as if each word were a private gift only for him. He’d packed away the merchandise table, every capitalistic impulse cut short by the desire to be fully focused on Rico. Behind him I saw Frankie, her expression calculating. I imagined she was torn to have such talent on her team this year. Rico, Cricket , even Lex—they made Atlanta the team to beat, these people who would eventually be her toughest competition in the individuals.
I turned to Trey and dropped my voice to a whisper. “So what happened with Lex?”
“I asked him if he was okay. He said yes. I came back inside. He remained in the parking lot.”
“He’d better be getting in here. He’s on next.”
A person in front turned and shushed us, so I pulled Trey into a huddle in the corner. All I could see was Rico in the spotlight, surrounded and solitary.
“How did he seem to you?”
“Nervous, agitated. No threat indicators, however.”
I scanned the edge of the audience for Lex’s pale sharp face. Crowded places provided an invisibility of sorts, if you knew how to work it. I wasn’t sure Lex did—he seemed the kind to naturally draw attention, not hide from it—but I wasn’t dismissing the possibility that he was somewhere in that shifting warm darkness.
Rico moved into his second piece, the shorter competition poem. Three minutes and nineteen seconds, one second under the time limit when performed perfectly. But despite the auspicious start, it was not one of his better performances. It lacked the dynamic push and pull he usually created, the dizzying spin of the lyrics, the rat-a-tat rhymes. Now, he was working by rote. He knew it by heart, but his heart wasn’t in it.
He pulled the mike from the stand. “And now I’d like to—”
A screaming alarm drowned him out, followed by the panicked murmur of the crowd. The sprinklers came on with a hiss and whoosh, and the murmuring ratcheted into gasps and shouts. Water soaked my hair and dribbled down the front of my dress.
I shoved a sopping hank of hair from my eyes. “Great, now what?”
Chapter Five
Trey shielded his eyes and looked around. “It’s the fire alarm.”
“I don’t see smoke. You think somebody pulled it for laughs?”
“The sprinklers are triggered by heat, not a switch. We need to evacuate.”
“We?”
He was suddenly in motion, the security expert taking charge. “I’ll clear the main room and check the kitchen, you clear the back. No one stays in the building until this gets resolved.”
“But—”
“Don’t forget the restroom. Then meet me in the parking lot. And call 911.”
Then he was gone, swallowed up in the throng of people. No one seemed frightened. Instead they were adrenalin-juiced and impossible to herd, like intoxicated goats. Through the din and surge, I saw Rico jump down from the stage and make his way to Adam.
Most people streamed out the front door, but some took the side exit into the alley, some cursing, others clinging to each other and laughing. As they pulled open the fire exits, more alarms went off, carving another facet of noise into the din.
I kicked off my heels and slung my purse more securely across my chest. Then I pushed my way toward the back, moving upstream against the crowd. The smell hit me from out of nowhere—smoke, bitter and noxious—and the first pang of fear struck.
The hallway loomed dark, water already puddling on the floor. I moved left, toward the restrooms, one hand against the wall for balance. Water lapped my feet, and I tripped on a box of CDs someone had abandoned in the hall, sending the plastic cases skittering. The smoke thickened, and I quickly realized why. It was pouring from the small restroom, the door ajar.
I kicked it open and saw the trash can next to the sink ablaze with a column of yellow fire. As the smoke cleared, I saw an even more disturbing sight—someone sprawled in front of the sink, legs crumpled, arms flung sideways.
I yelled for help, but my voice was lost in the screeching alarms. So I dropped to all fours and crawled inside, coughing and sputtering and wheezing, reciting grade schools chants.
“Get down and go. Stop, drop, and roll.”
Wet tissue and paper towels clotted the floor in a sodden ashy mess. I gagged, choking on smoke and sour bathroom smell as I scrambled forward. Eventually my hand closed on a pair of black leather boots.
Lex.
I realized I’d have to stand up to get him out of there. Cursing some more, I