully enjoy the kiss. I kept seeing myself hitting Angel with that metal pipe, his blood zipping through the air. With a sigh, I broke off the kiss and stepped back.

  “Johnny, about last night—”

  He put his finger to my lips. Another fiery flare shot through me. “Let’s not talk about business today.” He smiled that crooked grin I knew and loved so well. “Didn’t you say something about a tour?”

  * * *

  “This is incredible. Absolutely incredible.” Wonderment filled Johnny’s green eyes. Which were pretty wondrous in and of themselves.

  During the last hour, we’d done a complete sweep of the underground lair. The library, the kitchen, the suites, game room, equipment room, everything. Now, we stood in the training room watching a computer simulation of our previous battle with Siren and Intelligal at the factory near Good Intentions Lane.

  “The equipment, the computers, the holograms. Where do you guys get the money for all this stuff?” Johnny asked, his eyes moving from the lifelike holograms to the rows of computers and blinking lights. I could almost see him trying to calculate the cost of everything.

  I shrugged. “Being a superhero isn’t cheap, so it helps that Sam’s a billionaire.”

  “Who’s Sam?” Johnny asked.

  “Sam Sloane, the businessman,” I replied. “He’s Striker, another member of the Fearless Five, and one of the wealthiest guys in the city. He has plenty of money to burn on our superhero gear. And I don’t do so badly myself either. Fiona Fine Fashions has a very healthy profit margin.”

  Johnny’s eyes slid over my shirt and jeans. “I’m sure it does, with such a beautiful woman running it.”

  I smiled, pleased by the compliment. A lot of things about Johnny Bulluci pleased me.

  He turned back to the holograms that flickered in the training room below us. “Do you have more of these? I’d love to watch them.”

  “Of course. But they’re so boring. Why would you want to look at—” I knew why Johnny would want to watch our training simulations. He wanted to know more about Siren and Intelligal. Every strength. Every weakness. Every habit. He had to, if he was going to kill them.

  “Oh, Johnny.”

  “He was my father, and he was blown away. Can’t you understand that?” His voice was hard with emotion. Anger. Rage. Grief.

  “Of course I can understand it.” I put a hand on his shoulder. “No matter what else has happened, you have to know that I’m sorry for your loss. Losing a loved one is never easy, no matter what the circumstances are. Losing your father the way you did is especially painful. I know you think that I’m against you, that the Fearless Five are against you, but we’re on your side. We want Siren and Intelligal brought to justice just as much as you do. They’re planning something—something that could hurt a lot of innocent people. We’ve got to stop them before they get a chance to do it.”

  He didn’t respond, but his eyes went to my hand on his shoulder. They lingered on my diamond ring.

  “Is there anything I can say to get you to change your mind? To work with us?” I said in a soft voice.

  Johnny stared at me. “You have your duty, your code. And I have mine. I’m sorry, Fiona.”

  Then, he turned and walked away.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Johnny returned to the sick bay and spent the rest of the afternoon in bed recovering his strength. I paced around the library and brooded for an hour, before heading to the kitchen and polishing off everything I could get my hands on. Cookies, chips, pies, pizzas, cold cuts, cheese, bread. If it wasn’t nailed down, I ate it. If I’d had enough salt left, I would have gnawed on a couple of table legs. But I’d used it all on my French fries. Damn.

  The chief came in late that afternoon after his shift and checked Johnny’s vitals. I stood in a corner and watched.

  “Well, it looks like you’re healing up nicely, Johnny,” the chief said, listening to Johnny’s heart through a stethoscope. “In addition to your exoskeleton, I also believe you have a bit of regeneration. Then again, most superheroes do.”

  “I’m not a superhero,” Johnny said.

  He didn’t speak to me. He didn’t even look in my direction.

  “Well, everything appears to be in order. I think you can return home tomorrow, if you wish. Try not to do anything too strenuous for a couple of days, though. Okay?” the chief asked.

  Johnny nodded his head. “Okay. I’ll get out of your hair first thing in the morning.”

  “I’ll drive you back to Bigtime,” I volunteered.

  He stared at the tiled ceiling and shook his head. “That’s all right. I’ll just call a cab to take me back into town.”

  “You can’t exactly do that,” I pointed out. “We’re a couple hundred feet underground here, you know. Plus, there’s our whole secret-identity thing. Calling a cab would officially blow our cover.”

  “Then, I’ll go upstairs and call a cab from there. I’ll be fine. I always am.”

  Our gazes locked. Johnny pulled the covers up to his chin and rolled over on his side.

