The Festival of the Moon (Girls Wearing Black: Book Two) (40 page)

The woman who had greeted her at the door was all that remained.

“It’s over,” Melissa said. “If you come out and talk to me I will give you a painless death. If you make me chase you down I will stretch it out, and you will beg me to kill you.”

*****

“A date with Nicky Bloom is now available to the highest bidder at any price,” Byron said. “Do I have any takers?”

Meekly, his head still facing his shoes, his movements slow and frightful, Vince Weir raised his paddle.

“Yes, the gentleman in the gray suit. What is your bid?”

“One penny,” Vince said quietly.

The crowd stirred in displeasure. It was better not to get a bid at all than to have someone bid a penny.

“Very well,” Byron said, speaking quietly, clearly shaken at this strange turn of events. “The current bid is one penny. Do I have a higher bid?”

Marshall raised his paddle.

“I will bid two,” he said.

Nicky tried not to laugh. How arrogant she and the Network had been to think they could drop her into Thorndike and have her do as she pleased. Kim Renwick had spent her entire life preparing for this contest. It was the height of hubris to think that a computer hacker, a former jackal, and a team of vampire hunters could come in here and derail her.

Now Kim was getting the last laugh. Now it was clear to everyone in the crowd that Kim would win this contest. Not just win, but crush. She was doing more than defeating Nicky. Kim was sending a message. Nicky Bloom was going down in flames tonight, and the boys who thought they could buck the system and tell Kim where to stick it, were having to show their fealty to her in the most demeaning way possible.

Nicky looked at Art. Surely his bid was next. Even from across the auditorium, she could see that Art was drenched in sweat. Byron asked for a higher bid and Art raised his paddle.

“I will bid three cents,” he said.

“Are we done here?” Byron said in a scolding voice. “Does anyone have a higher bid or may we end this auction?”

The auditorium was silent. Nicky would be leaving here tonight with Art. His sin against Kim was greatest, so he got the greatest punishment. He had to take Nicky out on a date even though he’d just cost her the contest.

“The current bid of three cents is going once….going twice…”

As Byron inched this nonsense closer to the end, Nicky couldn’t help but think that there was a lot to be proud of. She found Phillip and Helena in the audience and threw a smile their way. Her primary mission might be over now, but her time at Thorndike was hardly a failure. She had learned the truth about her father. She had found Frankie and could mount a rescue mission before he turned eighteen. And tonight, while all this silliness played out on stage, a team of Network assassins was killing Melissa Mayhew. This mission wasn’t a total loss.

Then a green paddle went up in the middle of the audience and Nicky’s heart sank.

“A new bid from the center row,” said Byron. “Gentleman with the purple tie.”

As a wind of whispers passed through the crowd at the entry of this new bidder, Nicky tilted her head down, towards the rows in front, towards the spot where she saw knew he was sitting. She saw him when she first took the stage—his face was the first she recognized—but, as she had been doing for more than a week now, she had put him out of her mind.

Not you too
, she thought.
Everyone else can insult me as much as they want, it doesn’t mean a thing. But not you.

Their eyes connected for an instant, and she used hers to plead with him not to do this.

Whatever Kim is holding over you
, she thought,
it won’t matter tomorrow. Don’t do this to me. Please, Ryan. Please put your paddle down.

Ryan cleared his throat. “Yes,” he said to Byron. “I have a bid.”

“Is your bid four pennies?” said Byron, now making no attempt to mask his annoyance.

“No, I’ll do a bit more than that,” said Ryan. He looked at Nicky and flashed a smile, then he turned to Byron and said, “I bid ten million dollars on Nicky Bloom.”

The crowd couldn’t contain itself at this and Byron had to bang his gavel like an angry judge.

“Quiet please,” Byron said. “Quiet in the auditorium, please.”

The crowd hushed down to a silence, and Byron looked at Ryan.

“I wish to confirm your bid. Would you please repeat it?”

“My bid is for ten million dollars on Nicky Bloom.”

“Very good,” said Byron. “Ten million dollars for Nicky Bloom. Going once….going twice…”

He banged his gavel. “Shattering all previous records, a date with Nicky Bloom is sold to the gentleman in the purple tie for ten million dollars.”

*****

Gia crouched behind the red chair in the sitting room, watching Melissa’s feet make a slow approach across the foyer.

“Falkon has some explaining to do, doesn’t he?” Melissa said. “Nicky told me he wanted to be friends. I must say I am terribly disappointed at how this turned out.”

Me too
, Gia thought.

Any other night this week and they might have pulled it off. They were supposed to be a team of seven, with Phillip, Helena, Eve, and Patrick joining them for the kill. But tonight there were only three hunters present to greet Melissa. Kendall, whose ultraviolet lasers were doing great work until Melissa got away; Dante, whose huge height and weight turned out to be their undoing; and Gia, who was sad not so much because she was going to die, but because of the mess she was leaving behind for Nicky and Jill to clean up.

“I’m going to ask you one more time to come out and see me,” Melissa said. “If you do not, I will make sure you regret it.”

She spoke in a soothing voice now. She was trying to tug on Gia’s mind.

It was working. Gia felt a strong desire to stand up and give herself over. One more call like that from Melissa and she might not be able to resist.

It was time.

Goodbye, Nicky. Sorry I wasn’t able to be there with you at the end of this one.

As was the case every time she had faced a vampire, Gia had a capsule hidden in her cheek. With the tip of her tongue, she brought it forward, then she rolled it to the left side of her mouth, between her molars.

“So here it is,” said Melissa. “My last request. Come out now and talk to me.”

