When he pulled her through, she looked around, expecting something grandiose, quirky… What she got was a dusty old workshop full of woodworking tools and machines.
His smile was radiant. “This is my refuge.”
He was looking around, and she was looking at him. So different from the moody Hatter she’d first met, now he was bouncing on his feet, gripping her hand like a lifeline while he waited for her to say something.
There were several unfinished pieces around. Something that looked like shelves sat on a far bench, and closest to her, a large chunk of driftwood with a scene etched into its side. She squinted.
The scene was a depiction of trees and nature, but within the copse of trees were rounded shapes. She smiled when she finally recognized it.
“That’s a carnival.” She looked at him. “Like the one on your wall the other night.”
His knuckled her cheeks, brushed against the corner of her lips. She kissed him, and his laugh was relaxed, easy.
Gone was the madness, the mayhem of irony, and the gloom of depression. “As a little boy, my mother used to take me to the fair.” His eyes shone. “I loved the rides, but most especially the giant wheel with lights. Round and round it went.” He shook his head. “I could have ridden it all night.”
She grabbed his hand, turning it over, finally noticing the thick calluses on his palm. She brushed her fingers over it and then brought it to her mouth and kissed each one. Such strong hands, loving hands. A true artist, he’d touched every inch of her with those hands.
She didn’t want to leave. Ignoring the heat starting to gather behind her eyes, she asked, “Why don’t we?”
He took her chin, lifting her eyes to his. “Alice?”
She shook her head and sniffed. “Why don’t we ride all night, Hatter? Eat cotton candy until we’re sick and can’t think anymore?”
He said nothing for a moment, and she knew he sensed her sadness. It was in the way his mouth thinned, his fingers clenched, but he nodded instead. “Yes. Let’s ride, Alice.”
They stepped outside the workshop and, as Alice knew there would be, a Ferris wheel sat tall and stately, waiting just for them.
He led her to a basket, and when they sat, the ride started of its own accord. Lively carnival music filled the woods, and it was so perfect, so wonderful, she wanted to cry.
Her heart was breaking.
This wasn’t fair.
He hugged her, pulling her to his side. The air was sweet with the scents of night.
“Alice.” His voice shook. “I want you to stay.”
She bit her lip and turned her face into his side. Wonderland had not accepted her. Of that she was positive. There’d been no music, no land shaking—her stomach churned—it’d rejected her too.
Then a thought came, and she grabbed the lapel of his multicolored jacket. “Come with me, Hatter. Come back.”
He blinked, his eyes went hooded and she didn’t want him to say no.
“Not forever.” She rushed on. “Just long enough for me to get my life in order. Then we can go anywhere. Anywhere you want. We can be together. I’ll stay here permanently if that’s what you want.”
Already she imagined introducing her crazy boyfriend to her parents, to Tabby, and fought a snicker at the thought. Her conservative parents would flip. Tabby, on the other hand, would probably love him.
“No.”
She jerked. “What?” Alice drew a blank on her thoughts. “No?”
“No.” His jaw clenched, and her stomach dropped like the ride she was on. He couldn’t say no. Hadn’t he just said that he wished she could stay?
“But it’s perfect.” She should stop talking, stop embarrassing herself further, but she had to make him see.
His nostrils flared and he looked away. “I wish…” He squeezed his eyes shut. “Gods,” he moaned. “So many things. So many things, Alice. Please”—and she heard the same desperation in his plea as had been hers—“please stay with me. Don’t go back.”
A lump wedged in her throat. “Hatter, you know I can’t. Not if Wonderland rejects me. Danika told me the ground would rock and the air would sing.” She had no way of knowing if she’d broken it or not, but it didn’t feel like anything monumental had changed. There’d been no songs, no quakes. Which meant another Alice would come.
It was a bleeding-wound type of thought.
He shook his head. “It’s over. I don’t care. Let them come, let a million more come. I won’t have them, any of them.” He touched her chin, forcing her to look up at him.
