It was true. Whatever Berkley Brighton did, people hurried to hop on the bandwagon.
“Are you sure?” I asked.
Joanne nodded. “Honey, I’m always sure.”
Several hours later, I slumped back in my chair and rubbed my aching head. We’d gone over every possible thing three times. The food. Auction. Bachelors. RSVPs. Decorations. Donated art. I knew all the details by heart. I could recite the menu forward and backward. Spit out the exact number of cream puffs we’d ordered. Rattle off the names of all the bachelors we’d signed up. Remember the exact cost of the potted plants. Conjure up obscure facts about the art exhibit.
And I still felt like I was forgetting something.
We decided to take a break before wrapping up for the evening. One of the cooks brought in a silver tray full of star-shaped cucumber sandwiches, three kinds of cheese, crackers, fresh fruit, and steaming tea.
Grace and Joanne chatted about some event they’d attended last night. Abby shuffled her papers, pens, and files back into the proper slots in her shoulder bag, while Hannah sipped some cinnamon-flavored tea. I desperately wanted something to eat, but I scooted my chair away from the table. I didn’t want my luck to flare up and cause me to upset the whole tray. The way my fingers itched, it was only a matter of time before something bad happened.
“What did you think of Nate Norris’s barbecue, Hannah?” Grace asked, turning her blue eyes to the other woman.
“I don’t know. I wasn’t invited.” Hannah said, her voice frosty.
“Careful, honey,” Joanne said in a glib tone, her violet eyes sparkling. “The chip on your shoulder’s showing again.”
Hannah’s red lips puckered. Like most women on the society circuit, Hannah was a millionaire in her own right. It was how she’d gotten her money that some people had problems with. Hannah’s specialty was hostile takeovers. She took bankrupt corporations, bought up all the stock to get a controlling interest, made the businesses profitable again, then sold off the pieces for far more than she’d invested in the first place. The whole process resulted in a lot of hurt feelings all the way around.
Of course, there was some other talk about Hannah as well. That she used less-than-legal methods to divide and conquer. Some folks even whispered that she had ties to ubervillains and employed them on occasion to get what she wanted. But nothing had ever been proven. In addition to being a ruthless businesswoman, Hannah had enough money to make just about any problem disappear, including society gossip.
But she couldn’t quite break through the thin pink wall put up by the older matrons, no matter how hard she tried. And Hannah tried. Taking people to lunch, sending them presents and hard-to-get items, throwing lavish parties herself. For some reason, being rich wasn’t enough for Hannah. She wanted to be one of the in-crowd too.
“That was probably just an oversight on Nate’s part. Next time, dear, I’m sure you’ll get an invitation. It was nothing, really. Just a simple barbecue,” Grace said.
She let out a sympathetic cluck and leaned over, like she was going to pat the other woman’s hand, but Hannah jerked hers away, almost spilling her tea. Joanne smiled and poured herself a cup of the steaming beverage. Abby kept on shuffling her things, ignoring the drama.
I decided to follow suit and reached for one of the star-shaped sandwiches. Surely, a few carbs wouldn’t hurt. I could pretend the bread was whole wheat—
My power surged the moment I picked up the soft mound. I immediately dropped the sandwich back onto the silver platter.
Too late.
The sandwich was featherlight, but it hit the edge of the platter with the force of an anvil. The dish flew into the air, flipping end over end six—no, seven—times before landing right side up in the exact spot where it had been a moment before. The sandwiches that had been on the platter also rose into the air before stacking themselves neatly back onto the silver surface—one on top of the other until they formed a perfect little pyramid. The final sandwich plunged point first into the others, creating a star shape atop the mound of bread. There wasn’t a chef alive who could have created a more perfect display.
Mouths agape, everyone stared at the now-immaculate platter. I sat perfectly still, scarcely daring to breathe.
“Well, you certainly don’t see that every day,” Joanne said in a wry tone.
“No,” Hannah replied. “You certainly don’t.”
Hannah put her teacup down on the platter. She did it gently, with caution, given the weirdness of a moment ago. But that one small act was enough to upset the delicate balance my luck had achieved between platter and bread.
