Page 25 of Come Out & Prey

Why do I feel like my mouth is full of cotton balls? Gross.

I never understood how some prey animals can deal with furry little tails during sex, but I’m glad I likely won’t have to worry about cutesy shit like that. With my luck, I’ll be a dumbass wolf shifter—the most common pred around. I’m not anything special now, and I won’t be then.

Ugh.

“I.. I don’t... feel good, Mattie,” I groan, flopping onto my back as the room spins. Clucking her tongue, she walks over to draw the curtains, and panic hits me. Where the shit are the Heathers? Did they get out before anyone came to find me? “Um…”

“Whatever you took last night to sleep must have been helpful, Delores. It’s ten a.m. and even if you feel wretched, your team has arrived to get you ready for the dance at Apex tonight.”

Blinking, I sit up, and the brass band in my head plays at full volume. “Took? Apex? Team?”

Matilda sighs and sits on the edge of the bed. Her voice drops to a more tolerable volume as she looks at me. “Yes, dear. They have moved the prom to Apex Academy because of some issue with the gym at Shifter Secondary. Lucille relayed that to me this morning, and I was supposed to tell you first thing. She also arranged for a team of stylists to assist with preparation, and according to her, it will take all day. She was so pleased with her intrusion that she didn’t even open the boxes that came from Monsieur Growlvinchy—which is a good thing, I think.”

My eyes fill with tears at my current predicament. The change of location ruined any plans I had for Todd and I after the prom, the vodka the Heathers brought left my body a mess, my friends left without a word, and now Lucille handpicked people to pluck and primp me to within an inch of my life.

I’ll be lucky if I don’t end up looking like an unpleasant episode of Drag Race.

Rubbing my hand over my makeup caked face, I croak, “Mattie, for the love of everything fangy, please find me some aspirin, awashcloth, and a plate full of grease. I can’t deal with them all on an empty stomach.”

Her face falls. “Delores, you’re not allowed to eat before the dance—Lucille’s order. I’m supposed to lace you into the lingerie and corset, then bring you down to sit for them immediately.”

Is shefucking kiddingme with this shit?!

Not Mattie, of course, but my evil villain mother has constructed an entire day’s worth of absolute torture to punish me for never living up to her expectations. This could be payback for many things, and I’m not sure if I’ll make it. My belly is roiling, but even my inexperience tells me I should putsomethingon it to help it settle.

“Okay,” I whisper, giving in before Lucille sends someone worse than Mattie to fetch me. “But I at least have to have water and medicine. Then the punishment can begin.”

“What in thehellisthat?”I growl, glaring at the poor woman wielding the smelly brushes with aplomb.

“Just lightening up the beautiful blond, sweetness,” she mutters as she wraps foil around the sections of hair covered in the substance that’s making me gag.

I know I seem like an idiot, but I’ve never done any of the high-maintenance shit Lucille wanted me to do with my appearance. I don’t dye my hair; I shape my own brows, and I paint my own nails. She hates I don’t avail myself of her generosity for beauty enhancements, but her dependence on a team of peopleto get her ready to even step out of her bedroom always seemed ridiculous.

Naturally, she has every type of service known to predator kind being performed on me today, making the hangover roar viciously through my system with no end in sight.

“It smells bad,” I groan, closing my eyes. Maybe if I just let them work and drift off, I can figure out how to salvage my plans for tonight. If I can picture the grounds of the school, I toured the other day without envisioning the teacher hotties, that is. I haveno ideawhy I’m so fixated on them when I have the world’s best boyfriend locked down.

Something has to be wrong with me, right?

“Delores, sit up straight so you can get used to the corset. You must be able to breathe properly tonight so you don’t pass out,” Matilda chides from her perch at the window. She’s been keeping a careful eye to ensure that Lucille isn’t setting me up to look horrific, and I couldn’t be more grateful, even if I can’t show my appreciation in my current state.

“Ugh,” I respond, my brain flitting back to holding the doorframe in the bathroom while Mattie pulled the stupid strings to tie me in like a heroine in a movie about the Old South. It felt like my ribs were re-arranging in my chest, and despite my protests, she pulled until my waist felt like it was in a sausage casing. “I was measured specifically for my dress. You don’t think this will ruin it, do you?”

She shakes her head with a smile. “Monsieur Growlvinchy asked me before we left yesterday if I thought your mother would make you wear ‘one of those archaic torture devices’, and I told him Ibelieved it to be likely. That’s why the dress did not arrive until this morning right before you awakened.”

My eyes pop open and I feel tears prick them. I don’t know what I did to deserve Mattie or even this fairy godtiger fashion designer, but I’m so unused to anyone being this nice that it’s making me feel like my heart is aching. “That was kind of you both.”

“Dangerous, too,” the peacock shifter in front of me mutters while she continues with my hair. “But I feel you. I hate how the predators try to make their kids feel like shit all the time. I promise we won’t do anything to make you look bad, either.”

Matilda smiles at her and puts her fingers to her lips. The rest of the stylist’s team nods, agreeing to the secret pact we’re all a part of now.

“Thank you,” I whisper, looking at them all. “I don’t know why I feel so hungover, but I’m sorry I’m not being helpful. My friends were over last night and I drank a bit of vodka, but I feel like a truck hit me.”

“That’s not what vodka and a hangover feel like, girl. Methinks you got bigger problems than just your momma,” the brow wizard badger remarks. “Someone spiked the punch, if you know what I mean. You need to watch your back tonight… you seem to have more enemies than friends.”

Seriously?! Did I break a sacred vase or something as a kid?

Now I have to worry about every single thing I eat or drink tonight while figuring out how to recreate my special plans with Todd in a new location that I’m not overly familiar with.

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