“I just want you, Alice Hu. You. You, perfect china doll in the white clouds with that beautiful widow’s peak”—he touched her hair—“and your dainty feet, and bow-shaped lips that utter poetry and make me feel… alive.”
Tears started dripping then.
“I—” She sobbed hard, the tears obscuring his face. “Hatter, what are you doing? You know I can’t. I haven’t been—”
“Dammit!” he snarled. “Always no. Always, always no.”
She shook her head. Couldn’t he see she had nothing to do with this? She couldn’t control this—why couldn’t he understand that? Why was he making it so difficult on her? “Hatter, come. With me. Please.” Her words came between stuttered sobs.
“I can’t.” Two simple words, but they rang with the finality of a death knell.
He pulled his arm out from behind her, and Alice couldn’t believe it. Not after last night, this morning, all the heated whispers of love and adoration. He felt something. She knew it.
“We still have time. Please don’t do this yet. Please don’t turn away from me. I have responsibilities, but I love you, Hatter. It’s always been you. Please.”
He closed his eyes, the ride stopped, and he lifted the gate. “Don’t say things you don’t mean, Alice. I will not go and you cannot stay.”
“Stop telling me what I mean,” she snarled. “I’m so sick of you thinking you know me. Thinking you know at all how I feel.”
He didn’t react but simply said, “Love opens the gates, Alice.”
His eyes were distant, and she knew the truth. It was over.
He stood up and started to walk away, then stopped and came back. She thought maybe he’d changed his mind; her heart leaped and she wiped at the tears running freely down her cheeks. She didn’t know why Wonderland still rejected her, but it wasn’t for lack of love. She burned with it.
He took her hair, slipped it through his fingers, and shuddered. “I…” He swallowed and dropped his hand.
Desperate for his touch, unwilling to accept this, she leaned in. It couldn’t be over.
“Good-bye, Alice girl.” Then he turned, head held high, and walked off.
She stood numb, watching the scene unfold with cold detachment, her brain unable to accept the reality of the moment.
What had just happened?
He’d left her.
Why?
She hugged her arms to her body. Her hero. The man who’d saved her life. He’d walked off, never looking back. No kiss. No nothing.
Why couldn’t he have come home with her? She sucked in a breath, body shaking. She’d said she would say good-bye and go anywhere. She’d be happy so long as they were together, it didn’t matter where. Here. Earth. Anywhere.
The tears came harder, fatter, and hotter. She could hardly breathe out of her nose. Blue light shimmered in front of her, and then she stood face-to-face with the door.
Alice looked around. The Ferris wheel was gone; the woodshop was gone. She stood in the middle of an empty field.
Heart miserable, she reached out and took hold of the knob. Her foot was poised above the threshold as the memory of his words to her in the hospital room crowded her mind.
“Everything has beauty,” she said, “but not everyone sees it.” Her stomach hurt; her eyes burned. “I saw you, Hatter.” Her words whispered through the night. “I saw you.”
She walked away.
Hatter stood behind the s
hadow of a tree and watched her walk away, taking the last shreds of his heart with her. She’d lied. Just like the others. Told him she loved him, but she hadn’t. Because Wonderland would have said yes. She’d been perfect. So perfect, his tiny Alice with her piercing eyes and wicked mouth. He trembled, remembering her touch, her tongue.
“I saw you too, Alice.” His words carried like a whisper on the breeze. Wonderland shuddered, the wind sang with a choir of a thousand bells, and the ground swayed.
Hatter gripped the tree and horror blanketed his mind. Wonderland said yes, not because of her words, but because of his.
Chapter 12
Alice was gone and his heart bled crimson. Hatter grabbed his temples. She’d not lied when she’d said she loved him. Wonderland accepted her, wanted her. And she’d left them both.
Because of him. He’d not told her the truth, why he couldn’t go with her. Why he could never leave. She’d thought he’d rejected her. He should have told her the truth.
