Alphas #1

  Copyright

  Copyright © 2009 by Alloy Entertainment

  All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

  “When I Grow Up,” by Rodney Jerkins, James Stanley MacCarty, Smith Paul Granville Samwell, Theron Makiel Thomas, Timothy Jamahli Thomas (Rodney Jerkins Productions, Inc., Glenwood Music Corporation/EMI Music Publishing, Inc., Universal Music Corporation).

  All rights reserved.

  Poppy

  Little, Brown and Company

  Hachette Book Group

  237 Park Avenue, New York, NY 10017

  Visit our website at www.HachetteBookGroup.com.

  www.twitter.com/littlebrown

  First eBook Edition: August 2009

  Poppy is an imprint of Little, Brown and Company

  The Poppy name and logo are trademarks of Hachette Book Group, Inc.

  ISBN: 978-0-316-07132-1

  The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  Contents

  COPYRIGHT

  CLIQUE NOVELS BY LISI HARRISON

  ALPHA ACADEMY

  1: WESTCHESTER, NY BODY ALIVE DANCE STUDIO THURSDAY, JULY 22ND 11:37 A.M.

  2: SOMEWHERE OVER THE MOJAVE DESERT ALPHA JET SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 5TH 9:24 A.M.

  3: ALPHA ACADEMY JETWAY SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 5TH 11:43 A.M.

  4: ALPHA ACADEMY BUBBLE TRAIN SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 5TH 12:18 P.M.

  5: ALPHA ACADEMY BEE’S FORMER SUITE SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 5TH 1:13 P.M.

  6: THE PAVILION AMBROSIA BANQUET HALL SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 5TH 6:30 P.M.

  7: SOMEWHERE ON ALPHA ISLAND THE ROAD TO ADONISVILLE SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 5TH 11:45 P.M.

  8: JACKIE O CHARLIE’S BED MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 6TH 5:47 A.M.

  9: JACKIE O BATHROOM MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 6TH 7:00 A.M.

  10: ALPHA ACADEMY JACKIE O MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 6TH 7:23 A.M.

  11: THEATER OF DIONYSUS HONE IT: FOR DANCERS MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 6TH 10:11 A.M.

  12: NORTH SHORE NARCISSUS DAY SPA MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 6TH 11:47 A.M.

  13: NORTH SHORE THE JUNGLE MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 6TH 2:15 P.M.

  14: APOD MESSAGE TO ALL STUDENTS AND FACULTY MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 6TH 6:19 P.M.

  15: THE PAVILION AMBROSIA BANQUET HALL MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 6TH 7:02 P.M.

  16: JACKIE O BEDROOM MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 6TH 10:13 P.M.

  17: THE PAVILION AMBROSIA BANQUET HALL TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 7TH 7:37 A.M.

  18: THEATER OF DIONYSUS HONE IT: FOR DANCERS TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 7TH 10:37 A.M.

  19: ALPHA ACADEMY SHIRA’S OFFICE TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 7TH 8:08 P.M.

  20: ALPHA ISLAND PINK SAND BEACH TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 7TH 11:19 P.M.

  21: APHRODITE BEACH EROS SCULPTURE GARDEN WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 8TH 11:19 A.M.

  22: THEATER OF DIONYSUS HONE IT: FOR DANCERS WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 8TH 2:44 P.M.

  23: JACKIE O SHOWER WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 8TH 3:07 P.M.

  24: THEATER OF DIONYSUS DANCE STUDIO WEDNESDAY SEPTEMBER 8TH 8:03 P.M.

  25: ALPHA ACADEMY THE DARK WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 8TH 8:28 P.M.

  26: 100 FEET UNDER THE FARM TUNNEL WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 8TH 10:07 P.M.

  27: THE PAVILION AMBROSIA BANQUET HALL WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 8TH 10:40 P.M.

  28: THE VEGETABLE FARM GROUND LEVEL WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 8TH 11:10 P.M.

  29: SHIRA’S OFFICE WAITING ROOM WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 8TH 11:33 P.M.

  30: SHIRA’S OFFICE WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 8TH 11:59 P.M.

