Kristen (7 page)
After intense analysis, Kristen had decided on a long black Juicy tunic hoodie (Massie hand-me-down) over gray denim capris (Old Navy, to be destroyed by “accidental pen explosion” one week before the Pretty Committee returned). Black ballet flats (Capezio sale bin—seven dollars!) completed the vandal-chic look she was going for. She’d considered wearing her Cleopatra wig, not only for the pop it gave her green eyes, but for its ability to conceal her blond hair. Ultimately, though, she’d decided against it. Because the only thing Kristen wanted more than to make Dune fall in love with her was to keep the Witty Committee secret. They could always cheer her up if she lost Dune, but
he
could never fill the void if she lost them. No one could. So tonight, her blond hair was stuffed under a Burton snowboard cap. As she urged her bike forward, she pedal-prayed the combination of extreme humidity and black wool would not make her forehead break out in the morning.
Kristen got off her bike three blocks away from the country club and locked it to a burned-out streetlight. She checked left, then right. Certain no one was watching, she lifted the flap on her leather saddlebag (a gift from her uncle Billy in Texas) and pulled out the clear backpack. The pink crystals inside made it too heavy to wear, so she carried it in her arms like a big, crippled dog and waddled down the dark sidewalk like a pregnant penguin.
For the next three and a half hours, Kristen hid behind the shrub next to the service gate and studied the instructions the Witty Committee had left in the outside pocket of her backpack. They weren’t complicated. In fact, their simplicity was brilliant.
As her legs cramped from crouching and her stomach grumbled from a Ziploc dinner of milkless Lucky Charms (for luck), Kristen thought—fleetingly—about bailing. She was not a rule breaker by nature. Sure, she wore cute clothes behind her mother’s back and let the PC copy her homework, but nothing illegal. Ever! Yet here she was, about to trespass and vandalize. In a place she loved going to with Massie and the Blocks. And that should have made her feel awkward and uneasy, like she had in those boy clothes. But for some reason it didn’t. Instead it felt:
A) Exhilarating.
B) Daring.
C) Empowering.
D) Romantic.
E) All of the above.
It felt like she was about to face
her
mega-wave and find out what she was made of. After years of hiding behind Massie, her mother, her homework, and her soccer coach, Kristen was ready times ten for the answer.
“Ripple, come awn!” Dune’s terse whisper cut through the muggy summer night like a beautifully polished knife through red velvet cake—bringing her one step closer to pure heaven.
Kristen brushed the dirt off her butt and stood. Why get caught in the poop-in-the-woods position unless it was absolutely necessary? Which it wasn’t. The staff had left over twenty minutes ago and the club was deserted.
Tyler, Jax, and Scooter shuffled along a few paces behind Dune, their hands stuffed in the pockets of their skinny jeans and their shoulders slumped toward the dirt road. Ripple, a few paces behind them, was teetering on platform espadrilles, texting and chew-snapping a wad of brown Bubblicious.
“Ahhhh, smell that?” Dune sniffed the lobster bisque–scented air.
Kristen giggled, to show Dune she was ready to have fun despite their risky agenda.
“It’s the sweet smell of revenge.” He put his arm around her shoulders, then quickly removed it. The brief contact was enough to make the ends of her straight blond hair curl.
“I thought it was Jax,” Tyler chuckled.
“What?”
Jax whisper-screeched.
“Sucker punch!” Tyler nudged him with his black plaster cast.
“Shhhhh.” Kristen lifted her French manicured nail to her lips, casually showing off her flawless home job.
Ripple popped a bubble against her glossy mouth.
Kristen glared at her, making it perfectly clear who was running this operation. Ripple gently peeled the gum off her face and tossed the wad in the bushes.
Kristen let the un-green gesture slide and continued whispering. “Security patrols the grounds constantly. But there are only two guys, and it takes them exactly nineteen minutes to walk the periphery,” she explained, having memorized the Witty Committee’s instructions. “Which means we have to get in and get out—fast.”
