“How do you know?” Ivy asked. “Did they leave a note with the vamp adoption agency or something?”
Her dad threw his hands in the air. “No, of course not.” He started rummaging around in the fridge.
“And you never found out anything about them?” Ivy pressed.
Her dad closed the fridge without taking anything out and turned back to Ivy. “I received nothing but your name, your place and date of birth, and your ring.” He smiled and gave Ivy a hug. “But no matter. You yourself are all that matters—not your parents. You must look to the future, my Ivy—”
“Not back to the past,” Ivy finished for him, rolling her eyes. “You always say that!”
“I say it,” he said gently, “because it is true.” And with that, he picked up his newspaper and walked out of the room.
But it’s not true for me anymore, Ivy thought as she leaned against the counter. I want to know more—not just for my sake but for my sister’s. She had no choice but to see what she could find out on her own.
At the beginning of lunch period, Olivia bounced into the school’s editing suite and sank onto a swivel chair in front of a button-packed console. She and Camilla had reserved the suite so that they could record the voice-over for their documentary. As she waited for her friend to arrive, Olivia pulled out the script they’d written and quietly started rehearsing her lines—she was going to play Great-aunt Edna.
“My dear duke,” she whispered. Suddenly, the room’s loudspeaker crackled to life. “OLIVIA ABBOTT,” boomed a computerized voice. “I COMMAND YOU TO TELL ME THE DEEP, DARK SECRET OF FRANKLIN GROVE!” Startled, Olivia leaped to her feet. “OR ELSE!” the voice finished.
Olivia peered around, confused and a little frightened. What is this, some weird Serena Star interrogation tactic? she wondered.
Suddenly, a slim door in the corner of the room flew open, and Camilla stuck her blond curly head around it. “Is this place neat or what?” she grinned. Behind her Olivia could see a tiny gray room with padded walls and a microphone hanging from the ceiling. Hers was the voice Olivia had heard.
Olivia flopped back into her chair. “You scared the living daylights out of me!” she wailed.
“Sorry,” said Camilla mischievously. “So”— she grabbed the script from Olivia’s hand—“have you figured out who’s going to play the duke?”
“I asked Brendan Daniels, Ivy’s boyfriend,” Olivia answered.
Camilla looked pleased. “He’s perfect.”
“Unfortunately,” Olivia went on, “he can’t do it. He has band practice right now.”
“Oh,” Camilla said disappointedly.
“Maybe we can grab someone else,” Olivia said, rising from her chair and sticking her head out into the hallway. There weren’t many people around, but then she spotted her sister, trudging along, looking totally ticked off about something. Olivia caught her eye and waved her over.
“Hey,” Olivia said. “What’s wrong?”
“What’s wrong,” growled Ivy in a low voice, “is that I’m fed up with having that bloodhound Toby Decker on my trail! All I’ve wanted to do all morning is call the vamp adoption agency, but I can’t do that with him watching me all the time.”
Olivia scanned the hallway over her sister’s shoulder and spotted Toby peeking out from behind someone’s open locker door. Today he was wearing a striped tie. From a distance, he almost looked like an old-fashioned aristocrat instead of a slightly dorky eighth-grader.
“I have an idea,” Olivia sang, straightening her sparkly pink top and gently pushing past her sister.
Toby noticed Olivia approaching and stepped out from behind the locker door. He smoothed his hair back with his hand.
“Hi, Toby!” Olivia said. “What are you up to?”
Toby blushed. “Oh, you know. Nothing, really.”
Olivia widened her eyes and flashed Toby her biggest smile. “That is so exactly what I was hoping you were going to say. Come on!” She linked her arm through his and started leading him toward the editing room.
“B-but—” Toby stammered, his eyes scanning the halls for Ivy.
“No buts!” Olivia said. “You’re just the man I need!”
“I am?” Toby croaked.
“You are.” Olivia confirmed, giving his arm a squeeze. “Camilla and I are making a movie for media studies, and we’ve been looking everywhere for the right guy to play the dashing duke!” As she pushed Toby through the editing suite door, Olivia looked over her shoulder and winked at Ivy, who was lurking in a doorway across the hall. “He was just perfect,” Olivia told her sister later that day. “He’s got a nice voice and he even put on an Italian accent. ‘Edna, bella,’ ” Olivia imitated, clutching her heart, “ ‘I cannot live without you.’ ”
Ivy laughed so hard, black mascara tears streamed down her cheeks. “Olivia,” she gasped, dabbing at them with the sleeve of her black crocheted sweater, “you seriously suck.” Which Olivia knew was like the biggest compliment a vampire could give.
“Don’t I?” Olivia grinned.
“It was like being freed from prison,” Ivy said giddily as the bell rang for the start of science class. “I had the whole lunch period to myself! He did track me down again after English, though.”
“Did you book an appointment with the adoption agency?” Olivia asked hopefully.
Ivy nodded. “I’m going after school.”
There was a flutter in Olivia’s stomach. Maybe today’s the day I’ll finally learn something about my parents, she thought.
As Mr. Strain started writing instructions for the day’s chemistry experiment on the board, Ivy said, “There’s just one thing.” Olivia looked at her expectantly. “I need you to help me lose Toby again.”
Olivia understood right away what her sister had in mind. It seemed like ages since she and Ivy had traded clothes and swapped places, but it was so much fun. A smile spread across her face.
“We’ll switch!” they whispered together, as if on cue—which promptly set them both off in another laughing fit.
“Ladies,” said Mr. Strain sternly from the front of the room. “Is there something humorous about oxygenation?”