“Damn me.” He pounded his fist on his chair. The sky outside the window rolled with thunder; black clouds bloated with rain drenched the lands. She’d left, and it was all his fault.
Frogs dropped from the sky by the thousands, their dying croaks lingering in his ear like a macabre lullaby.
All his fault.
Dueling rams knocked horns, their strikes raging with the sound of thunder. His house shook, but Hatter wouldn’t move. He’d stay and watch as Wonderland ripped herself apart.
He swallowed the bile in his throat.
He should never have kissed her. Touched those soft pink lips, tasted the dew between her thighs. Heat spiraled down his legs, made him weak in the knees and stirred his blood. Gods, she’d smelled so good.
Like salt and caramel. His mouth watered, wishing he could taste her again, sink into the mindless oblivion of her beauty.
He was the Mad Hatter; he should have known he could never have a happy ending. He’d never allow it.
“Insane. Stupid. Insane,” he muttered. “And the raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting / on the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door; / And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon’s that is dreaming, / and the lamp-light o’er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor; / And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor / Shall be lifted—nevermore…”
“Hatter.” A golden ball of light materialized before him, the humming flit of wings becoming an irritating buzz. He swatted at Danika.
“Damn you,” he snarled, eyeing the fairy. “Why did you bring her?”
Her blue eyes grew wide and sparkled with tears. “Oh, Hatter.” She grabbed her chest. “What can I do? I cannot bring another Alice; she’s been found and Wonderland…”
Hatter pounded his fist. Blackbirds dropped like cannon shot against his roof, landing in front of his window with unblinking eyes. “I don’t want another! I want her. I want my Alice. My AlicemyAlicemyAlice.”
He grabbed his head; it hurt. It hurt to think of her; he closed his eyes and she was there, but when he opened them she was gone. Gone, gone, gone, and he was lost.
Come to me, my Hatter. The words tore through his skull. He dropped to his knees, heart thundering. “Alice!” he screamed. Come to me, my love. Come to me, tometometome…
“Alice!” Hatter cried. He heard her—she called to him. Wanted him. Needed him, just like before. But there was only blackness, no white clouds, just blackness and beeping, and his heart tore into a thousand fragments of fear because he tasted her sickness; the bitter nip of cancer spread inside and through his head. “Alice?” he screamed again, but the faint voice did not return.
“I cannot go to her. I cannot find her. Lost to me. Should have told her. Should have said why… She’ll never know…” He rocked, grabbing his chest and moaning aloud. Why had he sent her away? Stupid Hatter. Stupid. A dark void swirled in his vision; thoughts crowded his brain, sucking him down into a bog of nonsense. He couldn’t go to her. Couldn’t find her.
Danika shook him. “Look at me, Hatter. Tell her what?”
He shook his head. Thoughts scattering, rolling, mucking him up. Sweat beaded on his forehead as he squeezed the last lucid memory from his mind. “Love her. Alice is dying. My Alice. My Alice. Get her, Danika. Please…”
Then the voices crowded him, a million talk-talking sounds, and he stopped fighting. Too hard to remember, too easy to forget.
“Prophet! said I, ‘thing of evil!’—prophet still, if bird or devil!— / Whether Tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore…” Hatter never tore his eyes from the storm; his nails bled from scratching at the wood of his armrest as the madness of his mind consumed him.
Chapter 13
All Alice wanted was her room and her bed. She wanted to lie down and never move, never have to remember or think about the man who’d stolen her heart. Again. She almost crawled up the last flight of stairs, shaking the knob with weary hands. It was locked.
She frowned and patted her body. She was wearing the cami and shorts she’d worn the first night. No purse, which meant no keys and no cell phone. And it was late.
She didn’t want anyone to see her like this, her face all puffy from crying. Tabby had told her once she was an ugly crier. It was true. Her nose always got cherry red at the tip, and her eyes would turn puffy and purple.
