And just as she was thinking that, she saw a shadow fall across hers from behind, and half turned, but it was too late. Something soft and dark muffled her vision and clogged her mouth and nose, and pressure around her head yanked her off-balance. She screamed, or tried to, but somebody punched her in the stomach, which took care of the screaming and most of the breathing, and Claire saw a weak, watery sunshine through the weave of the cloth over her face, and shadows, and then everything got dark. Not that she fainted, or anything like that, although she was wanting to, badly.

The hot pressure of the sun went away, and then she was being dragged and carried into someplace dark and quiet.

Then down a flight of stairs.

When the moving stopped, she heard breathing and whispers, sounds of more than a few people, and then she was shoved backward, hard, and fell off-balance onto a cold concrete floor. The impact stunned her, and by the time she clawed her way out of the bag that had been jammed onto her head—a black backpack, apparently—she found there was a whole circle of girls standing around her.

She had no idea where this room was. Some kind of storage room, maybe, in the basement. It was crammed with stuff—suitcases, boxes labeled with names, all kinds of things. Some of the boxes had collapsed and spilled out pale guts of old clothes. It smelled like molding paper, and she sneezed helplessly when her frantic gasps filled her mouth and nose with dust.

A couple of girls giggled. Most didn’t do anything, and didn’t look very happy to be there, either. Resigned, Claire guessed. Glad it wasn’t them lying on the floor.

Monica stepped out of the corner.

“Well,” she said, and put her hands on her hips. “Look what the cats dragged in.” She flashed Claire a cold toothpaste-ad smile, as if the rest of them weren’t even here. “You ran away, little mouse. And just when we were starting to have fun.”

Claire faked more sneezing, lots of it, and Monica backed away in distaste. Faking sneezing, Claire discovered, wasn’t as easy as she’d thought. It hurt. But it provided time and cover for her to pull the phone out of her pocket, cover it with her body, and frantically punch *2.

She pressed SEND and shoved it between two boxes, hoping the blue glow of the buttons wouldn’t attract Monica’s attention. Hoping Shane wouldn’t be iPoding or Xboxing and ignoring the phone. Hoping…

Just hoping.

“Oh, for God’s sake. Get her up!” Monica ordered. Her Monickettes sprang forward, Jen taking one of Claire’s arms, Gina the other. They hauled her up to her feet and held her there.