Her Hidden Half (War Songs of the Courts #1)

Chapter Eighteen

I'd been passively watching them for about a minute by then, thoroughly entertained.

Kieran and a blonde woman he called Josie argued, not a breath wasted on any kind of mutual understanding. The best part of the whole thing was Reed. He was currently slumped against the wall next to the door, pinching the bridge of his nose, looking completely done with the both of them. He'd taken up the defeated position after he gradually lost his will to mediate the two, a sight that provided me with great amusement.

I wasn't thrilled by being woken up by the bickering, but at least I was getting a show out of it.

"How the hell do you think he got past the ward? It's impossible to breach from the outside," Josie asked, challenging him to give a plausible answer.

Everything she said came with a hint of entitlement. It was almost too easy to decide whether or not I liked her the moment she started to speak.

"He has to have someone on the inside," Kieran said, saying what I thought was obvious.

"And what self respecting shifter would conspire with a vampire? Especially one like Demetrius," she countered, a scoff of disbelief in her voice.

Okay, maybe it wasn't so obvious.

"You know what kind." Kieran gave her a knowing look.

"Oh, please. No one here would join that ridiculous group," she shot down his theory with a roll of her eyes.

"Then how would you explain it, Josie? He had to get in somehow," he said with an edge of frustration.

"I don't know, Kieran, but that doesn't mean that we should start jumping to insane conspiracy theories," she said, somehow looking down her nose at him even though he stood a few inches taller than her.

"Oh, come off it Josie," he threw back as he sat in a chair that was now set up in my room.

She managed to exhaust Kieran. That was impressive.

"Excuse me?" Her voice shrilled in outraged.

"You're excused," Kieran replied blandly as he leaned back in his chair, resting his calf on his other knee.

"Enough. Both of you. This isn't helpful to anyone," Reed interrupted before she could verbally claw Kieran's eyes out. Maybe even physically.

"But-," Josie objected before I cut her off.

"Why does everyone think it's okay to disrupt my sleep?" I sat up in the bed, meeting everyone's eyes as their heads turned my way.

"It's so rude," I said with a slight pout.

No one responded as they continued to stare. Josie breath whooshed out of her audibly as she seemed to remember how to breathe, looking a little paler than she had just moments before.

"Staring isn't exactly polite, either, you know," I informed the room with raised eyebrows, a sarcastic lilt in my voice.

"Does that mean what I think it means?" She whispered, as if that would prevented me from hearing her.

"I'm not sure. Maybe," Reed responded in a similar fashion.

Were they fucking serious?

"How is that even possible?" She said in an exhale, watching me with apprehension as she spoke.

"I don't know. It's never happened before," Reed said as he took in every detail of my being.

"I am in the room, you know. Mind letting me in on what hell is happening right now?" I said, interrupting when I couldn't take it anymore.