"Replica03 - Another Amy - Kaye, Marilyn" - читать интересную книгу автора (Kaye Marilyn)

All these thoughts raced through Amy's head in a nanosecond. Then she burst through the doors, ran to the pool, and dove in. She swam to the body, flipped it over, and dragged it toward the edge.
Her heart leaped. Aimee wasn't dead; Amy could feel her moving. No, not movingЧthrashing about wildly. Even though Amy's head was underwater, she could hear Aimee yelling. And over that, the sound of a voice shouting, "Cut! Cut!"
Amy wasn't sure whether her own grip loosened or Aimee broke free on her own. In any case, when she came up for air, she saw Mr. Hardy pointing at her. "Who is that? She ruined the shot!" Then Aimee's mother started screaming.
"She's the one who's stalking my daughter! Get her!"
Amy didn't hang around to hear more. She scrambled out of the water and took off. But even as she ran, an image remained in her head. Aimee's right shoulder bladeЧwhere there was no crescent moon.
She heard the steps behind her getting closer. There was no time to get her clothes out of the locker room, so she decided her best bet was to hide. When she reached the hall, she realized that no sound was coming from the office where the extras had been getting made up. She ducked in there and crouched low behind a table. Peering out cautiously, she could see the feet of the guards as they ran past the office.
She couldn't risk trying to get out of the room immediately, so she looked around for a better hiding place. She spotted a large cabinet under a counter and crawled inside. It was a tight fit, but she managed to close the door.
The crack between the door's rim and the wall of the cabinet gave her some light, and she could see into the office. Well, to about one foot above the floor, at least.
A pair of white-clad legs came into the room. She could hear objects being moved around on the counter above her head. A moment later two jeans-clad legs entered.
"You doing my face today?"
She recognized the voice of Rory, the soap-opera actor who had the lead opposite Aimee. The makeup man must have still been wearing his mask, because his response was muffled. "Yes."
She heard the creak of the chair as Rory sat down. "Man, I hate the way you guys wear those masks and caps," Rory commented. "Makes me feel like I'm going to have an operation here."
The man mumbled something about allergies.
"Yeah, I know all about allergies," Rory said. "I got about a zillion of em. You shoulda seen me the time I ate strawberries. I broke out so bad I couldn't work for two weeks."
The man must have asked him something Amy didn't hear, or maybe he'd just pointed to something, because Rory spoke again.
"Naw, that's just a regular ol' zit. You can cover it with that pancake stuff, right?"
The man must have responded in the affirmative, because it was a while before Rory spoke again.
"Can I take a look now?" he asked. "Very cool; excellent," he said, obviously examining himself in a mirror. "I can't even see that hickey on my neck. Thanks, man."
Rory left the office. Now all Amy had to do was wait for the makeup man to clear out. By now she figured they'd given up looking for her. Everyone had to be in the pool, filming, so she could sneak back into the locker room, pull on her clothes, and get out of the building.
The man was taking his time. Cleaning up, probably, Amy thought. She tried to relax and think about something other than her uncomfortable position in the cabinet.
But all she could think about was Aimee's ordinary back. She wasn't sure how she felt. In a way, she supposed it was a relief. From what she'd seen of Aimee, and from what Eric had told her, she wasn't the kind of girl anyone would want to claim as a sister. But on the other hand, she'd wanted so much to find another like herself.
Was that makeup man never going to leave? Maybe she should just fling open the door and make a dash for it.
But she didn't have to do that. "You can come out now, Amy."
She started. How could he know she was in the cabinet? And that voiceЧit was very familiar.
"Come out of the cabinet, Amy." The voice was firmer now, more commanding, and she knew where she'd heard it before.
She pushed on the cabinet door and climbed out. She didn't even have to look at the man, who had removed his mask and bonnet, to identify him. Mr. Devon.
She'd first met him when he'd pretended to be an assistant principal here at Parkside, and most recently he'd been a doctor at the hospital where her mother had lain in a coma. Now he was a cosmetician for the cast of Middle School Maniac.
"How did you know I was in there?" she asked. It was a dumb question. Mr. Devon knew everything. He didn't even bother to answer her.
"This isn't the place for you," he said.
"What do you mean?"
"Don't get involved in this," he told her.
Her heart fluttered. "So she is like me! That's why you're here!"
But his next words killed that notion. "She's nothing at all like you."
Her heart sank. "Then you're just here for me. That means the people from the organization are here too. Who is it? Someone connected with the movie?"
"Just leave," Mr. Devon told her.
Amy wasn't in the mood to be pushed around. She put her hands on her hips and didn't budge. "I think I have a right to know what's going on."
Mr. Devon's face took on the assistant principal expression. "Amy, do what I say. Go. Now."
When she still didn't move, he put a hand on her shoulder and firmly steered her out into the hall. She supposed she could have fought him off, but there was something about Mr. Devon that made her reluctant to get physical. After all, he was on her side. At least, that was what she'd always assumed.
The hall was silent. She couldn't hear any sound coming from the girls' locker room. There was no way she was going to leave the building in this disgusting tank suit.
Moving as silently as possible into the locker room, she headed for the bench where she'd left her clothes. She didn't make it.
Hands gripped both her arms, pulling them back tightly.
"Okay, we got her," a deep voice said. "Let's go."


11

Amy started to scream.
"Hey, don't do that!" a man yelled, and she thought she felt a poke in her back. She had to assume they had a gun. Were there two of them, or three?
She was still wet from her plunge into the swimming pool. They threw a towel around her, over her head, but even so, she was shivering as the arms pulled her outside the gym. She struggled, but there was no point. She might be a lot stronger than an average girl of her size, but she was still no match for two or three grown men. Trying not to panic, she considered her escape options.
"That's a good girl," one of them said as she stopped struggling. The comment annoyed her, so she kicked him.