Wicked Game (40 page)

The letter looks scribbled in haste, perhaps on a vertical surface, as the pen seems to have run out of ink a few times.

Ciara
,

First, I never intended to betray you. In fact, my alliance with Gideon was probably all that prevented your death at his hands. But I’m sorry for the lies. Every one of them.

They’ll catch me soon, if they can. I’ll go back to jail, perhaps for the rest of my life. In that event, please, please come see me. Forgive me.

Those last two sentences are underlined so hard the pen poked holes in the paper. My rib cage seems to constrict. The rest of the words are barely legible.

When you were younger, I told you about our family curse. I said it was salesmanship, that we could make anyone buy what we offered and beg us for more. It was meant as a joke, since the power of persuasion is usually a coveted gift.

But every gift is a curse in disguise. Because eventually we run out of suckers, and the only fools left are the people we love.

He must not have had time to sign it. It’s folded unevenly and wrinkled from being crammed in the envelope.

I hand the letter to Shane and rest my forehead in my hands while he reads.

When he finishes, he says, “You’re not like him.”

I look at him from the corner of my eye. “Remember when you said you wanted to peel back all my layers until you found the real Ciara?”

“On Lori’s boss’s desk. I remember.”

I lift my head. “Have you ever thought, if you got past all those layers, you might not want me anymore?”

“How do you know I haven’t already found the real you?”

“Trust me, you haven’t.” I take a deep breath and let it out. “But you’re about to.”

I reach in my back pocket and pull out another envelope. I hand it to him in exchange for Dad’s letter. He gives me a quizzical look as he opens it and withdraws the pink Skywave check.

$10,000,000.00.

I hold my breath as Shane stares at it.

“No ...” He shakes his head. There’s no triumph of cynicism on his face. His eyes fill with nothing but hurt and bewilderment, and that tells me everything. He believed in me until now.

His voice is nearly a whisper. “David said you tore up the check at the meeting.”

“I did tear up a check. I had Travis’s paycheck in my purse, along with his expired license—evidence of Skywave’s spying in case we needed them to back off. I switched the checks when Jolene came in.” From my
purse I pull the last envelope, full of crumpled paper. “I tore up a check for eight hundred forty-six dollars and fifty cents.”

He stares at the ten million dollars for a long moment, then shoves it into my hand. “Go. I won’t tell anyone.” He sets his elbows on his knees, not facing me. “And I don’t want a cut in exchange for my silence.”

“Shane . . . that’s not why I showed you.”

He turns back, his gaze intense. “I can’t go with you. I can’t fly, I can’t even chance a boat. We could get an inside cabin with no windows, but ships sometimes run fire drills in the daytime.”

“If I could take you, I’d go—”

“And I’d just slow you down.”

“—but I can’t, so I won’t.”

“You deserve a new life.” He stops. “Wait—won’t what?”

“Go.”

His eyes narrow. “You’d give up ten million dollars and a new life just for me?”

“Not just for you. I’m staying for my job, for the station and that whole dysfunctional family that makes the Munsters look like the Cleavers.” I hold up my dad’s letter. “Most of all, I’m staying for me.”

“Just tell me one thing.” His solemn voice chills me. “Did you plan all along to cheat us?”

I let out a deep breath. “No—except maybe in poker, just a little. For the big stuff, I was always on your side. I didn’t even know they were going to give me a check at the meeting. But once it was in my hands, some terrible, evil part of me couldn’t let it go.”

“That part of you isn’t evil. That part’s a conniver, but
it’s what saved the station.” He takes my hand. “That part is why I love you.”

My mouth drops open, and I forget how to breathe.

“It’s not the only reason, of course,” he says. “I also love the part of you that takes pity on stray dogs, and the part that makes my body feel like spontaneously combusting— in a good way, I mean.”

I take his face between my hands and try to tell him with my eyes what it means that he loves me
because
of who I am, not in spite of it. In case the eyes aren’t enough, I add the three words themselves, in alphabetical order, whispered between kisses and ragged breaths, repeated until they no longer sound strange coming from my mouth.

Shane wraps his arms around me. My skin feels raw and exposed, even under my clothes. I flinch, and his touch softens in response, hands gliding up my back, over the unbitten side of my neck, to my face, caressing me like I’m made of silk.

