Page 65 of Dragon 7

Deja narrowed her eyes at me. "Bitch, since when?"

"Since recently."

"Recently like when?"

"Recently like recently, Deja."

She put her hand on her hip but let it go.

She knows something's off. She's tabling it.

The doctor stepped back and looked at the nurse. The two of them exchanged some sentences in Japanese that I now understood entirely. The nurse asked if they should report Kiko’s birthing the twins to the Dragon’s Roar. The doctor said no, not now, the Dragon was in his own war and his Tiger was alive. They were saving the twins’ complications for after the battle.

“What complications?” I turned to the nurse. "Where's Kiko?"

The nurse gestured behind her, toward a long hallway running off the end of the basement. "She is in the room down the hallway with her cousins. Once the DNA test results were given to her, she did not want to hold the twins anymore or feed them. We have two other nurses caring for them right now. Which is making us even more. . .short-staffed for the injured. . ."

The nurse let out a long breath. "We hope Kiko will change her mind—"

"Oh, don't worry." I swung my legs over the side of the cot. The blanket fell away. My bare feet found the cold concrete floor. "Perhaps I can change her mind."

The doctor took a step toward me. "Tora, you should rest."

I stood up. “I feel good.”

The basement spun once and steadied. I touched the soul pin at my robe to ground myself.

Yoichi rushed to my side, but didn’t grab me. Perhaps, he didn’t want me to learn any more of his secrets. And honestly. . .I didn’t want to learn any more either.

I straightened. “I want to go visit Kiko.”

“Me too.” Deja stood. “And you have to catch me up on who Kiko is.”

“Oh, girl. She’s the whole reason why the war is on this island.”

“Oh, word?” Deja frowned. “Then, fuck that bitch.”

“Exactly.”

The doctor got in front of me. “Tora, we think you should rest—”

"There’s a war on the island. There will be no rest for anyone."

Especially that bitch.

Chapter ten

A Fucking Queen

Nyomi

The whole walk to Kiko's room, I caught Deja up on the drama—Kiko possibly being pregnant by Kenji and Hiro, Kiko being a mean girl when I first saw her in the mansion, her trying to crash the Cocktail Party, and of course Kiko calling the Fox to give him the location of the island.

Deja listened and didn't interrupt me once.

By the time we reached the door, Deja had her hand on her gun. The only calming thing was that it was still holstered.

Babies cried somewhere down the hall. Two of them. Their cries came thin through the walls, one a little higher than the other.