And the Oodles owners made sure to cater to their powerful clientele by carrying a wide selection of spandex, boots, capes, and masks, all in a variety of neon, sequined, and pastel prints, colors, and patterns. The Oodles owners knew that heroes and villains had cash to spend just like everyone one else and having them in the store attracted even more customers. Folks like those in Slaves for Superhero Sex, a group devoted to scoring with the city’s various heroes and villains, even if they had to put themselves in ridiculously dangerous situations to get noticed.
Yes, superheroes and ubervillains were a common sight at Oodles, but that didn’t mean people didn’t notice me as I walked deeper into the store.
“Hey, look! It’s Karma Girl!” someone said.
Murmurs and excited whispers rippled through the throngs of holiday shoppers, and it took me a second to realize they were actually talking about me. I’m still not used to everything about this superhero gig, especially strolling around in skintight silver spandex for everyone to see. Let’s just say that I’ve started paying a lot more attention to my diet and exercise routines since I’ve become Karma Girl. Not that it helped much, especially when Sam kept getting barbecue flown in from this restaurant called the Pork Pit down in Ashland, but a girl had to try.
I stopped a minute, struck a pose, and let everyone who wanted to snap a few photos with their cell phones. It didn’t take long, because I wasn’t nearly as popular as Fiona was as Fiera. The fanboys absolutely loved her long blond hair and big blue eyes, not to mention the oh so impressive way she filled out her costume. Me? Well, let’s just say my physique isn’t nearly as pinup-worthy as Fiera’s.
Once I’d smiled for the cameras, I walked to the center of the first floor, where the toy drive had been set up. From the photos Henry had shown me, I’d expected a simple bin crammed full of toys—but it was so much more.
A series of glass and metal balconies in this part of the store let shoppers on the upper floors look all the way down to the first level. A massive metal Christmas tree had been erected in the middle of the open-air space, stretching all the way up to the store’s top floor. But it wasn’t your traditional Christmas tree, because instead of ornaments, toys dangled from its many branches.
Trucks, cars, model tanks, board games, baseballs, miniature tea sets, coloring books, action figures, chemistry kits, bikes, skateboards—all that and more had been hung on the tree. Mixed in with the toys, I saw some of the clothes that Fiona and Bella had donated. Underneath the tree, Chief Newman’s boxes of food and school supplies had been wrapped in bright paper and stuffed into red Santa sacks. Sparkling red and silver velvet ribbons had been wound through the toys, tightly securing them to the tree, and crystal stars shimmered here and there on the branches. Another, larger star topped the tree, sending out sparks of rainbow color in every direction. All put together, it was one of the most dazzling displays I’d ever seen.
My breath caught in my throat in wonderment, and for a moment, I felt like a kid again, giddy with excitement about what might be under the Christmas tree or hidden in my stocking.
“Pretty cool, huh?” a soft, feminine voice murmured.
I turned to find Abby Appleby standing beside me. Abby was a pretty woman, with brown hair and pale green eyes. She also was an event planner known throughout Bigtime for her ability to get things done—no matter what.
I liked Abby. She planned lots of the society events that I covered for The Exposé, and I found her to be smart and funny, if a little tightly wound. According to Henry, Abby had been hired to plan the toy drive this year, and it was on track to be the biggest success ever, thanks to her tireless efforts.
“I thought we’d do something special with the toys this year, instead of just piling them on top of each other or wrapping them up and hiding them from sight,” Abby said. “This way, everyone can enjoy them, especially the kids when they come into the store in the morning.”
My eyes traced over the tree again, and I realized that it had to be made out of solidium to support the weight of all the toys, clothes, and other items. The metal glistened underneath the red, green, and silver holiday lights wrapped around the branches.
I shook my head. “It’s amazing. Absolutely amazing. You’ve outdone yourself again, Abby.”
