Runaway (Airhead #3) (2 page)

Three

NIKKI CHOSE THAT EXACT MOMENT TO come out of her room.

“What’s wrong with Brandon?” she asked as she click-clacked down the hall toward me.

“His car is on fire,” Steven said with a shrug.

“What?” Nikki’s voice rose to a high-pitched shriek. “Not the new Lamborghini!”

I had to flatten myself against the wall in order not to get knocked down as she hurried off after Brandon, her heels making a huge racket on the shiny marble floor.

“Brandon,” she cried, racing after him. “Wait! I’m coming!”

I wanted to remind her not to go outside or the paparazzi might get a shot of her, but it was too late. She was already gone.

Cosabella, who’d followed me from my room, rushed down the stairs after Nikki, her claws skittering on the slick floor. She gave a few excited barks and then, when Nikki slammed the front door in her face, gave herself a good shake and came trotting back into the living room, looking proud of herself for a job well done.

“So.” Steven folded his arms and stared up at me as I made my way down the long staircase. It was a little treacherous to navigate in high heels and a skintight Armani evening gown, I found. “You set the guy’s car on fire?”

This caused me to freeze in my tracks.

“Me?” I arranged my face into a suitably shocked expression. “What makes you think it was me, and not one of the paps, trying to lure him outside so they could get a photo op?”

“Because I found your fuse,” he said, holding up what used to be a wooden mixed-bead necklace Brandon had given me…

…at least until I’d rolled it in a mixture that included hot water, sugar, and another substance and let it dry overnight.

“You’re a liar,” I said when I reached the bottom of the stairs. I plucked the singed necklace from his hand. “You said you saw the car burning from the windows.”

“Actually,” Steven said, “I did. And I went out to investigate. That was a little while ago. I found it so interesting, I thought I’d let it keep going, to see what would happen. Where did
you
of all people learn to make a slow-burning fuse?”

“YouTube,” I said. I dropped the charred necklace into the neck of a Greek amphora that was sitting at the bottom of the stairs. “And I resent the implication that a girl wouldn’t necessarily know her way around explosives. I go to an alternative high school, you know.”

“Of course.” Steven nodded. “Stupid of me. But let me ask you a question,” he said as he followed me into the dining room, where I’d gone to sit down at the massive, already set table. “Why would you want to blow up Brandon Stark’s new car?”

Because he’s holding us prisoner here. And Christopher doesn’t love me anymore.

“It’s not going to blow up,” I said. “I just made a decorative design on the hood with lighter fluid. And there are plenty of fire extinguishers out there. I checked. If Brandon has any sense, he’ll get the fire out before it does any permanent damage to anything but the paint job.”

And I hadn’t timed the fire right. It was supposed to have gone up
before
he got a chance to kiss me.

“You didn’t need to destroy his car,” Steven said, joining me at the table. “The guy is a tool, but that’s going a little far, don’t you think?”

“No,” I said shortly. Cosabella curled up at my feet beneath the table.

“Wow.” Steven stared at me. “You really hate him.”

I pictured Christopher’s face growing smaller and smaller in the distance as the limo Brandon had forced me into snaked its way down the road.

You have,
my voice mail’s robotic voice said in my head, over and over,
no new messages.

Yeah. I guess I did hate Brandon.

“I told you,” I said. “I was only trying to mess up the paint job a little.”

Steven shook his head. “I’m not falling for it, Em.”

Of course he wasn’t. Nikki’s brother is a trained naval officer. He isn’t stupid.

But I widened my eyes and went for the innocent act anyway. Because of what Brandon said would happen if I didn’t.

“I don’t know what you mean,” I said.

“Convincing,” Steven said. “But spill now while we have five minutes alone together for once. You’re not in love with Brandon Stark. What’s going on, Em? Why are you pretending to be in love with Brandon on the one hand, then setting his car on fire behind his back?”

Whatever she knows about Stark Quark, if it’s worth killing Nikki Howard for
—
and then giving her a brain transplant to keep her image alive
—
it’s worth knowing. Believe me. And I want in,
Brandon had whispered to me that cold gray morning back in New York, just a week ago.

Why should I help you?
I’d demanded.