  Shutting me out again.

  * * *

  Tired, grouchy, and frustrated, I went to bed early. And I dreamed...

  I stood between Johnny and Siren. We were all in costume, standing in the middle of an open field. Spring-green grass stretched for miles in every direction, contrasting with the gaudy colors of our suits. And the gunmetal-gray of the pistol in Johnny’s hand. It was a large weapon, more like a cannon than an actual gun.

  Siren stared at me with her hypnotic blue eyes. “Are you just going to stand there and let him kill me? Or are you going to be a real superhero and save me?”

  Her voice sounded harsh and demanding. I could feel her will wrapping around me, squeezing my thoughts, my actions into her wishes and desires. My feet moved of their own accord until I stood in front of Johnny.

  “Please, Johnny,” I begged. “Please don’t do this. Don’t make me choose between the two of you. She’s not worth it. She’s nothing compared to you. Please, please don’t do this.”

  Johnny raised his gun and pointed it right at me. I opened my mouth to beg, to plead with him one more time. But he didn’t listen. He pulled the trigger. The bullet punched through the air, slamming into my heart. Breaking it—

  I woke up with a gasp and bolted upright. My heart pounded. My hair crackled and sizzled and hissed with fire. My fingertips glowed. Sparks flew everywhere, smoldering on my silk sheets. My eyes zipped around the room.

  My room. I was in my room. Slowly, I relaxed. It was a dream. Just a dream. Just a nightmare. I flopped back against the bed and rubbed my blazing eyes.

  For now.

  I stripped the sheets off the bed so they wouldn’t catch fire, then lay back down. I tried to go back to sleep, but for once, it eluded me. Hot and sweaty, I got out of bed and grabbed a couple of thick towels and an itty-bitty bikini from my stash of swimsuits.

  It was time for a midnight swim, something I’d started doing after Travis had died. I hadn’t slept well for months after his murder, and swimming was the only thing that calmed me down. The gentle splash of the water, the weightless feel of it against my skin, the rhythmic, repeated kick of my arms and legs soothed something primal deep inside me. For a little while, I could forget about my troubles, my pain, my anger. I could lose myself in the water. Plus, I didn’t have to worry about getting emotional and setting the pool on fire. I’d melted more than one treadmill that way.

&nb
sp; I walked through the deserted halls of the underground lair. We were taking the night off, given the disastrous events of the previous evening. My father had gone back into the city to finish up some paperwork regarding the mess at Oodles. Henry and Lulu were around somewhere, probably huddled in the library type-type-typing away on their computers, but no one was officially on call.

  I made my way to the exercise room. Unlike my pitiful closet space, Sam had spared no expense in outfitting the gym with the best treadmills, elliptical trainers, and strength-training devices money could buy. Row after row of gleaming machines sat in the long room, along with shelves full of exercise DVDs. Free weights, exercise balls, and yoga mats hung in racks in a corner of the room, which smelled like sweat, rubber, and old gym socks.

  We couldn’t afford to let ourselves go or ubervillains would wipe the floor with us. And then there was the PR side of things. Nobody—not the public and certainly not SNN—wanted to see out-of-shape superheroes. Even the older heroes like Granny Cane kept themselves in tip-top condition. They needed to in order to sell their toys and video games. Given my fiery metabolism, I didn’t have a problem keeping the weight off, but the others had to work at it.

  I strolled past the machines, opened a door, and stepped into the pool room. Sam had spared no expense here either. Cushioned lounge chairs and umbrella-topped tables crouched on either side of the Olympic-sized pool, along with metal lockers full of scuba, snorkeling, and other diving equipment. In addition to saving people on the mean streets of Bigtime, we’d also done more than a few underwater rescues. At least once a month, some civilian ran his car off the Skyline Bridge and into the marina. Or a cruise ship tipped over and had to be righted before it sank to the bottom of Bigtime Bay.

  But perhaps the most unusual feature of the pool room was the ceiling. Instead of the usual tiled ceiling that hovered above so many of the hallways in the underground lair, this one featured embedded 3-D holograms similar to those in the training room. A knob on one wall let you set the ceiling to whatever scene you wanted to look at, from rolling clouds, to lightning, to several of the better-known constellations. I chose the night sky setting, remembering my time with Johnny at the observatory. The ceiling dimmed to a dusky gray, and a smattering of stars twinkled to life, along with a full moon. I hit another knob, and the soft sounds of crickets and other forest creatures filtered into the room. Ah, perfect.