Dune grin-nodded, then turned to look at his friends in an I-told-you-she-was-cool sort of way.
And that gave Kristen the strength to continue playing alpha even though the position hadn’t officially been handed to her yet.
“There are five valves that control the sprinkler system. They are located to the right of the laundry room.” She pointed at the white woodshed about fifty yards away. “I’ll dump the color crystals in the water tank—on my cue, you turn the dials. And if all goes well”—Kristen paused for dramatic emphasis—“the
green
will be
pink
by morning.”
“Genius!” Dune punched the starry sky.
“Cool.” Tyler and Jax snickered.
Even Scooter allowed himself to smile. But Ripple ignored them all and kept texting.
“Why are you here if you’re not going to pay attention?” Kristen hissed in Ripple’s faux diamond–studded ear.
“My tutor-sitter was fired today and my dad is out.” She smirked.
Kristen summoned her love of Dune to stop herself from pulling his sister’s dry “before” hair out of her scalp.
The crunch of wheels on gravel sounded from the distance.
“Look, the guards,” Jax gasped, pointing his skull-ringed index figure at a black SUV.
Kristen’s heart started rattling around in her chest, but she took a deep, calming breath, flipped her watch to the LCD side, and set the timer. If she gave the cops four minutes to pass, they’d still have nine minutes to get the job done and six more for travel.
“Shhh. We’re fine,” Kristen whisper-hissed. According to the plan, it was totally doable.
They sat in total silence with nothing but the distant
whoosh
of passing cars and the sound of their heartbeats to keep them entertained.
“Let’s go,” Kristen said once the guards had passed. She lifted her heavy pack with a grunt. Without a word, Dune took it and strapped it to his back, like it was made of weightless fairy dust. Free of weight and full of love, Kristen led the way toward the club’s PRIVATE PROPERTY sign with the swift sprint of a seasoned soccer captain.
They all managed to scale the fence without a problem, except Ripple, who was faux-struggling, obviously hoping Jax would help her. But there was no time for games.
“Skye scales the fence into GAS all the time. It’s totally alpha,” Kristen whispered after landing on the other side. And before she knew it, Ripple was by her side.
As she led the way to the shed, the bottoms of Kristen’s feet throbbed from stepping on the chain link in her flats. But she didn’t care.
Love was supposed to hurt.
Kristen’s WC skeleton key (thank you, Einstein!) unlocked the shed door and earned her a round of supportive back pats from the boys. If happiness were bricks and stones, she’d have been the Great Wall of China.
The giant silver water tank was in the middle of the shed, humming and bubbling just like the WC had said it would be. But no one had warned her about the skunk smell, which for some reason she found embarrassing, even though she had nothing to do with it.
The gleaming sprinkler valves jetted out of the tank as if begging to be turned—begging to be used in a way they had never been used before. Begging to see what they were truly made of. And Kristen winked at them, as though they were old friends who, after all these years, still had everything in common.
“Okay, everyone grab a dial and I’ll—”
“You gotta get outta here!” a girl panted behind them.
Everyone turned to find Skye standing in the doorway, the full moon illuminating her pewter metallic bikini as if moonlight came free with purchase. A tangle of jewel-toned gauze scarves were tied around her long neck, drawing attention to her bone-deep tan and white blond curls. Her abs were more chiseled than Ashlee Simpson’s nose. She looked annoyingly airbrushed.
Kristen’s insides were jumping up and down shouting,
Whyyyy meeeeee?
But her thick skin kept the others from hearing it.
“Huh?” Jax stared at her shiny B-cups, looking slightly dazed.
“I was about to go for my midnight swim when I heard the guards on their walkie-talkies. You guys were spotted on the security cameras. They’re on their way!”
“What cameras?” Kristen challenged. The blueprints never showed any. . . .
Ripple nervously chewed the gloss off her lower lip as she discreetly slid her cell phone into the front pocket of her denim Roxy minidress.
“Do you want to obsess over cameras, or do you want me to get you out of here?”