Gia didn’t respond. She had already broken the capsule open with her teeth and allowed the cyanide to squirt down her throat.

Chapter 40

“What just happened in there?” Nicky asked.

“I won a date with you,” said Ryan. “Lucky me.”

They were riding to the airport in the back of the limo.

“But why?” Nicky said. “I don’t understand what you did. What about Kim?”

“Things have changed,” Ryan said. “Turns out Kim isn’t as powerful as I thought she was.”

Ryan was all smiles and giddiness. Nicky had never seen him this way.

“What happened with Kim? What changed?”

“Sorry, can’t tell you that.”

“Why can’t you tell me? Ryan, this is so strange!”

“I know it. We’ve got to go hang out somewhere for a week now. Where do you want to go?”

“I don’t…what about your family? What about all the things we talked about on the phone and in your letter? What is Kim going to do to you now?”

“Nothing,” Ryan said. “I didn’t know the whole story. She led me to believe she was in a position to do something horrible if I didn’t give her exactly what she wanted, but then this morning I learned the thing I thought she could do…well, she can’t do it at all.”

“What thing, Ryan? You’re not making any sense. What are you talking about?”

“The secret Kim was holding over me. It isn’t dangerous. She can’t use it.”

“But what is it? What’s the secret?”

“If I told you, it wouldn’t be a secret, now would it?”

“What? Why are you being so weird?”

“I can’t help it! All this time, Nicky, for years, I thought Kim had me trapped, but now it turns out I was wrong. It feels like I’ve escaped from prison!”

“What prison, Ryan? What changed?”

“I wish I could tell you,” Ryan said. “I trust you, and I don’t want to keep things from you, but this isn’t my secret to share. It wouldn’t be right of me to say.”

“Fine, whatever,” Nicky said. “But what happens now?”

“What happens now is you don’t get killed,” said Ryan. “No matter what the rest of the year brings, you’ve got ten million in the pot now. That should be good for at least a third place finish. Whoever ends up in that cage at the end of the year, it won’t be you. Can you believe this Nicky? Can you believe that we got her? Kim thought she had this all wrapped up but now you’ve won the Date Auction. I don’t know what’s going to happen in there now that Kim’s up for auction, but I guarantee you that no one is bidding ten million dollars. The old record was two million. You totally destroyed it!”

“Why did you wait so long? What was the deal with that? That had to be the strangest Date Auction--”

“In history? Oh, it absolutely was. First you were going below the minimum, then those losers were bidding pennies on you.”

Ryan started laughing. Even as she felt lost, Nicky found herself smiling at him. He reminded her of how he was on those lunch dates during the first week of school, when they were just two teens who liked each other and she wasn’t yet a girl wearing black.

“But why did you let it go there? You waited until the last possible minute to make your bid.”

“I wasn’t going to bid on you at all,” Ryan said. “Pretty as you are, Nicky Bloom, and I gotta admit, you look dynamite tonight. Good Lord, that makeup…and your hair.”

“Be serious, Ryan.”

“I am being serious. The minute I saw you I wanted to place a bid, but I had sworn to myself that I wouldn’t. Once I learned the truth about this secret Kim’s been holding over my head, my great bit of rebellion was going to be no bid at all. I was going to thumb my nose at the whole system. The richest kid in America sits on his hands during the Date Auction. It was going to be killer. But then it became clear that Kim screwed you over, like she does to everyone, and I decided to get in the game.”

“Yeah you did. Ten million dollars. That’s…”

“Huge, I know,” said Ryan. “It’s obscene, but it’s what I had available to bid. Remember last week when Kim was at my house and I called you?”

“Yes, I remember.”

“She was so smug,” said Ryan. “It’s because of Kim that I had ten million dollars to spend tonight. That was the number she wanted. Those were the funds my family put in the bank for me to bid on her. I tell you, Nicky, it made me sick thinking of giving all that money to the immortals.”

“You realize you gave it to them anyway, don’t you?”

“Of course I do. But as much as I hate this contest and this school and the immortals who run it all, I don’t hate it enough to see you get killed. And now I know that you’re safe. That’s worth a couple million bucks, don’t you think?”

“I suppose it is,” said Nicky. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome. But really it’s Kim you should be thanking. She’s the one who made this all happen. All I did was spend my parents’ money.”

“You did a lot more than that,” Nicky said. “You took a risk for me. I know you don’t want to be involved in all the politics of this town.”

“You got that right.”

“But now you are involved, and I appreciate it,” Nicky said.

They looked at each other for a moment, and Nicky felt like everything was going to be ok. The giant weight on her shoulders, a weight that had grown by many multiples when Sergio decided to visit her dressing room, all seemed manageable now. She didn’t have to do all this heavy lifting by herself.

“I’d like to go to Italy for the date,” she said.

“Italy, that’s good. Lots of people go to Venice for their dates.”

“I mean the Italian Alps.”

“It isn’t really…ski season.”

“That’s where I want to go. When we get to the airport, can you have the pilot take us there?”

“I feel like there’s something you’re not telling me,” Ryan said.

“That makes us even, because I know there’s a lot you’re not telling me either.”

Nicky’s phone buzzed with a text. It was from Phillip.

Vince just won the date with Kim for three million. She looked furious. Strange night, huh? Have fun on your adventure. I’ll let you know when we get the all-clear from Gia.

“What is it?” said Ryan.

“It’s my dad,” said Nicky. “Kim’s auction is done. Vince Weir placed the winning bid. It was a lot less than yours.”

“Vince? I’d think Art could have outbid Vince.”

“Art could have put together a bid as large as yours if he wanted,” said Nicky. “I have no idea what was up with Art tonight.”