Chapter Three
The Accidental Duchess Goes to Camp
Mallory
Mallory had briefly looked up from The Accidental Duchess when gravel crunched under the car’s tires and Ed, the family driver, announced, “We’re here, Miss Blake.”
Then she had stuck her nose back in the book. She was reading the whole Duchesses in Love series like it was made of crack. One more page was never enough. The black-hearted yet undeniably handsome Duke of Blackmore had just laid eyes on the feisty American, Lydia Farrow. The duke was picking up his fiancée at the docks. He’d never met her before, and he was about to pick up the wrong woman—Lydia. The whole scene made Mallory smile inside.
She was having pretty much the same day as Lydia, except for the part about the duke. Also, she was riding in a Bentley, not an ocean liner. Mostly, there was no duke.
Sitting in the back of the car, trussed up in her sister’s clothes with side-swept bangs that kept falling in her face and a pair of brand-new contacts that felt like sand in her eyes—Mallory wasn’t sure if she was up to playing Blake. It seemed impossible to be graceful and confident, especially with hair in her eyes. She sat up straight, though, and took a deep breath.
If she wanted to open a new chapter in her own life, a chapter where she didn’t play the wallflower, she needed to do this. Blake had confidence, charisma, and most of all, everyone knew she mattered. Still, Mallory was starting to feel an asthma attack coming on. She clutched her inhaler with a death grip and marked her page in The Accidental Duchess. The duke would be waiting for her after registration.
Ed turned the car off and looked over his shoulder. “You ready, Miss?”
Mallory slunk down lower in her seat. “Ugh.” In her head she repeated: Hi, my name is Blake. I’m smart, pretty, confident, and people like me. She took a puff off her inhaler. As long as she didn’t see anyone Blake knew, Mallory could pull this off… If it did work, she might figure out the key to, well, not happiness, but maybe she’d figure out how to walk into a room like she owned it. So far, being herself had been a huge disappointment. Stepping into Blake’s shoes and being forced to play the part of someone else—it was just what she needed.
Ed came around and opened her door. “I know it’s court-ordered, Miss, but you’re going to enjoy yourself. I know you will. It’s time you got out of that fishbowl you live in and hang out with some decent folks.” Mallory gave Ed a funny look. He never talked to her. Maybe Blake confided in their driver, which was kind of cute. Ed made a much better best friend than her sister’s actual bestie.
“Oh, come on out, Blake. I’ve never known you to back down from a challenge. You’re going to be just fine.”
Weird as it was, Mallory wasn’t that close to her twin, but apparently Blake was BFFs with their chauffeur. Maybe there was more to her sister than she knew. Either that, or she was more desperate for a functional father figure than Mallory realized.
She gave him an awkward hug. “Thanks, Ed. I appreciate it.”
“See you in six weeks, Miss. Have a good time.”
With that, he sped off, giving one last honk. When the dust settled, she found herself standing in a dirt parking lot next to a pile of luggage she had no way of carrying all by herself, dressed in an outfit Blake had picked out. The dress grazed her thighs in the front and swooped down to her ankles in the back. As she walked across the parking lot, the lightweight fabric billowed out like a royal robe. Wedge platform sandals Blake had insisted she wear finished the look. Mallory wished fervently for her well-worn T-shirt and jeans.
Thinking of how Lydia Farrow navigated her meeting with the duke with nothing but confidence and wit, she calmed the butterflies and walked up to the registration table. A guy in a Camp Pine Ridge shirt said, “Miss Jones, I presume.”
With a gulp, she nodded. It wasn’t quite a lie…yet. As he flipped through papers, she glanced around at the other campers. It was a hodgepodge—little kids, teenagers, a few counselors, a lot of hovering parents. Without anyone she knew to ground her in reality, Mallory felt like she was watching footage from a summer camp movie. There was so much noise and excitement. With a bolstering breath, she held her purse tighter and straightened her back. Then the crowd shifted to reveal someone she never would have expected to see.
Benjamin Iron Cloud stood just past the sign-in table, all shiny black hair, dark soulful eyes, and straining pec muscles against a too-tight T-shirt. His hair was a little longer than it was at the end of the school year. If possible, it made him even cuter.
Mallory hadn’t seen him since “the Incident.” She was pretty sure Blake hadn’t, either. Principal Danvers had suspended Blake and Ben for the rest of the school year. Their dad had finished Blake’s punishment with an epic grounding.
The Incident… All information about the prank was hearsay because it went down behind the closed doors of a faculty meeting. The day in question, the same day she and Jill had absconded for the town library, had been Principal Danver’s birthday. When a woman arrived in the front office claiming to be a singing telegram, the secretary must not have thought much of it. She buzzed her in, stuck a “Visitor” badge on her barely-there top, and the Marilyn Monroe look-alike marched down the hallway to the principal’s office. Most girls at Bellevue dressed pretty skimpy, so no one blamed the secretary for not putting two and two together.
Presumably she sang “Happy Birthday” to Mr. Danvers at the meeting. It didn’t take a genius to figure out how she triggered the alarm. During the evacuation she was naked, except for Mr. Danver’s suit jacket and a pair of still-smoking nipple sparklers. It seemed likely that she must have been standing right under the smoke alarm when she set off her sparklers.
Principal Danvers, who knew the building was not actually on fire, must have tried his best to keep Marilyn in the building, but the sprinklers forced them out. In the end, the principal ran out of the building, his business suit soaked from the sprinklers, with a mostly naked stripper by his side. Some kids sold the video to the local news for pretty good money.