She frowned a little. As Abby and Carmen, we were friends, and I realized that I’d spoken to her that way instead of being the mysterious hero with the supersecret identity. She looked at me a second longer, obviously wondering at the familiar tone in my voice, but shrugged it off. Abby was used to dealing with superheroes and their quirks at the events she planned. Besides, she knew as well as I did that more than one well-to-do businesswoman on the society circuit moonlighted as a hero or villain in her spare time.
Abby pulled a cell phone out of one of the pockets on the khaki mesh vest she wore over her green sweater and black pants. She tapped a few buttons on her phone. “And you are right on schedule. I like that about you, Karma Girl. I’m glad you’re here tonight and not Fiera. She’s never on time for anything, and she always ends up melting something before the event is over. Her temper’s as fiery as her fists.”
I hid a grin at Abby’s rather apt description of Fiona.
“Anyway, I’m out of here for the night,” Abby said. “We’re locking the doors in five minutes. I don’t think you’ll have any problems, but you never know. Obviously, you can take care of yourself, and of course you can always call in the other members of the Fearless Five if anything happens.”
“Of course,” I murmured.
I didn’t tell Abby that everyone else was busy tonight. Sam was away on business, Fiona was spending some time with the Bullucis, and Henry and the chief were doing their sweep of the city. Besides, I didn’t plan on contacting the others unless I absolutely had to. I didn’t want to give Fiona any more excuses to keep ribbing me about being a rookie superhero, and calling in the crime-fighting cavalry on Christmas Eve would give her ammunition for weeks. I might be relatively new at this superhero gig, having only been wearing my silver spandex a little more than a year, but I still had my pride.
“Don’t worry,” I said in my most confident, earnest, sincere, authoritative superhero voice. “I’ll take care of the toys. I want those kids to have a great Christmas just as much as you do.”
Abby nodded, satisfied. She gave me a final smile then strolled down the store’s center aisle, heading for the front doors.
My eyes swept over the tree one more time, enjoying the colors and lights, before I started walking a slow circuit around the entire display.
Time to go to work.
#
The next half hour passed uneventfully. An announcement was made that the store was closing for the night, and all the shoppers drifted toward the exits. The security guards escorted everyone outside, then locked the doors and left as well. Normally, a few guards would stay behind in the store, but the owners had decided to give them the night off because I was here. What did you need with guys with guns when there was a real, live superhero on the premises?
Actually, I’d probably take the guys with the guns myself. Guns almost always worked the way that they were supposed to, whereas superpowers had a tendency to go on the fritz.
Either way, it looked like I was in for a long, silent night locked in the store by myself, with only the twinkling lights of the toy tree brightening the scene. Still, I couldn’t help but feel uneasy. My inner voice, the one I always listened to, was whispering to me. I just couldn’t quite figure out what it was saying—or what kind of trouble might appear before the night was through.
My inner voice was part of my powers as an empath, my ability to tune into the emotions and feelings of others and sense their thoughts and future actions. All my life, I’d had these little twinges, vibes really, about things that were going to happen, sort of like knowing who was on the other end of a ringing phone before you ever picked it up.
According to Chief Newman, I’d always had a
bit of a latent talent, but the radioactive goo—the freezeterium—that Malefica had dumped me into last year had cracked open that part of my brain and amplified the ability a hundred thousand times over. Now, not only could I sense other people’s emotions, but I could actually see the psychic energy that surrounded them—and tap into that power and use it anyway I wanted.
As Karma Girl, I basically squinted at ubervillains until I saw the colorful waves of energy radiating from their bodies. Then I could mentally reach out and grab that energy, and use the villains’ own powers against them. That’s how I’d defeated Malefica, along with Frost and Scorpion, the other members of the Terrible Triad. Maybe my power wasn’t quite as photogenic and impressive as Fiera’s fists continually bursting into flames, but it worked for me—
A faint tap-tap-tapping sound snapped me out of my thoughts.
My breath caught in my throat, and my heart leaped up into my chest. What the hell was that? I glanced at the tree, wondering if perhaps one of the toys had come loose, hit the floor, and was rolling around.