And send the pyramid of sandwiches tumbling into my lap.
Bread and cucumbers and cheese and mayonnaise splattered onto the front of my shirt and dripped off my lap onto the thick rugs below. But that wasn’t the worst part. The cup tipped over too, sending a spray of tea at me. The brown liquid hit my chest before dribbling down my torso, making one enormous, soupy mess.
At least the tea had cooled down. Otherwise, I would have been badly burned. That was the weird thing about my luck. It made bad things happen to me, but they were never terribly serious or life-threatening. Just horribly embarrassing. Like this particular moment.
The other women stared at me. Shocked and disgusted.
“Well,” I said, trying to laugh as I picked a bit of cucumber off my cheek, “I guess I won’t be needing a facial anytime soon. Mayonnaise is supposed to be great for your skin, right?”
Nobody answered me.
4
The meeting broke up after that. Grace, Hannah, and Abby said their goodbyes to Joanne and me. I echoed their sentiments from the floor, where I was on my hands and knees picking up soggy pieces of tea-soaked bread.
Joanne lounged in her chair and surveyed the mess. A small smile played across her lavender lips. “You certainly know how to clear a room, Bella.”
“Don’t worry,” I said, trying to ignore the slick, greasy feel of mayonnaise on my hands. “I’ll clean it up and pay for the rug. I know it must be expensive.”
Joanne waved her hand. “Don’t worry about it. I’ve been dying to get a new one anyway. Now, I have the perfect excuse. There’s a bathroom down the hall. Go get yourself cleaned up. And try to do something with your hair, will you? It looks all nappy and frizzy. I’ll get one of the housekeepers to take care of this.”
“Are you sure? About the rug, I mean—”
“Go!” Joanne pointed her manicured nail toward the door. “Berkley has a hundred rugs like this one. He won’t miss it, I promise.”
Well, I’d offered. That was all I could do. This wasn’t the first rug I’d ruined, and it wouldn’t be the last. In fact, there were several locations in the greater Bigtime area where I was no longer welcome because I’d caused so many catastrophes. Just last week, I’d been barred for life from Jewel’s Jewel Emporium. I’d obliterated not one, not two, but three diamond-solitaire pendants. It is very, very hard to break diamonds, but somehow, I’d found a way to reduce them all to powder. With my bare hands.
I followed Joanne’s directions as best I could. Down the hall might as well have been in another state as big as the mansion was. It took me ten minutes to find the bathroom, which could have housed a whale. Everything sparkled. It was so clean and white and sterile I doubted anything in the room had ever been used. I ran the tub-sized sink full of hot, soapy water, stripped off my white shirt, and scrubbed it. Despite the soaked-in globs of mayonnaise, the fabric came clean almost immediately. That was another strange thing about my luck. Sometimes, it was actually good, a blessing instead of just a jinx.
As for my hair, well, until Berkley or some other tycoon started making super—and I mean really, really super—strength conditioner, I’d just have to live with it. And so would Joanne.
I rummaged around in the tall cabinets until I found a hair dryer. I plugged it in one of the wall outlets, far, far from the sink and bathtub so I wouldn’t tempt fate and electroc
ute myself. Or blow every fuse in the mansion. Using the hot, steady blast from the hair dryer, I got most of the moisture out of my shirt. Fifteen minutes later, I was ready to face the world again.
I headed back toward the library, admiring the rooms and furnishings I passed. Many of them were familiar to me. Johnny and I used to have a ball playing hide-and-seek in the mansion, while Berkley entertained Bobby and James. Sometimes, it took us hours to find each other. Once, Johnny hid so well Berkley had to get his staff to help me look for him so we could go home. We finally found Johnny asleep in a bedroom closet—
POP!
I stopped, wondering at the strange sound. It reminded me of cereal snapping when you poured cold milk on it. For a moment, I wondered if I’d imagined the noise. And why. I didn’t particularly like cereal.
POP!
POP!
POP!
