Deprivation House Read Online Free PDF Page A

out. Except I was here to work.
    I studied the people who had gathered at the tableso far—without being too obvious about it. They were all possible suspects. If Ripley won the money, that meant they lost it.
    Olivia and Wilson were still whispering. He seemed pretty happy about it.
    Hal Sheen, one of my roommates, was sketching in a notebook. I figured he was working out some element of the planet L-62, a planet he was creating step by step. He’d told me a little about it last night. For every decision—such as not having carbon-based life forms—there are millions of consequences.
    He planned to use the planet as the setting for a video game. But he couldn’t even start plotting it out until he’d figured out every detail of L-62.
    Kit and Bobby T were sitting on my left. Everybody else was still upstairs.
    â€œWhat’s up with you guys?” I asked. “Do either of you think you’ve figured out what we’re going to be doing here?” That had been pretty much the only topic of the barbecue.
    â€œI don’t even care,” Bobby T told me. His eyebrows were blue too. I hadn’t noticed that before. “My fans are drooling for my next entry. The whole mystery of it all is making them crazy. I almost got my highest number of hits ever. And you know what that means. Ka-ching. Ka-ching.”
    â€œSo, Bobby, when the movie option on your blog gets renewed, ’cause I’m sure it will, do you think I could play myself?” Kit asked. “I know no one else could. They aren’t actors,” she added quickly.
    â€œRipley was in that Peach Fizz soda commercial,” Bobby T reminded her.
    â€œThat. That’s not acting. That’s standing around being famous for being rich and having famous parents.” Kit gave a flip of her hand. “Anyway, what do you think? About me playing me?”
    â€œHollywood likes names, princess,” Bobby T told her. “I think they’d be a lot more interested in having Ripley playing Ripley.”
    â€œBut I’m going to have a name after the show’s over,” Kit protested. Then she seemed to realize she wasn’t getting anywhere. “Maybe you could just mention me in the blog and that I’m looking for an agent.”
    â€œAdvertising on blogs costs money,” Bobby T answered.
    â€œLike you need cash,” muttered Kit. She turned to Mary, who’d sat down on her other side.
    â€œI have a valuable product,” Bobby T explained to me. “It loses value if I give it away for free.”
    A waiter showed up and started pouring juice.
    â€œIs there coffee?” Kit asked.
    I took the interruption as an opportunity to getout of the conversation with her and Bobby T and scanned the table again. Pretty much everyone had arrived. Joe was sitting next to Brynn, and he looked pretty happy about it.
    â€œHere comes the big cheese,” Mikey said from my right.
    I followed his gaze and saw Veronica striding into the room. She wore a deep red suit today with matching shoes. Mom had a suit kind of like it that she called her “power suit.” She wore it to meetings when she wanted to get more money for the reference section of the library.
    But Veronica’s stopped a lot higher than Mom’s did. And when Mom wore the suit, she wore shoes with two-inch heels. Veronica’s had to be double that, and the heels were thin as pencils.
    â€œI hope everyone slept well,” Veronica called out as she sat down at the head of the table. She didn’t actually sound like she cared one way or the other.
    â€œI did,” James answered. He strolled into the dining room in cutoff sweat pants and a faded T-shirt. I figured he’d slept in them. He definitely hadn’t bothered to brush his hair. Everyone else had gotten dressed for the day.
    Veronica nodded toward the only empty seat. “You’ll be glad you did. In a little while, you’ll have