Because,
he’d said.
If you don’t, I’ll tell my dad where the real Nikki Howard is. And,
he’d added, about Christopher,
no more of that other guy, the one in the leather jacket, who seems so into you. Just me. You’re mine now. Understand?

I’d looked up at him then like he was crazy.

But now I know better. Brandon Stark isn’t crazy. Dumb, maybe. Desperate to leave his mark on the planet, the way his father has, but with no real idea about how to go about doing that.

But not crazy.

And if you tell them that I’m making you do it, I’ll tell my father about the girl.

Would he? Would Brandon tell?

He certainly didn’t care about Nikki— or about Steven or Mrs. Howard. Sure, he was willing to house— and clothe— them, since they had nowhere else to go, thanks to his dad’s company essentially stalking them.

But he was only doing this because of what he thought he was going to get out of it: me (only not the real me. The me he thought I was, this made-up girl whose name he didn’t even really know, who looked like Nikki Howard).

Oh, and whatever it was Nikki knew that he thought was going to make him so much money.

“Em.” Steven was staring at me, his face— so much like the one I saw reflected in the mirror every morning when I put on my makeup, only masculine— tight with anxiety. “Whatever he’s threatened you with, I swear to you, I can make it better. You just have to tell me what’s going on.”

I wanted to believe him. I really did. I’d never had a big brother before, but I was starting to really love Nikki’s. He was so comforting, with his wide shoulders and steady gaze. I almost believed that he could make it all better.

But of course he couldn’t. No one could.

And if you tell them that I’m making you do it, I’ll tell my father about the girl.

Except Brandon wasn’t going to tell his father a thing about Nikki. He couldn’t. He needed her too much. She held the key to everything.

But Christopher. He’d tell his father about Christopher.

“Oh, there you are,” Nikki’s mother called as she came down the floating staircase, holding carefully to the handrail as both her poodles, Cosabella’s siblings, skittered down the steps in front of her. “Is everything all right? What was all that ruckus I heard before?”

Talk about saved by the bell…a real Southern belle, as a matter of fact: Nikki and Steven’s mom had the drawl and the gently fading beauty of one. You could see where both Nikki and Steven got their good looks. Mrs. Howard was still what my dad would call a knockout.

But before anyone could say anything else, the chef’s assistant came out of the kitchen, holding a silver tray.

“She-crab soup,” he said, trying to ignore the obnoxiously dancing poodles at his feet, all hoping they might be able to trip him and that he might spill some of what he was carrying. He seemed more disconcerted by the fact that there were only three of us than by the dogs.

“Oh,” he said. “Is Mr. Stark not ready for dinner yet?”

“There was a little emergency,” I said. “He’ll be back in a few minutes. I guess you could tell the chef to go ahead and serve.”

The assistant nodded, holding the tray for Steven and his mother to help themselves to the first course, then retreated back into the kitchen, his rubber clogs soundless on the black marble floor. Cosabella and Mrs. Howard’s dogs, Harry and Winston, followed after him, still eagerly hoping he might drop something.

“What kind of emergency?” Mrs. Howard asked.

“Em lit his car on fire,” Steven said.

Mrs. Howard, about to lift her shot glass of soup to her mouth, gasped instead. “Em! Why would you do such a thing?”

I shrugged. I couldn’t tell her I’d done it because Brandon was a great big lying fake who’d caused me and my boyfriend to break up forever. She, like everyone else, thought I was in love with Brandon, and that he was protecting her and her daughter from his evil father.

And, in a way, he was.

I didn’t want to worry her more than she already was. She’d left everything behind— her business, her home, her friends, her life— for her daughter.

Who actually didn’t seem all that grateful for it, if you asked me.

“Shouldn’t we call the fire department?” Mrs. Howard asked, still looking shocked.

Just as she was saying this, one of the glass side doors opened, and Brandon came in, Nikki tripping at his heels.

“I’m telling you, it was those jerks from
OK!”
Brandon said. “And I’m not standing for it. Not a second longer. I’m calling my lawyers. I’m suing for the cost of replacing my car.”

“You’re so right, Brandon.” Nikki wobbled along after him in her too-high— and several sizes too big for her— platform wedges. “It had to be them. Who else would do such a thing?”