The sound came again and again, louder every time, and I knew I wasn’t daydreaming. The pops! emanated from a salon a few feet ahead. I crept up to the doorway and peered inside. It was one of Berkley’s viewing rooms, where he kept his paintings and statues and other expensive, important works of art. Cushioned chairs and low couches scattered throughout the area invited people to sit and stare at everything. Night had already fallen outside, but white footlights highlighted the art against the dark walls. I’d spent many hours in this room and others like it, trying to draw and paint and sketch as well as the masters.
POP!
A man appeared in front of a particularly abstract Picasso, where there had only been empty space a moment before. He wore a formfitting leather suit so blue it was almost black. The insignia of a scarlet rose intertwined with a silver thorn flashed on his chest. Dark hair curled around his face and silver mask, which had jagged edges that matched the thorn insignia. Although I tried to listen to as little superhero and ubervillain gossip as possible, I still recognized him.
Debonair.
One of the most notorious rakes—superhero, ubervillain, or otherwise—in Bigtime. He seduced women of all ages like other men breathed—with supreme, unconscious ease. He had a body even the other male superheroes envied—totally, perfectly chiseled. Michelangelo’s David come to life. He wasn’t too tall or too short and had a dazzling smile that could make a blind woman see. The gallant teleporter oozed sex appeal from head to toe, and billed himself as the ultimate lover and seducer. Debonair even had his own aptly named hideaway—the Lair of Seduction. Any woman who spent any time with Debonair there couldn’t help falling under his charming spell. At least, that’s what they said on SNN, the Superhero News Network. I’d never found blue-black leather to be any sort of turn-on, no matter how impressive the body underneath it was.
Debonair wasn’t a superhero, but he wasn’t quite an ubervillain either. He didn’t care about taking over the city or world domination. Instead, he was a master thief. Of sorts. Several priceless works of art had gone missing from various homes and galleries in Bigtime over the years after Debonair had paid them a visit. But just as many had later turned up in museums and other public places around town. Debonair had his own shady agenda no one had ever really been able to figure out. The only thing you could really count on was for him to pop! in using his teleportation superpower, make some witty, charming quip, and pop! back out. He was rather like Swifte that way.
Debonair snapped his gloved fingers. A painting depicting a field of irises left its frame and appeared in his hand a second later. Berkley had more security than Fort Knox, and I waited for an alarm to start blaring. Sirens to sound. Bars to crash down over the doors and windows.
Nothing. Not even a whisper.
Debonair snapped his fingers again. A long, hollow tube appeared in his other hand. He carefully rolled up the painting and stuffed it inside. He snapped his fingers a third time, and the tube disappeared. My eyes darted around the room, wondering where the container had gone, but I didn’t see it anywhere. Only an empty frame remained where the painting had been hanging on the wall.
I looked up at the ceiling. The mansion’s security cameras swiveled left and right and up and down as though everything was fine and dandy. Debonair must have done something to them, obscured them in some way. Or maybe he was teleporting around too fast for them to follow. Either way, it was up to me to stop him.
“Hey!” I said. “What do you think you’re doing?”
Debonair turned at the sound of my voice. He didn’t seem alarmed by the fact I’d caught him stealing the painting. Didn’t seem worried or bothered in the slightest. Instead, the thief tilted his head and gave me a thorough once-over. I crossed my arms over my chest and tried to look taller and scarier than I really was. Of course, that’s rather hard to do when you’re just over five feet. But still, I tried.
POP!
He appeared at my elbow, and I stifled a surprised scream. I would have stepped back, but he grabbed my hand and pulled me toward him. I put my other hand out to brace myself against his chest and immediately realized that Debonair didn’t wear a sculpted breastplate like some of the other superheroes and ubervillains did to improve their looks or hold in a less-than-flat midsection. Those tight, taut muscles under that slick leather were all him.
My fingers spread out. Oh my. I couldn’t help being impressed, despite my hatred of all things superhero.
“Bella Bulluci. What a delightful surprise.” His voice was low and throaty.
“You know my name?”
