Runaway (Airhead #3)

by Meg Cabot

  This was news to me. Grandma? Grandma always told Frida and me that we were pretty. So much so that it really didn’t mean anything. Of course we were pretty. We were her granddaughters. It doesn’t mean anything when your grandmother tells you that you’re pretty.

  But Mom? Mom never said we were pretty, or looked good. It was always, “Your mind is all that matters!”

  And of course that’s true.

  But it would have been nice to have heard our hair looked good, once in a while.

  And now that I knew Mom had liked girlie clothes? Mom, who always dressed so sensibly in gray suits and low-heeled shoes? Grandma had had to stop telling Mom she was pretty because she got so conceited about it?

  This was fantastic stuff. I couldn’t wait to tell Frida.

  If I ever saw her again.

  “And I guess,” Mom went on— she was practically babbling— “I just thought if I followed her lead, you two would turn out like me…more interested in things academic than…well…”

  What? What had Mom been like as a girl? I was dying to find out.

  But by then Jerri had gotten to my head with the spray blower.

  “Look, Mom,” I said. “I have to go get ready for the show. I understand everything you’re saying. I know it’s all fake. No one knows that more than me. But it’s still nice to hear your mom say you’re pretty once in a while, you know? But don’t worry about me, okay? Everything’s going to be fine.” This was a boldfaced lie. I had absolutely no way of knowing this. But what else was I going to say? Look, Mom, because of my jackassery, my boss may be about to kill your youngest daughter? “Just call Lulu as soon as you hear from Frida.”

  “I will,” Mom said. She hesitated, then said, “I love you, Em. In case that wasn’t clear. No matter what you look like. Or what you wear.”

  This brought tears to my eyes. Because I so didn’t deserve it.

  “Thanks, Mom,” I said. “Me, too.”

  I hung up and handed the phone back to Jerri.

  “Moms,” I said to her, rolling my eyes in an effort not to burst into tears.

  “Tell me about it,” Jerri said, tucking her phone back into her pocket. “Mine smokes a pack of Camel Lights a day. Can I get her to stop? No way. Close your eyes now, hon, I’m gonna do your face.”

  Forty-five minutes later— which Jerri claimed was a speed record for her— I was out of hair and makeup and tucked into the diamond bra and panties, my wings attached and floating behind me. I looked, when I saw myself in the mirror, like a cross between an angel and…well, a girl wearing a diamond bikini.

  Oh, well. Hopefully, Mom wouldn’t be watching.

  I strode in my platform heels toward the soundstage as Jerri trotted alongside me, blotting on the last dab of lip gloss.

  “There you are.” Rebecca appeared as if from nowhere, still in her black evening gown with the slit up to here. “I heard you were late. What did I warn you about? Did I tell you not to be late? Did you eat anything? I can see your hip bones. I know you didn’t eat anything. If you faint on me, Nikki, I swear to God…”

  “I’m not going to faint,” I assured her. “Is Brandon here with you? Because I really need to talk to him.”

  “As a matter of fact, he is,” Rebecca said, looking demure. Or as demure as it was possible for Rebecca to look, which wasn’t very. “You might as well know, we’re an item now. And I know there’s a bit of an age difference, but honestly, I think he could use a mature woman in his life. No offense, Nikki, but you haven’t exactly been the most steadying influence on him. And he needs stability.”

  “I really don’t care about that,” I said. “You can have him. That isn’t what I want to talk to him about. It’s about his dad, actually.”

  “His dad?” Rebecca shrugged. “Not exactly his favorite topic. But it’s your funeral.” She pulled her BlackBerry from her Chanel bag and began banging on the keyboard. “You sure you want to get into this now, right before the show? Can’t it wait? You’re onstage in five. And don’t talk to Ryan, all right, darling? All the girls are talking to Ryan, and it’s getting on his nerves.”

  I looked up and down the hall. There were models in Stark brand underwear and wings everywhere. I saw Kelley, my friend from the dress rehearsal, wave her cell phone at me and set off her ringtone. It played the Journeyquest Dragon Battle Cry. Kelley laughed and pointed at me, then gave me the thumbs-up. I smiled at her like Ha! That’s funny.

  But mainly I was thinking how much I wanted to throw up.

  “I won’t,” I said.

  Rebecca shrugged and kept banging on the keyboard.

  What was Robert Stark doing right now? I wondered. Was he trying to kill my sister?

  And what about Christopher? Had Lulu and Nikki gotten him my cell phone? I felt so vulnerable not knowing what was going on.

  I wasn’t the only one. Gabriel stepped out of his dressing room in full makeup and his tux. He was with his band— all of whom were good-looking enough to cause a ripple of excitement to pass through the other models, Ryan Seacrest suddenly forgotten.

  But Gabriel ignored it. When he saw me, in fact, he said to the rest of his guys, “Hey. I’ll be right there,” and fell back to whisper to me, “So? Have you heard anything?”

  I shook my head. “Nothing. You?”

  He shook his head. “I’m sure it will be fine.”

  “Or,” I said, “we’ll walk out onto the stage and a boom will fall on us, killing us both instantly, courtesy of Robert Stark.”

  “It’s always good,” Gabriel said, tugging on his lapels, “to think positive.”

  “Brandon will meet you after the show,” Rebecca announced, reading from the screen of her BlackBerry.

  “But I really need to talk to him now,” I said, unable to keep the dismay from my voice.

  “Well.” Rebecca shrugged. “What do you want me to do? The man says he’s busy. He’ll meet you upstairs in the Stark Sky Bar, he says. There’ll be champagne for all of us to toast in the New Year. It’s where we’re all going to watch the Times Square ball drop. There’s a perfect view from there—”

  “Places!” Alessandro came scurrying down the hallway, clapping his hands. “All of you. Backstage, now! What are you dillydallying for? Are you trying to give me a heart attack? The show’s started! We’re live! No more talking once you get through the soundproof door. Go! GO!”

  I reached instinctively for Gabriel’s hand. My own was ice-cold. But his felt warm…just like his gaze when it met mine.

  “It’s going to be all right,” he assured me, with a smile. “You did the right thing.”

  “Did I?” I asked. I wished I could believe him. In theory, I did.

  But Frida! My own sister! How could I have been so stupid?

  “Oh, God,” Rebecca said, noticing our clenched hands. “What is going on here? Are you two an item? This is perfect. Can I announce it to the press? Do you have any idea what this is going to do for your sales numbers, Gabriel? You’re already in the stratosphere, but this, honey, we’re talking Mars—”

  By this time, I was going through the studio doors, and all the cameramen and sound engineers were shushing Rebecca to be quiet.

  Still, she stood behind the doors, even as they were closing, whisper-yelling, “You can’t hide things from me, Nikki! You can’t run away! I know all your secrets!”

  If only she knew.

  Inside the backstage space of the studio, where we were all gathered to wait our turn onstage, it was so quiet, I could almost hear my own heartbeat. It was the front of the studio, where the stage was, where it was another matter entirely. There, it was thunderously loud. The live audience was screaming with appreciation for Ryan and the models who were already strutting out onto the stage, doing their catwalk up and down the runway, showing off their different bra and panty sets.

  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 hi
t 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, wh
o 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…