“Come on.” He stands and helps me up. Unlike my knees, my brain feels strong and clear. As we ascend the stairway, I know what I have to do.

I stop at the doorway to my bedroom while he moves inside.

“You wanted to hear my last ‘last song’ for you,” he says, “the one I played while you were at Gideon’s.” He goes to my shelves, blocking them with his body so I can’t see which CD he pulls out. After a rattle of plastic, he taps the play button.

Applause, then a soft voice. “Good evening. This is off our first record.”

The opening acoustic chords of “About a Girl” rumble
forth, the first song we listened to together—before he bit me and I hit him. I laugh, having never been so uplifted at the sound of Nirvana.

He walks back to me, an ironic smile on his lips. “Did you expect something sappy just because you were in mortal danger?”

“Come with me.” Carrying the check and my father’s letter, I lead him into the bathroom. I pick up the matches lying next to the strawberry-scented candle.

“No.” He takes Dad’s note and tucks it into his shirt pocket. “Someday you’ll wish you had this.”

I nod, wondering if someday I’ll hate it when he’s right.

I open the matchbook. Sweat makes my hands slippery, and even the rough cardboard of the match is hard to hold, but I manage to light it.

I place the check in the dry sink and find myself unable to continue. Flame eats the flimsy cardboard stick, traveling down the shaft of the match so quickly it burns my fingers and falls smoldering on the edge of the sink. Shane waits.

The second match lights more easily. My hands are steady now, so steady they freeze when it’s time to drop the match onto the check. I light the candle instead and stare at the trail of zeroes.

“It’s freedom,” I say to Shane’s reflection. “The con to end all cons. With ten million dollars I could afford to be a good person for the rest of my life.”

One side of his face crinkles into a smirk. “Fortunately, it costs nothing to be bad, and you’re better at that.” His fingertips brush the back of my shoulder. “Cut the drama and just burn the thing.”

“Okay, okay.” As the song heads into the last chorus, I
light the third match off the candle’s flame and pick up the check in my other hand.

I feel on the verge of a freedom even ten million dollars can’t buy. Who knows? Maybe only negative ten million dollars can buy it. A small price to beat a curse.

Match meets paper, which flares the colors of a sunrise. The crowd cheers again.

Visit the vampire DJs, listen to VMP playlists, and get your own Lifeblood of Rock ‘n’ Roll merchandise at
www.WVMPradio.com
. For the vamps’ secret stories of how they were turned, check out
www.jerismithready.com
.

Read on for a sneak peek at

the thrilling sequel to WICKED GAME.
Available everywhere in May 2009!

The things I believe in can be counted on one hand—even if that hand were two-fifths occupied with, say, smoking a cigarette, or making a bunny for a shadow puppet show, or forming “devil horns” at a heavy metal concert. The things I believe in boil down to three major categories:

Rock ’n’ roll

Vampires

A damn good pair of shoes

Number Two came about when one bit me, in the middle of what could non-skankily be called an “intimate encounter.” The third came later, when I gained the identity and thus the bank account of my dead-undead-dead boss Elizabeth Vasser, owner of WVMP, The Lifeblood of Rock ’n’ Roll.

I’m two people only on paper. In real life, I’m just Ciara Griffin, underpaid marketing manager and not-paid miracle worker for a vampire radio station.

On nights like this, marketing is a miracle in itself.

The Smoking Pig is packed with fans who chose to spend Halloween Eve—aka Hell Night, Mischief Night, or Tuesday—in a bar with their favorite DJs, the ones who whisk them through time into another era, and into a world where vampires just might exist.

I lean back against the brass bar rail to avoid getting trampled by a couple dressed as Marilyn Monroe and Marilyn Manson. The guy in the Monroe costume can’t be more than twenty-one, but he’s twisting to a fifty-year-old tune with as much enthusiasm as his grandfather probably did.

Above me, the station’s long black banner hangs on one of the rustic pub’s long wooden crossbeams. Draped with fake cobwebs, it features our trademark logo, an electric guitar with two bleeding fang marks.