I stared at his broad chest, the rose insignia just even with my eyes. He smelled sweet but manly, like rose petals mixed with a rich musk. The heady scent made my head fuzzy.
Debonair put a finger under my chin and tipped it up. His eyes slammed into my hazel ones. They were blue—as blue as blue could possibly be and then some. A ring of silver and black shimmered around the edges of his bright irises, adding to the intensity of his gaze.
“Of course I know your name. You make some of the finest clothes in all of Bigtime. And as you may know, I’m a purveyor of fine things.” His gaze raked over me in a slow, sensual way that made my breath catch in my throat. “All sorts of fine things. In fact, I think it’s time for me to sample one right now.”
Debonair leaned in and lowered his lips to mine.
And I got angry. Really, really angry. Yeti Girl angry. Debonair might be attractive—okay, sexy with a capital S—but that didn’t give him the right to just pop! over here and manhandle me. Lots of sexy heroes and villains called Bigtime home. They were a dime a dozen, really.
But Debonair thought he was going to kiss me just because he could? Without any encouragement whatsoever from me? After he’d stolen from my friends? I didn’t think so.
I might be short, but I can take care of myself. Johnny’s supertough exoskeleton had given him an unfair advantage when we were kids. As a result, I’d learned lots of dirty tricks to ward off unwanted noogie and tickle attacks. Like the one I was about to use right now.
I ducked Debonair’s looming lips, turned my body into his broad chest, grabbed his left arm, and flipped him over my shoulder.
POP!
He teleported away a second before he slammed into the floor. My eyes flicked around, wondering where he’d poof to next.
POP!
He appeared in the hallway in front of me. “That wasn’t very nice, Bella. All I wanted to do was kiss you.”
“Well, I didn’t want you to kiss me.”
“But I’m Debonair,” he said.
His tone was smug and self-assured, like the very mention of his name should be enough to make any woman his willing slave. And get her to take off her panties. Sexy and arrogant. A dangerous combination. One I had to work very hard not to find attractive. Maybe the Casanova routine worked on other women, but it wasn’t going to on me.
“Oh, get over yourself,” I snapped. “You’re not all that.”
He smiled. That too was perfect, just like the rest of him. White teeth. Nice lips. A tiny dimple in his chin.
“I think
the folks in SSS would disagree with you. I’ve been their Man of the Year three times in a row now.”
“Slaves for Superhero Sex? The cult group full of crazies who worship heroes?” I snorted. “They’re hardly an appropriate judge of character. They’ll do anything in spandex.”
That was an understatement. Slaves for Superhero Sex was a group of men and women whose sole purpose in life was to get up close and personal with superheroes. SSS members deliberately did stupid, life-endangering things—like handcuff themselves to railroad tracks and swallow the key or climb to the top of the Skyline Bridge—in hopes that some superhero would come along and rescue them. Not only that, they usually tried to make time with their superhero savior after they were out of danger. In recent months, some of the more enthusiastic, morally challenged members had gone over to the dark side and started volunteering to be flunkies for various villains. At least, that’s what had been reported on SNN.
“And what about you, Bella? Do you like spandex? Or are you more of a whips-and-chains kind of girl?” Debonair asked.
“That’s none of your business!”
I couldn’t stop myself from blushing. Whips and chains? I’d never dream of doing such a thing. Why, I hadn’t even been much of a regular-sex girl lately. Not since before my father died, really.
Debonair gave me another sexy, knowing smirk, but I’d had enough of the witty banter. I was damp and tired and I smelled like moldy bread. So, I skirted around him, careful to stay at least six feet away at all times, and headed down the hall.
“Where are you going?” he called out. “We were just starting to warm up to each other.”
“You want warm?” I asked, stopping in front of a small red knob. “Think how warm you’ll be when the police show up and toss you in the slammer. Stealing from Berkley Brighton? Now, that was dumb. But pissing me off? That’s what’s really going to get you into trouble.”
I yanked down the fire alarm. Loud bells and sirens blared to life throughout the massive house. Please exit the building, a man’s voice intoned over the commotion. Please exit the building.