Belle of the Brawl Read Free Page A

the Hillary Clintons on the other. She flashed her housemate a tight smile and moved closer.
    “Where are the rest of the Jackie O’s?” Skye asked, still trying to catch her breath.
    AJ pointed an unmanicured finger toward the other side of the round stage. Charlie and Allie both wave-pointed at a seat they’d saved for her. Skye smiled, wiping a cool trickle of dance-sweat from her temple.
    “Thanks,” Skye muttered to AJ. She sashayed across the round stage to join her friends, flipping her white-blond wavelets over her shoulder. “See ya.”
    “There’s no law that we have to sit with our houses,” AJ called after her, but Skye rolled her eyes and kept walking, pretending not to hear. Instead, she waved to Allie, who looked a little teary sitting next to Charlie and Thalia. Poor Allie. Why couldn’t AJ just let the drama die already? Skye flashed Allie a reassuring smile, then plopped into the seat next to Charlie, folding her leg warmer–clad calves to one side of her seat and leaning in to whisper to her housemates.
    “Sooo… What’d I miss? Why are we here?” She sent a stealth sideways glance at the back row for a brief Brazille-brothers assessment before returning to her fellow O’s. But she wasn’t sneaky enough, because Sydney—Shira’s most sensitive son—flashed her a desperate smile. Skye turned away and picked a tuft of imaginary lint from her champagne-colored dance skirt.
    “Good question.” Charlie shrugged, her mocha-brown eyes twinkling under her bangs. “Shira hasn’t yelled at us in seventy-two hours?”
    For the last seventy-two hours, Skye had been in dance overdrive, logging twelve-hour solo dance days with only the holographic playback machine to keep her company. Ever since Shira had called her into her office last week for a little pep talk wrapped around a death threat, Skye had been a dancing machine. Partly, she wanted to improve her moves and impress the bossy Aussie, but mainly, Skye had made a deal with the she-devil: If Skye broke Syd’s heart, Shira would break Skye’s enrollment at Alpha Academy.
    But Syd’s heart was made of fine china that cracked and fissured with every beat. He was walking PMS, and to make matters worse, Skye’s heart insisted on beating loudly for a different Brazille brother—Taz. Skye had tried to force her heart to follow orders, but loving Syd was something she just couldn’t do.
    And those who can’t do, hide.
    As Skye curled up in her chair and tried to ignore Syd’s eyes drilling hearts into her back, a silence fell over the room. The circular stage slid open silently to reveal Shira Brazille. The mogul’s head slowly rose up from the stage,starting with her kinky auburn curls piled high atop her crown and followed by her ubiquitous round sunglasses that hid her ice-blue eyes from view. Next came her yoga-toned shoulders—one bare, one covered with brightly patterned fabric, then finally the rest of her, clad in a flowing Pucci patio dress. Balancing atop a BRAZILLE INDUSTRIES –emblazoned white hoverdisc, Shira floated in midair a few inches above the closing hatch of the stage.
    “Hello, m’dears,” Shira boomed, her red lips widening into a TV-ready smile.
    “For once, none of us is in danger,” Charlie whispered, leaning in so Allie and Skye could hear.
    Depends what you mean by danger.
Skye did a few calming neck-rolls and waited for Shira to go on.
    “First off, I’d like Singh Rootlieb and Saylene Davenport to take the stage.” The room erupted in whispers as two girls stood up. Both of them wore sunglasses. Alphas in each row took out their aPods and aimed them at the petite Indian from the Virginia Woolf house and the broad-shouldered Texan from the Tyra house. Dozens of muffled bleeps meant girls were downloading personal data using the aPod Alpha Bios app.
    “They’re both IM’s!” Charlie whispered as Singh and Saylene took the stage.
    “What’s with the shades?” Allie whispered. Charlie