  Clique novels by Lisi Harrison:

  THE CLIQUE

  BEST FRIENDS FOR NEVER

  REVENGE OF THE WANNABES

  INVASION OF THE BOY SNATCHERS

  THE PRETTY COMMITTEE STRIKES BACK

  DIAL L FOR LOSER

  IT’S NOT EASY BEING MEAN

  SEALED WITH A DISS

  BRATFEST AT TIFFANY’S

  THE CLIQUE SUMMER COLLECTION

  P.S. I LOATHE YOU

  BOYS R US

  Other novels by Lisi Harrison:

  ALPHAS

  For Danielle Paige, alpha extraordinaire

  ALPHA ACADEMY

  Welcome to the inaugural class of Alpha Academy. Thousands of girls answered the alpha call over the last year. One hundred have been selected. The fittest shall survive.

  As you know from my No. 1 best-selling autobiographies, Watch Your Outback: An Aussie Orphan’s Struggle to Endure, You Can’t Eat Hope, and From Roos to Riches, I have built a billion-dollar empire on nothing but good instincts and sheer determination—or, rather, “Shira determination,” as many Fortune 500 CEOs now call it. My FEWs (Female Empowerment Workshops) have been licensed all around the world and translated into seventy languages. My cosmetics company, X-Chromosome, is the leading manufacturer in beauty products for girls, worldwide. And Brazille Enterprises… Well, I’ll stop here.

  This is about you.

  While my legacy will live forever, I may not. * Should I eventually pass, I will leave behind one hundred girls forever changed by Alpha Academy. Your illustrious class is filled with hyphenates: We have an environmentalist-poetess, a dancer-model-actress, a junior Wimbledon winner–-inventor, a Bollywood film star–cell phone novelist. But a true alpha is more than her résumé. She is more than perfect pitch, a perfect turnout, a perfect ten, or even a perfect IQ. She is a machine with heart. She is the future. She is you.

  Survive a year at Alpha Academy and your wildest dreams will roll out before you like a giant red carpet. Orientation begins September 5. Bring your A-game and a toothbrush. Everything else will be provided. Enclosed is an aPod. It will explain the rest. Turn it on.

  Sincerely,

  Shira Brazille

  President of Brazille Enterprises

  International Alpha Female

  1

  WESTCHESTER, NY

  BODY ALIVE DANCE STUDIO

  THURSDAY, JULY 22ND

  11:37 A.M.

  There were five Skye Hamiltons in the Body Alive Dance Studio. One on each mirrored wall and one in the flesh. As in-the-flesh Skye step-turn-step-plié-step-fan-step-ball-changed, the reflections followed. So did the nine other girls in Atelier No. 1. Or at least they tried.

  A trickle of sweat slithered from the base of Skye’s tightly bunned blond waves down the back of her pale blue leo. She drew her shoulder blades back (even more), trying to pinch the salty snake—not because she was embarrassed, but because she could. Her body always did what it was told. All she had to do crank up the music and ask.

  “And one… twooo… thu-hree… fourrrr… five… six… seh-vuuuun… eight.” Madame Prokofiev slow-clapped to the jazzy ooze of Michael Bublé’s “Fever” while scanning her students for TICS (Timing, Incongruity, Carelessness, and Smiles). As always, her scrutinizing brown eyes whizzed past Skye like two bullets aimed at someone else.

  “Too wristy, Becca!” She clapped. “Less chin, Reese.” Clap. “Rollllllll the knee, Wendi. Don’t poke.” Clap. Clap. “And I swear on my tendons, Heidi, if you don’t fix that posture, I’m going to use you as a throw pillow!”

  Chignoned and clad in a no-nonsense black cami with matching flare dance pants, the aging brunette looked like a prima ballerina laced up tighter than a pair of toe shoes. Yet she moved like honey and stung like a bee.

  Skye loved her.

  Charged by Madame P’s silent approval, Skye added a turn before the freeze, then came out of it with hands in prayer pose—a Bollywood Namaste Flower. The routine hadn’t called for it—her instincts had. She’d downloaded the M.I.A. track from Slumdog Millionaire, an
d like some people got songs stuck in their heads, Skye had this one stuck in her body.

  “Enough.” Madame P clapped sharply, the frown lines in her passion-wrinkled forehead bunched like loose leg warmers. Had she gone too far with her flower?

  All nine dancers stop-panted, but Skye’s heart kept hitch-kicking against her rib cage. Finally, she crossed her arms over her B-minus cups and ordered it to take five.

