Being Nikki

Plot summary

Em Watts, while on a model shoot in St. John's for a Stark Brand deodorant commercial, clings onto a rock cliff over a group of nurse sharks, when she suddenly falls into the water, only to be rescued by Brandon Stark. Later, at the hotel, she gets a call from her apartment about a man who keeps coming to her door. Em returns to New York to find that the man is Nikki Howard's brother, Steven, bringing her the news that their mother has gone missing. She tries to convince Steven that she doesn't know anything, but barely gets him to believe her "amnesia" story. Lulu, attracted to Steven, invites him to stay in their loft.

Em notices that the loft has been bugged, and begins to watch her words. When she visits her real family, who are being bugged as well, she comes to the realization that she cannot return to her old life. As she leaves her family's apartment in tears, she encounters Christopher, who tells her of his plans to take down Stark Enterprises for "killing" Em. She realizes that he must have loved her after seeing a picture of her former self in his bedroom. Christopher also says that he can assist in the search for Nikki's mother if Em can get him an account name and password for a Stark employee, and she reluctantly agrees to help.

At a rehearsal for the upcoming Stark Angels fashion show on New Year's Eve, Veronica, a Stark Enterprises model, warns Em to stop sending romantic emails to her boyfriend Justin Bay. Em insists that she has not been emailing Justin, but Veronica does not believe her. As Em completes her run and heads for the end of the catwalk, she trips over a pile of feathers ripped off a pair of Stark Angel wings- seemingly set up by Veronica. After the accident, Em is taken to the office of a Stark doctor, and, before she leaves, observes the doctor typing her username and password on a Stark employee login site. Em, Christopher, Lulu, and Steven visit Christopher's cousin Felix, who hacks onto the Stark IT mainframe with the newfound account details.

Later, at Nikki and Lulu's annual party, Christopher kisses Em and reveals that he knows her real name. He also confesses that he has always loved her, and regrets that it took her death for him to finally realize it. Em realizes that the disappearance of Nikki's mother is linked to Justin's emails. She asks Justin to borrow his cellphone, but when he refuses, Christopher and Gabriel Luna stage a physical intervention. Em and Christopher go through Justin's messages and, finding one from 'Nikki Howard', get Felix to track the message to the house of Dr. Jonathan Fong, a Stark neurosurgeon living in Westchester.

When they go to Dr. Fong's house, they discover that Nikki's mom and Nikki herself (now in the body of a drunk driver) are alive. Dr. Fong explains that he carried out the brain transplant after discovering that Nikki had not actually suffered an aneurysm, and that she has been recuperating in his house to avoid being found by Stark Enterprises. It is revealed that Robert Stark ordered Nikki's death after she tried to blackmail him with secrets she overheard about the Stark Quark laptop range. However, Brandon, who was left sleeping in the car, wakes up and enters the house. He threatens Em, telling that she must help him destroy his father's career, and leave Christopher. She unwillingly does so, and he takes Em, Steven, Nikki, and Mrs. Howard to his summer house to continue hiding from Stark.

Characters