Then a familiar face strolls in, glaring at us all. "Well, well, fucking well," Dice hisses, making Dray choke on a chuckle. "I can't believe you left me behind, damn it."
He sulks as he crosses his arms over his chest, staring expectantly at me. Where's Chaz when you need him?
"Sorry. It was sort of—well, Gage... and then... we didn't know if—"
"Hmph!" Dice sulks, earning a chuckle from the majority of the room. I swear he's three seconds away from stomping his foot.
"Dice," Zee says, sounding patronizing, "did you feel abandoned?"
The incubus stares down the night stalker who is teasing him. I bite back a growing grin, and then discreetly cover it with my hand when it becomes too much.
Dice breaks away from the group to join Zee and Deke to catch up on all the latest, since I just ran through it all already.
Kane rifles through his bag, and he smiles into it before looking up at Dray. "Thanks."
Dray smiles and offers him a wink. Obviously I'm nosy, so I try to peer into the bag, but Kane snaps it shut in front of my eyes. When I pout, he simply laughs.
"Come on. Let's get some rest. Red Moon is out tomorrow night, so we'll be sleeping in a cage. Dray and the others are going to secure it for us."
"Never thought I'd hear conversations like this in my safe house," Shay says as she materializes in the room, startling me a bit.
"Neither did I," Chaz says, materializing beside her and offering me a teasing wink. "But then again, Alyssa was always a little wild."
Everyone chuckles, but I scoff inwardly at the pathetic joke. I was anything but wild. Sheltered, naive, possibly stupid—not wild, though.
Mom clears her throat as she swallows a knot—possibly a wad of pride. "Shay—thanks—for all of this."
Shay looks at me and smiles, and then she lowers the stretch of her grin before facing my mother. "I've loved that girl for too long to let our problems get in the way of her safety. I'm still—confused by some of the madness, but we'll face it together."
They share a silent moment, possibly exchanging a wordless truce. Chaz bores and plops down on the other side of me.
"Now we just need to know who we're facing."
"The woman in white," Kane mumbles, thinking back to the small girl who has haunted his every thought.
"Sierra and I are going to go out tonight, see if we can sniff out anything that could be tracking us," Amy interjects, being unusually helpful for a change.
Kane stays lost in thought, never even hearing her, so she looks to Dray to make sure he heard her.
"I'll come with you. In case you have any problems," Chaz says, letting his devilish grin quirk up.
Oh. My. God. Did he seriously just flirt with her?
Amy rolls her eyes, though I swear she's secretly struggling not to smile.
"Last I checked, lycans are a little more badass than dusters. We'll be fine."
Chaz leans forward, eyes narrowed in challenge, and lips curved in a flirting grin.
"You have no idea how badass I can be."
Yep. He's flirting. Definitely flirting. We're not friends anymore. Nope.
Amy smirks as she leans forward, letting a feral gleam coat her eyes before they spark orange. "I'm not impressed by boys who fart glitter."
Several spurts of laughter spill free, but Chaz takes it well, shaking his head as he chuckles, too. He doesn't really fart glitter—I don't think.
Amy's smirk turns into a genuine grin, and I actually think I see a touch of blush on her cheeks. The devil bitch blushes. Unbelievable.
Dice's eyes widen as his laughter halts. "The woman in white," he says urgently, causing all of our laughter to taper off in response. "It's the imposter who is pretending to be Calypso."
He acts as though he has had a stroke of genius. Instead of being met with praise or gasps of realization, he's met with groans of exasperation.
"What?" he asks as the majority of the room gawks at him.
"Really?" Sierra says while settling down onto Deke's lap. "You don't think that's the first person we would have suspected."
Dice frowns as he glances around at all the eye rolls. Mom decides to elaborate for the clueless incubus.
"Frankie has stayed at the light council since we discovered there was an imposter. He hasn't let her out of his sight. You can vaporize to move around inside the council dwelling, but you can't vaporize yourself from inside to outside or from outside to inside. You have to walk in or out. She's a part of this, but she's not the leader."