But there was nothing there. No toys, no clothes, nothing on the floor except the presents sitting in their sacks ready to be handed out in the morning.
The tap-tap-tapping came again—low, slow, and steady—and I knew I wasn’t alone.
I immediately reached for my empathic ability and scanned the area near the toy tree, turning in a slow circle and looking for the waves of psychic energy that would tell me someone was near—and exactly where he was.
But I didn’t see any waves—no blacks, no reds, no blues, no greens. There was simply too much stuff in the department store for me to easily zoom in on the mystery person’s location.
So I decided to go about things the old-fashioned way. I closed my eyes and listened—really listened—to the tapping, trying to determine exactly where the sound was coming from. Then, I opened my eyes, slid into the shadows cast out by the racks of clothes, and headed in that direction.
I crept through the clothes, careful not to brush them as I passed. Up head, the tap-tap-tapping grew louder, and I spotted a figure weaving through the glass makeup counters. I picked up my pace, moving at an angle and getting ahead of the figure. I stopped beside the last makeup counter and slid behind an oversized, smiling cardboard cutout of Swifte, Bigtime’s speediest and most flamboyant superhero. Apparently, Swifte had come out with his own cologne just in time for the holidays—Eau de Swifte.
The cardboard cutout had been spritzed with the cologne, which smelled fresh, like pine needles mixed with a faint citrus note. It made my nose twitch, but it was far more restrained than what I’d expected, given Swifte’s boisterous, showboat nature and rampant love of publicity. I shook my head, held back a sneeze, and focused.
My plan was simple. As soon as the mystery figure walked by my hiding spot, I’d sucker-punch whoever it was, grab her psychic energy, and use it against her. When I had the ubervillain secure, I’d fish my cell phone out of my boot and call the cops to come haul the evildoer off to jail.
I let out a breath and flexed my gloved fingers a few times, before curling them into a tight fist. I didn’t have superstrength like Fiera did, but I’d been working out, and I could throw a punch when necessary. Besides, the element of surprise was the key thing here. You could take almost anyone down—superhero and ubervillain alike—as long as you had that.
The tap-tap-tapping grew louder. I frowned, and my inner voice chattered at me again, but not in warning this time. No, for some reason, that sound seemed … familiar to me now.
But I didn’t have time to figure out where I’d heard it before, because a shadow appeared on the floor, creeping closer and closer to me as the mystery figure neared my location. I sucked in a breath, drew back my fist, and got ready to strike—
A second later, a woman stepped into view—one I recognized.
High-end, Fiona Fine jeans and a red pullover made by Bella Bulluci covered her slender body. She also sported colorful streaks in her black, spiky hair. Normally, the streaks were blue, but she’d dyed them red back during Thanksgiving in honor of the holiday season.
I was so shocked by her appearance that I just stood there, mouth open and fist hovering in mid-air.
She must have sensed me hiding there, waiting to punch her, because she glanced over at me, cursed, and stumbled back in surprise. Her feet got tangled up in her cane, which slipped out of her hand, and she barely managed to grab one of the makeup counters and catch herself before she hit the floor. The backpack that she’d had looped over one shoulder fell off and went sliding across the floor, along with her cane.
I stepped out from behind the perfumed Swifte cutout and stared at the woman in front of me. Why was she here? More importantly, how had she gotten into the store past all the security?
Lulu Lo looked up and gave me a sheepish grin. “Hi, there, Sister Carmen.”
#
“Lulu?” I asked. “What are you doing here?”
Lulu grinned, her dark eyes gleaming in her face. “Why, backing you up, Sister Carmen. Henry told me you were on toy duty tonight, so I thought I’d come by and keep you company.”
I just stared at her, my mouth still open. Some superhero I was—I’d almost punched one of my best friends.