Exhausted, annoyed, she kicked the door and then headed back down. She’d walk to the shop. Maybe Tabby was still there.
She grabbed her head. It was throbbing again. Somehow, and she couldn’t even remember doing it, she walked the three blocks to her storefront. Waikiki was dark, with few stragglers around. It had to be well past midnight, but things didn’t slow down until at least two or three in the morning.
“Dammit!” She sobbed, the tears started back up again. Last thing she wanted was to be locked out all night. She wanted to sleep, to forget him, to forget that. To forget it all.
In frustration, she yanked on the door and yelped when it gave way, nearly causing her to fall down as she stumbled through.
“Alice!” Tabby’s cry was unmistakable and filled with panic.
“Tabby?” She looked around the dark room and finally saw a small movement slip away from shadow.
Then arms were crushing her and she was crying loud. “I knew it, I knew you’d come back here. Alice, where the hell have you been?”
Tabby clung to her so hard she could barely breathe. Wanting to kick herself all sorts of stupid, only just realizing she’d been gone three days. They’d all probably been sick with worry.
“I…” She pulled a blank, not knowing what to say. Who would believe this story? She wouldn’t believe this story if she hadn’t lived it. “I’m fine.” She laughed, trying to play it off, and disentangled Tabby’s arms from around her neck.
Tabby growled. She walked to the wall, flipped on the light switch, and pointed at her. “How dare you leave like that? How dare you.” Her brown eyes were thin slits, and Alice had never seen Tabby so angry. Vibrating with it. She looked like hell too.
Her eyes were puffy and dark, like she hadn’t slept in months.
“Do you know how hard it’s been running this place without you? Wondering if you were dead or alive? Your mom has been crazy with grief.”
She laughed. “Jeez, Tabs, I’ve only been gone three days. I’m sorry but…”
Her eyes widened. “Three days! Try three months, you asshole! Three months!”
“Shut up. Don’t be stupid.” She laughed, but Tabby didn’t crack a smile. In fact, she didn’t even blink. She walked up to Alice, grabbed her shoulders, and shook. Panic was so thick on her that Alice felt it choking the breath from her lungs like smoke from a fire. “Tabs?”
Her lips wobbled, and Alice could see she had a hard time swallowing. “Three months, Alice.”
Her knees suddenly gave out on her, but thankfully Tabby anticipated that reaction and pulled a chair out just in time. She plopped onto it, grab
bing her head. It was splitting, and each time she swallowed, she tasted metal on her tongue.
Alice shook.
Tabby dropped to her knees, wrapped her arms around her waist, and held her tight. Hot tears soaked the front of her shirt. But Alice was cold. Calm. She knew.
The pain in her head, the visions. She closed her eyes. The loss of time.
“It’s back, isn’t it, Tabby?”
“Oh Alice, Alice.” She repeated her name like a litany. “Best doctors. Best care. We’ll catch it in time.”
Empty words. Three months. That was a long time. The longest blackout ever. They both knew. The tumor was back.
She should be crying. But there was nothing there now. She was empty. Devoid. And a part of her had suspected when she’d told him her story. It was back. She closed her eyes, remembering dark brown eyes that made her want to melt at his feet. Made her want to forget this world.
Something wet slid from her nose, and when she brushed the back of her hand against it, a red streak smeared her hand and the strong scent of blood filled her head.
Had it only been a dream?
The doctors had done all they could. But the tumor was too large, too deep, and two weeks later, she battled for life. Wonderland was a fairy tale that no longer existed for her in the new reality of doctors and cancer. In a matter of days, she’d become an emaciated skeleton. Doctors had been shocked at her rapid decline. Even she’d been amazed, as if the three months she’d been missing and healthy suddenly spun time forward the moment she’d set foot back on Earth. She was skin and bones, with nothing but a few stray hairs on her head. She looked dead already.
[Kingdom 01.0 - 03.0] Kingdom Series Collection Page 12