The two Marilyns jostle me again, and I reach up to check the status of my mile-high ponytail. Wearing a short floral dress as twenty percent of the Go-Go’s (the Belinda Carlisle percent), I’m glad the crowd provides plenty of heat. October in Maryland shows no mercy to beach wear.

“Excuse me,” shouts a voice to my left, straining to be heard over Jerry Lee Lewis’s slammin’ piano.

I peer over rosy-lensed sunglasses at a young man about my age and height—mid-twenties, five-eightish, with a lanky frame verging on heroin-chic thin.

“The bartender said I should speak to you,” he says.

I examine his swooping bleach blond hair, skinny jeans, and faded Weezer T-shirt. The smudged black guyliner makes his hazel eyes pop out behind a pair of round glasses.

“Billy Idol meets Harry Potter. I like it.”

He puts a hand to his ear. “What?”

“Your costume,” I shout, my voice already raw after only an hour of this party.

He gives a twitchy frown and shifts the messenger bag slung over his left shoulder. “I’m Jeremy Glaser, a journalism grad student at University of Maryland. I came up to do a story on your station.”

Oops. I guess it’s not a costume.

Jeremy extends a heavily tattooed arm toward the rear wall of the Smoking Pig, away from the stage and the speakers. “Can we talk?”

I reach back to the bar for my ginger ale. “Interviews by appointment only. Give me your e-mail and—”

“It’s a freelance assignment for
Rolling Stone
.”

My glass slips, and I spill soda down my arm. “Whoa!” I shake the liquid off my hand and grab a bar napkin. “I mean, wow.”

He gestures for me to join him at the back of the Pig. This time I don’t hesitate.

We push through the crowd toward a dark corner, my espadrilles sticking in the booze puddles. I take the opportunity to rein in my galloping ambition and figure out how to play my hand.

Why didn’t this guy call ahead? Either he’s an impos-ter (always my first guess, due to my own former occupation), or he’s committing journalistic ambush to see if we’ll embarrass ourselves.

“So what’s the angle?” I ask him over my shoulder.

“The first issue of the new year will focus on the death of independent radio.” He turns to me as we reach the back wall. “You guys are putting up a valiant battle against the inevitable.”

“Thanks. I guess.” I hand him my business card. “Ciara Griffin, marketing and promotions manager.”

“I know who you are.” He examines my card in the light of a dancing skeleton lantern, then jots a note under my name.
“&er-ah,”
he mumbles, noting the correct pronunciation.

I keep my smile sweet. “Could I take a peek at your credentials?”

He pulls a handful of folded paper from his bag’s outside pocket. “The one with the letterhead is the assignment from
Rolling Stone
editorial. The other pages are e-mails discussing the nature of the story.”

I angle the paper to the light. “How does a journalism student snag such a major gig?”

“My professor has a connection.” He adjusts his glasses with his middle finger. “Also, I can be pushy.”

“I like pushy.” I hand him back the papers. “In fact, I’d like to buy pushy a drink.”

My best friend Lori swoops by with a trayful of empty glasses and “horrors d’oeuvres” plates. I reach out to stop her—gently, due to her momentum and the breakable items. She’s dressed as another twenty percent of the Go-Go’s, a small black Jane Wiedlin wig covering her white-blonde hair.

“Hey, Ciara.” She sends her words to me but aims her perky smile at Jeremy.

“Lori, I know you’re busy, but can you get this gentleman from
Rolling Stone”
—I emphasize the last two words— “whatever he’d like to drink? Bill it to the station.”

“I can’t accept,” he says, impervious to her cute. “Conflict of interest.”

“Put it on my personal tab,” I tell her. “A drink between new friends.”

She beams at him. “There’s a dollar-a-pint Halloween special on our dark microbrew.”

He hesitates. “Do you have any absinthe?”

“Um, I’ll check.” Lori tries not to laugh as she looks at me. “Another ginger ale?”

“Definitely.”

Lori winks before walking away. She knows I always stay more sober than my marks.

I take the last sip of my flat soda to wet my drying mouth. Dealing with the press is usually the jurisdiction of my immediate boss, Franklin, the sales and publicity director. Despite great effort, he’s never raised the interest of a national publication, much less
Rolling Stone
. And now they’ve fallen in our laps, waiting for me to fill them with fascination.