"You told me nothing happened," she whispers, "but something did. Right?"
I glare at her mulishly. "We are never going to talk about this—-"
But Chassie is already interrupting me, saying in a rather dazed voice, "Weren't you scared, Addie? I just...I'm just having a hard time imagining—-"
What the—-
Is she saying she's trying to imagine the logistics of my ménage à trois with Rayé and Haine?
The thought is enough to make me shudder, and I shoot her a look of horror. "Ewwwww, Chassie."
I'm hoping she'd deny this, but instead Chassie starts to blush, and I groan anew. "Seriously?"
The other girl looks torn between hilarity and mortification. "Sorry, sorry, it's just..." She suddenly stops speaking, and when I see her sober up, I quickly turn around—-
Oh.
The mean girls have finally made their grand entrance in the cafeteria, and it kinda makes me feel sick, how they're so obviously relishing their extra five minutes of fame as Laurel's "overwrought" friends. I've seen them guest in every TV, radio, YouTube, and podcast show that would have them, crying fake tears just before inviting the public to like their videos on Tiktok.
Shallow little cats, they all are, but...
"You're seeing what I'm seeing, right?" Chassie whispers.
I can only nod, knowing exactly who she's referring to. One of them - Rebecca, I think her name is - seems unusually keen to avoid everyone's gazes. I stare at her as hard as I can, knowing that she'll eventually sense it, and if it bothers her enough...
C'mon now...
I reach for my can of orange juice, and as I absently take a sip, that's when I see Rebecca slowly turning to look at us—-
Gotcha.
There's only one way to describe the look in her eyes...and it's fear.
I jump to my feet, and Rebecca's gasp of bloody murder has everyone turning her way. A second later, she's running out of the cafeteria like the Devil himself is after her, when actually it's just a couple of Wunderland monsters.
I slowly sit back down and count the seconds until...
Buzzzzzz.
Chassie and I exchange looks as my phone vibrates noisily inside of my pocket. I take it out, and Haine's three-worded text is the sweetest thing I've read in ages.
We have her.?? Un-Sleep ??IF ONE SAYS TOMATO, and another says to-mah-to, there's also such a thing as saying 'un-sleep' when waking one up from a magically sedated sleep. That's just how Wunderland logic works, and Rebecca comes out of her drugged state with a panicky gasp the moment Haine murmurs the word.
"Oh my God." She starts to cry when she sees herself tied to a stake like a witch on trial, and her cries turn into desperate sobs as she looks wildly about her and takes in the crazy number of doors lined up in my doorway. It takes a while before she finally realizes she's not alone, and when her gaze collides with mine—-
Rebecca's eyes fill with terror, and her body starts to shake violently. "You!"
"Uh..." I want to say something just as dramatic, but the other girl's clearly not interested in hearing my answer, with the way she's already started screaming.
"Help! I'm being kidnapped! Somebody, please help me!"
The shrillness of her screams make me wince, but when I take a peek at my companions' expressions, Rayé only looks bored while Haine...
Uh oh.
The Hatter suddenly shifts into a lion with a fang-flashing roar, and it works like a charm.
My entryway is quiet as a tomb now while Rebecca is pale and unmoving. I see her eyes start to tear, and I realize she doesn't even trust herself to blink without being chomped to death. It almost makes me feel bad, really.
Almost.
But when I remember how she has very likely something to do with Laurel coming after me with a knife—-
I cross my arms over my chest and give her a good, hard glare. "We're going to ask you some questions, and you're going to answer us with nothing but the truth. Because if you don't..."
The plan is to just give her a little scare, but since Haine, bless his merciless heart, is not the type to do things half-assed...
Oh...wow.
Even I end up breathless as I watch the Hatter's leonine form make a thirty-foot jump before crashing down right in front of Rebecca, sharp claws just an inch away from her throat-—
Oops.
The Hatter shifts back into his human form, asking, "Too much?"
"Uh...yeah?" The girl's fainted dead away, hello?
"Injecting a little fear in a person never hurts," Rayé dismisses.
A little fear? I don't know whether to feel protected or worried, the way these two shifters are so out of touch with how terrifying they are when they're in their feline forms. But one thing's for sure at least: once Rebecca surfaces, I'm betting my life she's going to start singing like a canary...I'M RIGHT, I think fifteen minutes later. The moment the other girl wakes up, she can't speak fast enough, and the whole story comes stuttering out.