  She lined up with the rest of the DSL Daters (they made super-fast connections with boys), Missy Cambridge, Becca Brie, Leslie Lynn Rubin, and Heidi Sprout. Like Skye, her besties were blond—two in braids, two with ponies—and wore identical pink balloon skirts over gray leotards and tights (BADS Anna Pavlova Collection). Skye had added her signature sleeves—like leg warmers for arms; today’s were black mesh with charms dangling from the wrists: a horseshoe for luck, a dance shoe for love, a pair of lips for kissing, and a locker key for practical reasons. Every time she moved they jingled, adding a little extra something to the otherwise humdrum musical score.

  “Flair, ladies.” Madame P heel-toed to the center of the room, clucking her tongue in disappointment. “Dance is not just knowing the steps. It’s interpreting them.” She winked at Skye, releasing her from the scold. “So please try to remember. We’re doing Twyla, not Twilight, so stop sucking!”

  Some of the girls gasped. Some giggled nervously. Skye pressed her thumb against the sharp grooves of her locker key. The pain kept her from gloat-smirking.

  Madame Prokofiev snapped her fingers. “Again! And one… twooo… thu-hree… fourrrr… five… six… seh-vuuuun… eight.”

  This time, the girls responded like thoroughbreds at the starting bell. Their Capezio’d feet polished the shiny wood floor that the Hamilton family had owned for years. The force of their synchronized movements pumped Skye with energy and made her sweat pride. Not only for the girls who danced, but also for her parents, who gave them the place to do it.

  A thunderous knock interrupted their flow. The door opened just enough for Madame P to see that someone wanted her in the hall. She gave Skye a nod, silently transferring power to her star pupil, and then slipped out.

  Skye rolled her neck, then padded happily to the front of the class, pausing only to change songs. “Same routine in triple time.” She grinned, her legs twitching, ready for some real dancing.

  “When I grow up I wanna be famous I wanna be a star…” the Pussycat Dolls meowed from the iPod deck.

  “Ah-five, six, seven, eight…” Skye went hard. The midday light pouring in from the windows found her like a spotlight.

  Tutting, waving, popping and locking, she moved faster to the pounding beat than the Tasmanian Devil on So You Think You Can Dance. With Madame P gone, she could let go of the traditional dance steps and express herself freely. Borrowing at will, she riffed on a few Bollywood moves, added the punch of Broadway, a dash of Beyoncé hip-shaking, and a sprinkle of ballet scissors from Romeo and Juliet. She moved between more styles than a Moulin Rouge montage. At the end, she executed a final glissé tour jeté, leaped up, and gave a little bow to the captivated audience that would be there one day. The charms on her sleeves clanged together. They sounded like applause.

  Straightening, she turned to the two rows of four behind her and panted, “Again. Without me this time.”

  Skye had set the barre high. Just like it had been set for her by her mother years ago. Leslie Lynn attacked the moves with gusto, but that very same headbanging enthusiasm caused her bangs to wriggle free from her loose braid. Her attempt to sideswipe them during an axel turn dropped her one second behind the other dancers and left her dragging like a piece of toilet paper on the back of a shoe.

  Feet turned out in textbook first position—her power position—Skye pursed her lips and channeled her inner Russian dance dictator. “The mirrors are here for us to perfect our form, not our hair,” she announced. Leslie picked up the pace with an embarrassed grimace.

  “Chest out,” Skye demanded of Heidi, whose posture had taken another dive. Heidi had sprouted B-plus cups this year, the pull of which she was obviously still having trouble adjusting to. “Own ’em, H!”

  Heidi thrust out her boobs while her back arched in protest.

  Note to self, Skye thought. Introduce H to the new line of Martha Graham bust-minimizer tops. Give her the friends-and-family discount if she balks.

  Next to her, Becca spiked up into a high, athletic half split that was about two centimeters short of a cheerleader hurkey. Skye pulled Becca’s ponytail down to stop her overzealous bobbing. “Less bounce, more weight.”

  Becca sucked in her already concave stomach on hearing the word weight. Skye sighed. Becca wasn’t the brightest beta on the barre, but she was sweeter than Splenda and shadowed Skye with the dedication of a choral swan in Swan Lake. Those who can’t lead follow. And as long as they followed Skye, everything was perfect.

  Next, she circled Missy. Each strand of her hair was in place, just like her steps. She strung together the exquisite sequences with technical perfection: Her toe was pointed at a forty-five-degree angle, her shoulders parallel to the floor, and her leaps timed to a millisecond of the driving beat. But she was full of more lead than a Chinese toy.

