Gaia Moore punched the phone number one last time. There were a few rings, just like before, then the high-pitched three-tone warning that made her want to grind her teeth right down to the roots.

"I'm sorry; the number you have dialed is no longer in service," the automated voice droned.

Gaia slammed the receiver down in its cradle. There had to be some sort of glitch in the phone system. Maybe everyone in Manhattan had decided to order a pizza all at the same time. Because there was no way her uncle Oliver would change his phone number without telling her. Why would he? Didn't he promise to take her away to Europe? Didn't he say that he was going to save her from her miserable existence? This was just some sort of mix-up....

She knew Uncle Oliver would eventually make good on his promises. She knew it. But she wasn't about to just hang around George and Ella's brownstone, waiting for him to get in touch with her. She would be a proverbial sitting duck.

Ella might not be that hurt. Of course, the last time Gaia had seen her, Ella was lying on the pavement in the middle of the park, bleeding. It was hard to tell how serious the wound was, but if Ella was as strong as Gaia was beginning to suspect, there was a fairly good possibility the stepmonster might soon return. To finish Gaia off for good.

My foster mother wants me dead.

Even now, the words in Gaia's head made little sense. It was all still too much for her to take in. Sure, they had always hated each other... but to go so far as to pull out a gun? If she functioned like a normal human being, Gaia imagined that she would have sweaty palms right now. Wobbly knees. She'd be quivering -- like an old newspaper over a subway grate. Or like a bowl of that nauseating Village School cafeteria Jell-O. Like a normal person. She'd exhibit the signs... the signs of fear. Maybe she'd even hyperventilate.

But instead, as always, her mind was sharp and clear. Her movements were quick and decisive -- like an animal's. She darted up the stairs to the fourth floor, her lungs rising and falling in perfect rhythm. In situations like these, there were advantages to being a freak of nature. She knew she had to leave. Immediately.

Gaia tore furiously through the dirty laundry scattered around her sparse bedroom, stuffing only the most essential pieces into her beat-up messenger bag. Cargo pants -- in. T-shirts and trashed sneakers -- in. Black hooded sweatshirt -- definitely in.

Unworn Gap capris purchased in a moment of consumer weakness -- hopelessly out.

What had ever possessed her to buy a pair of pants that emphasized her grotesque calves?

One wool cap, one bottle of Cockroach nail polish. If five years of being shuffled from one foster home to another had taught Gaia anything, it was how to pack up her life in under six minutes. The secret was always keeping your personal possessions down to a bare minimum and never owning anything you couldn't ditch at a moment's notice. That went for people, too. Not that there were very many people she was leaving behind.

Gaia had never been very successful at collecting friends. Unlike Heather Gannis, who was constantly swarmed with her own ego-bloating posse, Gaia could count the number of friends she had on one hand and still have enough fingers left over to go bowling. Actually, she could count the number of friends she had on her thumb.

The only person she had left was Ed.

Ed Fargo. Shred. The good guy. Ed understood what it was like to be an outsider -- a freak like her, in his own way. Ed's wheelchair was to Gaia's fearlessness as... what? A sickness was to a disease? A boat was to a ship? Maybe not, but he had been loyal and understanding, especially during the times when Gaia knew she wasn't so easy to understand. It crushed her to imagine a life with him. But it beat sticking around and getting killed.

Of course... there was Sam.

Sam wasn't a real friend, though. Hardly. He was an enemy. He was an insect, fit to be squashed. The lowest form of vermin on the planet. But maybe Gaia should count him, anyway, because having just one friend on the entire planet was way too depressing for words. It was hard to know exactly what Sam was to her -- the ultimate crush, a failed romantic possibility, the only person she had ever loved. Most important, Sam was the betrayer of her dreams. While she had been loving him from a distance, he had slept with Ella.

Even the thought of it stung like a slap. It hurt. Physically. Even if Ella hadn't tried to kill her, that was reason enough to get the hell out of town.

At four and a half minutes Gaia snapped the bag closed and slung it over her shoulder. A new record. Flying down the staircase at the speed of light, Gaia's tangled yellow hair brushed the expensively framed trash that Ella liked to refer to as her "work" -- trite black-and-white photos of wide-eyed kittens, open-toed shoes, and the Flatiron Building. Vapid and tacky. But that pretty much summed up Ella in a nutshell.

"Psychoslut" summed her up pretty well, too, though.

If Ella's aim with a gun was as lousy as it was with a camera, staying healthy wasn't going to be a problem. But Gaia knew now that she couldn't take that risk. Ella's entire existence was an act. Ella was trained in several martial arts -- just like Gaia. Oh, yes. After that combat in the front hall about a week ago, Gaia knew that Ella was one of the few people on earth who could kick her ass. So there was no reason to assume that Ella wasn't trained to be an expert marksman, either. This whole spandex, big-hair, trophy-wife thing that Ella played to the hilt was a cover.

The question still remained, however: What exactly was she covering up?

At the second-floor landing Gaia's feet came to an involuntary halt. As hard as she tried to look away, her eyes came to rest on the very last photograph. It wasn't one of Ella's travesties -- but a snapshot that George had taken of Gaia with her mother and father five years ago. Before her world had fallen apart.

Father.

Those two single syllables fired like cannon shots through her mind. It had been him on the street, hadn't it? The one who had shot Ella? So why had he vanished? Why hadn't he come running to save her? Why had he ditched her... again?

But his photo couldn't answer those questions. The sight of the clueless twelve-year-old girl with skinny arms and dirty friendship bracelets set in motion an endless chain of self-pity and burning anger. Gaia had been so trusting. She had actually been naive enough to believe her father would be there for her... forever.

Gaia ripped the photo off the wall with such raw force that a three-inch chunk of plaster came off with it. She shoved it in the bag.

Whatever. She wouldn't try to guess at her father's motives. Her uncle was there for her now. That was all that mattered.

Go... go...

Racing down the hall and into George's office, Gaia was seized with a raw, gnawing guilt. The desktop was bare except for a computer, the way George always left it when he was out of town. She wouldn't be able to say good-bye. Despite his grotesque taste in wives, George was a good man. He had been a friend of her father's....

Stop thinking of--

From downstairs came the heavy whoosh of the front door opening.

Gaia's stomach soured at the familiar, nauseating clack of stiletto heels pounding on marble.

Ella hadn't been that hurt. No. She had clawed her way home.