“Is everything all right?” Mrs. Howard asked. “No one was hurt, were they? Is the fire out? Nikki, no one got a photo of you out there, did they?”

“Oh, it’s out,” Brandon said as Nikki shook her head. Brandon had his iPhone glued to his face. “And Nikki’s fine. But the paint job on my car is ruined. Ruined! Hello, Ken?” He started shouting into his cell phone. “Ken, it’s Brandon. They trashed my car. What? The Murciélago, that’s which one. Why? How the hell should I know why? To get a reaction out of me that they can plaster all over their damn magazine covers, that’s why. Why else?”

“I don’t know how any of us are supposed to be able to eat,” Nikki said with a sigh as she sat down, unfolding her white linen napkin with a snap, “after what just happened. The paparazzi have just gotten so out of control. How could they do such an awful thing to poor Brandon?”

“What makes you think it was the paparazzi?” Steven asked, not looking in my direction anymore as the chef’s assistant came into the dining room, carrying another tray. He was trying very hard not to trip over the dogs again.

“I don’t know who else it would be,” Nikki said. “Brandon’s never hurt anyone. He’s completely sweet and adorable.”

I choked a little on the sip of sparkling water I’d just swallowed. If Brandon was sweet and adorable, I was Satan’s bride.

“Maybe,” I said when I’d recovered, “it was his dad.”

“What?” Nikki looked confused. “Why would his dad send him a nice car for Christmas, then light it on fire?”

“Because,” I said, “maybe Mr. Stark knows you’re here.”

Nikki turned visibly pale.

“You think he knows?” she asked.

Yeah. I was evil. I was a car-burning, lie-telling supermodel. Whatever. I didn’t care anymore. They’d already given me a brain transplant, made me dump my boyfriend, and were going to make me parade around in a million-dollar bra on national television in a couple of days. What more could they do to me? Kill me?

Well, guess what? I was already dead.

“He could suspect,” I said. “And if he does, we don’t have much time. We need to know what it is he tried to murder you for. That way we can get the proof we need to prosecute Brandon’s dad and have him put away where he can’t try to hurt you anymore.”

Nikki’s chin slid out stubbornly.

“Like I already told my
mother,”
she said, putting an unpleasant emphasis on the word
mother,
“when she tried to bring this up the other day: Brandon’s dad did not try to have me murdered. I don’t know where you all keep coming up with this story—”

“Because we all sat in the same room with Dr. Fong,” Mrs. Howard explained patiently. “And heard him reveal that you didn’t have an embolism, Nikki—”

“But they forced him to do the surgery, anyway,” Steven interrupted. “They were going to
throw your brain away.
He saved your life by transplanting it into the body you have now. Why don’t you get that? Just tell us what you were going to blackmail Robert Stark about, and we can all go back to our old lives.”

“Oh.” Suddenly, Nikki’s eyes were bright with unshed tears. “Can we? Can we all go back to our old lives, Steven? I’m sorry, but you seem to have forgotten that that isn’t possible for some of us. Because
there’s another girl living in my old body.”

She shot me a look that sent chills up my spine. No one— not even Whitney Robertson, back at Tribeca Alternative, who I’m pretty sure had disliked me more than any human being in the entire universe, and only because when I was on her volleyball team during PE, I’d sometimes miss the ball— had ever given me a look of such pure, unadulterated hatred.

“So I can’t go back to my old life,” Nikki said to her brother. “That girl right there is living in my apartment, using my money, taking my gigs; even
my dog
likes her better than me.” She pointed through the glass tabletop at Cosabella, who was sitting at the side of my chair, panting up at me eagerly, hoping I might slip her a piece of whatever food was about to be served (which, I have to admit, I’d been known on occasion to do).

“So excuse me,” Nikki went on, “if I’m not exactly in a rush to get out of here. I happen to like things exactly as they are, considering the alternatives. Because if you think I’m going back home to live in redneck Gasper, USA, with you and Mom, Steven, well, you can just think again. I’m never going back there.
Never.”

“Nikki,” I said. I felt terrible about what had happened to her. I really did. Even though none of it had been my fault— hey, I definitely hadn’t chosen to be the new brain behind the Face of Stark— I felt like I owed her something.