  The song ended and the dancers stopped. Missy blinked up at her friend, eagerly awaiting her notes. It was like a sadist’s Hallmark card; when you care enough to be insulted by the very best.

  “Watch me.” Skye launched into a perfect piqué turn, arms wide, hands clasped, as if hugging Kevin Fat-erline. “You want to be solid and liquid at the same time, like an unopened juice box on a whirling merry-go-round,” she instructed, borrowing a line from her mother and passing it off as her own.

  One… two… three…

  After the third revolution, the door creaked open and Madame P glided back in.

  On the fourth turn, Skye saw her parents, dressed in matching gray-and-white après-dance warm-ups, her mother waving a piece of gold paper over her head.

  And on the fifth—wait, was that a camera crew? Skye slowed, then settled on the balls of her feet. Lithe waitresses dressed in white BADS unitards and silver tutus wheeled in tray after tray of dim sum followed by Skye’s favorite cake, Payard’s pont neuf. It was a veritable port-a-party. But why? Food was never allowed in the studio. Or in the dancers, for that matter.

  Missy and Leslie widened their glitter-dusted eyes at Skye, who shrugged in return.

  “Congratulations, my darling!” Natasha Hamilton shouted in her faint Russian accent. Her moonlit whitish-blond hair was clipped in a low ponytail. But the rest of her moved with uninhibited joy. She waved a gold-glittered envelope in the air. “You have been accepted to Alpha Academy!”

  The back eight squealed in envy-delight.

  “What?” Skye’s Tiffany box blue eyes searched her mom’s identical ones for an explanation. A retraction. A punch line.

  But the pride on her mother’s face was as genuine as it was rare.

  The last time Skye had seen it was seven years ago, when she’d told her mother she wanted to become a professional ballerina, just like her. Months later the studio had been built, instructors had been imported, and training had begun. But no matter how hard Skye danced for it, that proud expression had never returned. Until now.

  Eccentric billionaire entertainment mogul Shira Brazille had announced the school’s opening on her show, The Brazille Hour, last spring, and Skye had been desperate to attend ever since. The Aussie expat had founded the exclusive boarding school to nurture the next generation of exceptional dancers, writers, artists, and inventors because she was—in her and everyone else’s estimation—the final word in all things alpha. CEO of AlphaGirl International, acclaimed entrepreneur, fashion guru, Shira was everywhere. She was more respected than Martha, more revered than Michelle, and more liked than Oprah.

  Skye threw up her arms and spun in a perfect pirouette. “I’m in!” She tapped her toe on the floor, her breath catching in her throat. This was it. Her big
break. The gateway to more stages, more solos, more standing ovations, more proud expressions, more chances to be at the center of everything.

  A brunette reporter with a chin-butt that rivaled Demi Lovato’s stood in front of a one-man camera crew. She forced a wide grin on her powder pink lips. “This is Winkie Porter from Westchester News 1, reporting from Body Alive Dance Studio in Westchester, New York?” Winkie’s voice went up at the end of every sentence, making even her name sound like a question. “Eccentric billionaire entertainment mogul Shira Brazille announced the opening of Alpha Academy last spring to, and I quote, ‘nurture the next generation of exceptional talent without distractions from our mediocre world.’ And our very own fourteen-year-old Skye Hamilton, dance wunderkind, is one of the lucky one hundred to secure a coveted spot!”

  “You did it, Skye-High!” Her dad scooped her up into a lift, and she giggled on the way down. Even though she landed perfectly, she still felt like she was floating.

  “Are we getting this?” Winkie asked her stubbly-but-cute camera guy. When he shook his head no, she said, “Mr. Hamilton, could you do that again?”

  The dancers scuttled behind Skye and her father in an attempt to get on camera. They moved in a tight tangle, like a clump of hair coasting toward the shower drain.

  Skye shrugged and nodded at her dad, whose hazel eyes moistened with pride as he whirled her again. He set her down gently, his full head of dark blond hair slightly tousled from the spinning. She patted it down like he was her very large obedient poodle.

  “Did you ever think your daughter would be sought after by the most influential woman in the world?” Winkie stuck a microphone under his strong chin.

  “Of course.” Geoffrey smiled at his daughter.

  Winkie rested her frosty hand on Skye’s shoulder. “We heard there was a little mishap with your essay and that it was lost in the mail. Did you stay up all night rewriting? Take us through your ordeal.”

  Skye adjusted her sleeves. How did Winkie know about that?