Bingo.
Brendan was over by a rack of necklaces and browsing through the semi-precious stone section. He picked up a long strand of chunky blue lapis lazuli with silver beads.
Ooh, thought Ivy. That’s a good one.
Focus! she berated herself. Don’t lose sight of the mission. She darted behind a stack of turntable shelves of beads where she could see most of the store.
Brendan was engrossed in the necklaces but, out of the corner of her eye, Ivy saw the security guard who had warned her earlier. He was walking through the entrance of the store and looking around.
I’ve been rumbled, Ivy thought, pulling the black scarf further over her face. She wondered if she should abandon the mission, but Brendan had three necklaces in his hand and seemed to be finally making a decision.
The security guard stopped to talk to the store assistant, who pointed back towards the shoes where Ivy was a moment ago.
‘She’s over there, Hank,’ Ivy heard her say.
Now Brendan was moving towards the counter and Hank was approaching Ivy’s hiding place. If she fled now, she’d miss whatever Brendan was going to buy, but if she didn’t, her cover would be blown and she might end up in mall prison.
Before she could move, her phone blared out the tune of ‘Double Trouble’. Olivia. Then several things happened at once . . .
Ivy panicked and fumbled for her phone.
Brendan started to turn around.
Hank spotted Ivy, his eyes widening.
She turned away just as she pressed the green button on her phone, desperately trying to silence it. Her foot hit the bottom of the bead display and her bag swung behind her, knocking into one of the layers of multi-coloured beads, making a great racket. She twisted back, trying to stop her bag hitting it again. Out of the corner of her eye, Ivy saw Brendan look over just as she went over on her ankle and wobbled into the rack. She tried to hold the display steady, only to tip the whole thing on top of her, crashing to the ground with a squeal, and sending little plastic globs of circles, squares and heart-shapes everywhere.
Lying on her back, surrounded by a rainbow of little plastic beads, Ivy felt like a smudge of black paint across a Picasso.
Brendan ran over to her. ‘Are you OK?’ he gasped.
Hank’s face loomed. ‘Gotcha!’
The store assistant shook her head at the mess.
‘Uh, I’m OK.’ Ivy scrambled to her feet and started collecting the beads. ‘I’m really sorry; I didn’t mean to.’ She realised her phone was still in her hand. ‘I’ll call you back,’ she whispered to her sister and hung up.
Hank stood there with his arms crossed and Brendan hurried to help the store assistant lift up the display rack.
‘This is going to take me hours,’ the assistant said.
‘No, no,’ Ivy replied. ‘I’ll do it.’
‘We’ll do it,’ said Brendan. He crouched down among the beads and started to sort them into piles.
Ivy sat next to him, picking out the four-leaf clover beads, completely embarrassed.
‘You sure you want to help this girl who was trying to mug you?’ Hank asked Brendan.
Brendan smiled. ‘She wasn’t trying to mug me, sir. She’s my girlfriend.’
That completely baffled Hank, but at least he and the store assistant left them to their sorting.
‘What’s going on?’ Brendan asked as he scooped all the alphabet beads into one of the lower racks.
Ivy opened her mouth to try to explain without actually confessing what she was doing, but nothing came to mind. ‘Uh, well, Brendan. Honestly?’ Ivy said. ‘I was stalking you.’
Brendan chuckled.
She explained how she saw him and, when he lied about where he was, she guessed he might be shopping for Valentine’s. ‘I didn’t want to be caught out as a neglectful girlfriend if you bought me a present,’ she said.
‘I know you’re not into the cheesy pink hearts stuff, but I wanted to get you something,’ Brendan said, looking embarrassed. ‘Especially because you’re gone the whole week of Valentine’s.’
Ivy felt her heart warm up. ‘Even though I made a complete bunny of myself in there, is the offer still open?’
Brendan nodded.
‘Because that lapis lazuli necklace was killer.’
Brendan grinned and let a bunch of daisy-shaped beads clatter into their slot. ‘Just promise me you’ll give up on the spy game,’ he said, smiling. ‘You’re not very good at it.’
Ivy nodded gratefully. ‘I promise.’
Maybe Valentine’s isn’t so cheesy after all, Ivy thought.
Olivia was packing. Six casual outfits for the trip to Transylvania lay spread out on her four-poster bed, with her more formal outfits hanging from the antique full-length mirror in the corner.
‘Is that enough?’ she asked herself. ‘Or one more skirt?’
Something small and white flew through her bedroom door and landed on her baby-blue pea coat. Olivia picked up the papery globe. It was a clove of garlic.
Mrs Abbott poked her head through the doorway with a silly grin on her face. ‘You’ll need that to fight off all the vampires in Transylvania,’ she said.
Olivia forced herself to smile. ‘Ha ha!’ she replied weakly. Her adoptive mom and dad had no idea about her biological family’s unusual eating habits and preference for sleeping in coffins. That was the First Law of the Night: no one could find out vampires really existed. Olivia was a rare human exception, and she was certain her mother wouldn’t let her get within a mile of Transylvania if she knew the truth.
‘Can I come in, honey?’ Mrs Abbott asked.