“How awesome are you?” Dune asked Skye, dropping Kristen’s backpack in a corner.
“We can talk about
me
later,” Skye said in a totally self-obsessed serious way. “Follow me.”
The guys seemed more than happy to run behind Skye—after all, it was a free invitation to watch her dancer’s butt in a metallic bikini for fifty yards without being called out on it. Kristen, however, chose to speed-walk her way to safety, refusing to completely buy Skye’s story and double-refusing to accept that
Skye
would be crowned heroine of the night.
Ugh.
Kristen was surfing a wave of j-barf.
“Here they come,” Skye whisper-shouted. “There’s a break in the fence by that rock. We can fit under so they don’t see us hop the barrier.”
“Are you
sure
?” Kristen challenged, hoping to expose her as a fraud.
“How do you think I get in here every night?” the alpha whisper-shot back.
“Point!” Kristen could practically hear Alicia say.
Skye checked over her shoulder then lifted the torn metal like a curtain. “Non-members first,” she insisted with a sacrificing smile. “You’ll be in a lot more trouble than I will if you get caught.”
“How cool is she?” Jax mumbled to his boys as they belly-crawled through the dirt like soldiers at boot camp.
Kristen fake-coughed, hoping to drown out Dune’s response. It worked, but his brow-lift plus thumbs-up said it all.
Everyone but Skye and Kristen had made it through when they heard the stealth hum of a golf cart.
“Come awn!” urged the survivors from the safe side. “Hurry!”
Knowing this was her only chance to out alpha-Skye, Kristen did the honorable thing and took a step back.
“This was
my
mission,” she said loud enough to remind everyone. “If anyone goes down for this, it should be me. You go first.”
“But it’s
my
rescue, so
you
should go first!”
Circles of light danced around them like morbidly obese fireflies. “Who’s there?” called a security guard, frantically waving his flashlight.
“Hurry!” Kristen said. The bottoms of her feet were tingling, anxious to get moving. Anxious to show the others what years of soccer drills could do for a girl. “There’s time for both of us to make it if you go
now
,” she whisper-shouted. “Go.” She gently shoved Skye onto the ground and foot-nudged her toward the opening in the fence . . . not because she had dreamed of doing that from the moment they met. It was to save her, of course.
“Ow!” Skye whined, mostly for the sake of the boys, who were watching the mini catfight as if it were the Super Bowl.
The lights were getting closer and the jingle of keys was getting louder. “Stop!” shout-coughed a man who was fighting a losing battle with bronchitis.
Kristen was too afraid to turn around, but she could tell by the sound of his voice that she still had a few seconds before he could grab her arm or ID her face. She crouched down, preparing to crawl, but Skye was still under the fence. “Go!”
“I can’t,” Skye panicked. “My scarf is stuck.”
“Hurry!” Ripple called.
“Let’s go!” Dune urged.
“I’m trying,” Skye grunted.
Kristen frantically ran her hands along the metal diamonds, searching for the snag. “I don’t feel anything.”
“You
don’t
?” Skye’s devious smirk was suddenly illuminated by the security guard’s flashlight. “Ooops.” She slid under the fence like a greased sardine. “My bad.”
“What?!”
Kristen was about to accuse Skye of sabotage, but she was yanked to her feet with such force that the words fell out of her mouth and landed in the dirt. Just like the rest of her night.
THE GREGORYS’ CONDO
Wednesday, July 22
12:07 A.M.
Marsha Gregory yanked open the front door before Dwight, the security guard, had a chance to ring the bell. She was wearing a red paisley pajama set and beige Ugg slippers, and her mousy brown bob was pulled into a tiny ponytail. Her creamy skin was soft with night cream, making her hard green eyes look like two sharp rocks in an otherwise glistening stream.
“Who is
this
?” She glared at Dwight’s bushy mustache with contempt and pulled her daughter inside. “I thought you said you were sleeping at Ripple’s house? Why are you covered in mud? Where’s your bike? Is your scholarship in jeopardy?”
