Chapter Two
FROST
Reed: I have the inside scoop. Frost got his tarot read.
Rook: It is four in the morning. FOUR.
Reed: Why are you up, then?
Rook: Stetson is allergic to sleep
Reed: I'd say fatherhood looks good on you, but I saw the bags under your eyes the other day.
Wells: I was about to get some sleep, but now we're talking about babies and tarot?
Reed: Frost got wrangled into the book club last night and they had the voodoo matchmaker chick read his tarot.
Rook: Gemma told me. She couldn't stop laughing.
Frost: Listen, I was promised free drinks and cream puffs. I was tricked.
Spencer: Only you would be tricked by cream puffs, Frost.
Wells: I'm honestly surprised he was lured anywhere for anything less than strippers and booze.
Frost: Cream puffs > strippers.
Wells: I'm genuinely shocked by that statement. I need to go lie down.
Spencer: What did his tarot say? Or are we just laughing at the novelty of Frost being the target of Kiss-Met's creepy magic?
Frost: It said everything is the worst and I should expect nothing to go right. Doesn't sound like matchmaking to me.
Reed: Ruth insists that it did, actually, point to Frost meeting someone fortuitously.
Frost: I reject that interpretation.
Rook: Right
Reed: LOL
Spencer: I'll see you at the altar in 6 months, buddy.
Real laboratories were messy. I wasn't sure what I'd been expecting when I visited my friend's lab for the first time, but it wasn't… clutter. When we exited the waiting room, which was more of a wide hallway with a desk, really, Wells led me down a short hall, past a breakroom on the right, a smaller lab space where one of his interns sat hunched over a microscope, and into the main research space. It almost looked like a kitchen but without cooking appliances.
The L counter that took up most of the white space was covered with scattered papers, micropipettes, racks of tips, petri dishes, slides, several computer monitors, and a small freezer unit. A giant centrifuge took up most of the right side, and there was one other lab tech in a coat wearing purple gloves and writing down something on a sheet of labels. It smelled like latex and antiseptic, and although I knew Wells would be nothing but fastidious with whatever he did, it was hard to accurately comprehend what the hell they were actually doing in here.
"I'd offer you a seat, but…" Wells trailed off, gesturing to the faded, rolling office chair that was stacked high with unopened white boxes.
I folded my arms. "You're worse than Rook."
"Take that back," Wells grinned crookedly, leaning against one of the counters. He placed his hands on the edge of the stainless-steel surface, drumming his fingers. "I know that seeing the work won't make much of a difference to you, but it's hard to portray how limited our resources are without actually showing you."
I panned a look around the small, crowded space. "Yeah, this is janky as hell."
"We're so close," Wells added, fixing his glasses. "Maybe not for whatyou'duse the compound for?—"
"Ageless beauty," I offered, lifting my hands in a flourish, mocking the beauty industry. "It's not the most altruistic motive."