Because she was a computer whiz, hacker, and all-around information trader, Lulu knew everyone who was anyone in Bigtime—especially when it came to things that weren’t exactly on the up-and-up. She used to slip me information about Bigtime’s heroes, villains, and various criminals in exchange for my writing newspaper articles on Yee-Haw!, a therapeutic riding center that she helped fund.
These days, Lulu was one of the people who knew that I was really Karma Girl. She also knew the identities of the other members of the Fearless Five, because she was engaged to Henry. Lulu might not have a superpower, but she’d helped us with her tech skills more than once when we were chasing down the latest, greatest ubervillain.
“Um, a little help here, please?” Lulu asked, struggling to pull herself up onto her feet.
I snapped out of my daze. “Sure. Let me.”
I put my arm under Lulu’s shoulder and helped her stand. Then, I bent over and picked up the cane she’d dropped and handed it to her.
“Thanks,” Lulu said. “I’ll be glad when I can get around without using this thing. Although I can’t complain too much. I’m doing better now than I was this time last year.”
Lulu had once been caught in a battle between the Fearless Five and the Terrible Triad, and she’d been paralyzed as a result and forced to use a wheelchair. Then, earlier this year, Lulu had been in the middle of another battle. Only this time, she’d been struck by a massive energy ball, thanks to an ubervillain named Siren. Lulu’s heart stopped, and she’d almost died, but the electricity had actually done some good in the end because it had kick started all of the dead nerves in Lulu’s spine.
Since then, Lulu had been undergoing physical therapy with the goal of walking on her own—and she was slowly getting there. I was happy for my friend and all that she’d accomplished. In her own way, Lulu was tougher than any hero or villain.
I offered to help Lulu, but she insisted on walking over to the toy tree by herself. Still, I picked up the backpack she’d dropped and carried it, despite her protests that she could get it herself.
We stood there in front of the tree, staring at all of the toys, lights, presents, and ribbons, and Lulu let out a low whistle.
“Damn,” she said. “I never had a Christmas tree like that when I was younger. Makes me wish I was a kid again.”
I grinned. “Me too.”
I grabbed a couple of chairs from a nearby lawn furniture display and dragged them over to the tree so we could sit there in comfort. Lulu unzipped her backpack and pulled out a solidium thermos and two cups. She unscrewed the top of the thermos, and the rich smell of hot chocolate filled the air.
“Hot chocolate?” she asked. “I even brought those mini marshmallows shaped like t
he F5 insignia you like so much.”
My grin widened. “You’d better believe it.”
Lulu fixed us both a cup of the steaming hot chocolate, which she’d generously laced with a delicious raspberry syrup. I held the cup in my hands, just letting the warm, sweet aroma fill my lungs. We sat there in companionable silence for several minutes, sipping our sugary treat and enjoying the way the gleaming lights cast out a kaleidoscope of colors and star-shaped shadows everywhere.
“So you want to tell me how you got past the store’s security system?” I finally asked. “Because apparently, it’s not as foolproof as it’s supposed to be.”
Lulu shrugged. “It was easy. All I had to do was hack into the store’s security network and tell the system to unlock one of the side doors. Nothing to it.”
I raised my eyebrows and looked at her.
Lulu sighed. “But I was a good girl. I made sure the door was locked and shut behind me, and I reset the security network while I was at it. I think that’s enough to get me on Santa’s nice list this year. Besides, we don’t want any ubervillains crashing our holiday party and making off with the tree, now do we?”
“No, we don’t,” I said.
Once again, my little voice murmured in the back of my mind, and I didn’t know why. Everything was still and quiet, and there hadn’t been so much as a whisper of trouble so far, except for Lulu sneaking inside the store and scaring me half to death.
So why did I feel like we weren’t alone? And that the worst was yet to come?
We sat there sipping our hot chocolate and talking for a while, but eventually, Lulu got up and started wandering around the first floor, saying she wanted to see what was left on the racks for the after-Christmas sale. I got to my feet as well. It was almost midnight now, which meant it was time for me to do a walk-through of the store.