When police questioned the stripper later, she stated that someone named Benjamin Iron Cloud had paid her ten times her normal rate to perform the stunt. Ben was arrested and charged with: 1) setting off fireworks within city limits without a permit (the nipple sparklers fell under the statutory definition of firework), 2) corruption of youth, and 3) attempted arson—or as Blake described it: attempted fun.
It didn’t take long for the cops to figure out it was Blake’s fault. The smoking gun—Blake had used their dad’s credit card to buy a strip-o-gram. Not her smartest moment.
Now, here they were. In the parking lot of Camp Pine Ridge. Ben was looking right at her. Normally, Mallory would have been thrilled. He was the kind of guy who left a trail of swooning girls in his wake. Mallory had the tiniest crush on him, a crush she tried to deny—what was the point? But Ben wasn’t staring at her because she was cute. He was staring because he hated Blake, for totally understandable reasons. If Mallory wasn’t masquerading as her sister, she would sidle up to him and say, “I know how you feel! Can you believe the stuff she gets away with?” Unfortunately, she was stuck on the receiving end of Ben’s angry glare. If the director found out that she and Blake had pulled a switcheroo, Blake would be off to an actual prison. Who knows—Mallory might end up joining her. Their masquerade probably qualified as obstruction of justice.
“What are you doing here?” he said, his voice acid.
Her breathing kind of cramped up, and she took a puff off her inhaler. You’re Blake, remember. “I’m here…because of what happened.” When he didn’t answer right away, she went on. “I hope you didn’t get in too much trouble because of the stripper thing. I mean, I thought it was…funny. It wasn’t supposed to turn into a big thing about bringing explosives to school. They were just sparklers.”
His expression remained unreadable.
With a glance around, she said, “It looks really nice here, though.” She was full-on running at the mouth. “Maybe it’ll be fun.”
“Are you on something?” he asked.
With an unwavering, deer-in-the-headlights smile, she shook her head. “No, I’m good.” She was high on something, but it wasn’t illicit. It was just nervous energy mixed with some social anxiety.
“Why are you here?” she asked Ben.
He stared back without answering.
She wasn’t sure about the particulars of Blake and Ben’s history, but he clearly needed an apology. “I’m sorry,” she said. In a confident and loud voice (her nod to Blake) she repeated, “I’m sorry. I hope we can start over this summer.” She wanted to learn to be more like Blake, but she didn’t want to spend the whole summer carrying on a feud she hadn’t started. Really, she was on Ben’s side. She couldn’t tell him that, but maybe they could just leave the past where it belonged and move on to enjoy a conflict-free summer.
Ben scrunched up his face in disbelief. “What?”
“I don’t know what else to say but I’m sorry.”
Ben blurted out a laugh.
This was not going to-plan at all. Mallory wanted to learn how to be confident and well-liked. Period. That was it. Her only conflict management strategy was “Run! Hide!” She was the girl who apologized for taking up space and breathing other people’s air.
Ben looked at her closer. “You’re kidding. You must be kidding.”
Her hopes sank. “No. I’m really sorry. I want to start fresh.” She hated when people didn’t like her. Ben didn’t look like he was going to let this blow over with an apology, though.
The angry expression on his face made her want to cower and hide behind her horrible shaggy bangs.
“Sociopaths can’t feel sorry. Good effort, though,” he said.
Mallory’s jaw dropped as she watched him turn and walk away from her like she didn’t matter. Note taken: she had an enemy at camp. Operation Be Blake for the Summer was not off to a good start.
Standing around feeling shocked in the parking lot wasn’t going to do any good, though. She pulled herself together and went to the registration table. After she figured out where her cabin was, she asked the counselor in charge, “Can I leave my bags here? I have too much to carry.”
He agreed, so she headed toward her bunk. Thankfully, the counselor was busy and her bunkmate hadn’t arrived, so she had a minute to think. She plopped down on her bed to collect her thoughts. The only person she’d ever fought with was Blake and that was just sister stuff. The stakes were never higher than a sweater or which restaurant to eat at. And for all their fighting—they were still family at the end of the day. They could count on each other for the important stuff, like taking your sister’s place at summer camp.
If she was going to spend the summer with Ben, she needed a strategy. After thinking for a minute, she decided it was simple. She had two choices:
Act like Blake and stand her ground. Make like he deserved everything she’d dished out.
Act like Mallory and continue to apologize.
When she thought about it that way, it was barely a choice. If she was going to be Blake this summer, she would have to take the good with the bad. That included a feud with Ben Iron Cloud. If he didn’t want to make up, she’d just have to stand Blake’s ground and return fire when necessary. Nice Mallory was gone. Blake was open for business. Now she just needed to retrieve her luggage so she could play the part in full costume, which Blake had packed.
At the registration table, things were starting to wind down. One of the counselors was going through the paperwork. He growled at someone’s file. “Another camper forgot to sign up for activities this week.”
“Who?” another counselor asked.
He scanned up to read the name. “Iron Cloud, Benjamin.”
An evil lightbulb flashed in Mallory’s brain. It was a moment of pure-Blake. “Oh, I know Ben,” she offered. With a goofy smile, she said, “Just sign him up for crafting. He loves crafts.”
“Really?” the guy asked.
“Yep.”
With a shrug, the counselor signed Ben up for crafting, and Mallory giggled. Ben knitting—the image alone tickled her newly discovered evil funny bone.