Atticus dropped his gun and ran to Jericho, throwing his arms around him. He didn’t care if he looked weak or desperate. He just needed to touch him, feel the heat of his body, feel his breath, hear his voice. Holy fuck. Holy fuck. That was so close. Too close.
Jericho hugged him back tightly, burying his face against his neck. “And you said you were bad at killing, Freckles.”
“I think my heart stopped,” Atticus confessed.
Seven clapped Atticus on the back. “Nice shot, man. Can we get the fuck out of here?”
Atticus nodded. “Yeah, let’s go.”
* * *
Atticus stared down into the pit below, at the slew of boys shouting and throwing Doritos at each other. There was a movie on, but none of them were really watching it. Felix had a sketch pad and was drawing something with long, sure movements. Arsen was sitting in the corner of the couch, away from the melee.
“Is it always like this?”
Jericho wrapped his arms around him from behind, hooking his chin over his shoulder to peer down at the chaos, saying fondly, “Sometimes, it’s worse.”
“Where did they all come from?” Atticus asked. “Do they have families of their own, or are you it?”
Jericho sighed. “Some of them have family, if you can call them that.” He pointed at each of them in turn, starting with the blue-haired boy. “Arsen had a father with Russian mob ties, who drove home with his fists exactly how bad for business having a gay son was.”
“Asshole,” Atticus muttered.
Jericho nodded, pointing to Nico, who sat dead center of the fray, a lollipop hanging from his mouth, like always. He reminded Atticus of Adam, so cocky, so self-assured. “Nico’s dad is doing twenty for money laundering, and his mother’s a disaster. He shares a shitty apartment with Levi, but the walls are paper thin and most of their neighbors are either sex workers or drug dealers, which makes it hard to sleep.”
Atticus scoffed. “I imagine it would be.”
Atticus knew what it was like to be afraid to go to sleep at night because it wasn’t safe. He hadn’t thought about it in years, but seeing Benny, seeing those boys below—barely out of their teens—trying so hard to stay safe made him think of his own fucked up past.
Jericho pointed to Cree. “Cree’s adoptive parents are abusive as fuck evangelicals who treated Cree like he a servant most of his life.”
Finally, he pointed to Levi with his angelic face and a mop of blond curls. “And Levi’s mom was an exotic dancer, so he had to be alone at night in a very dangerous neighborhood.”
“So, you…adopted them,” Atticus said, sounding both amused and impressed.
Jericho turned his head, kissing Atticus behind the ear. “I gave a bunch of queer kids a place to feel safe.”
Atticus tilted his head, giving him better access. “And trained them to kill.”
“It wasn’t my intention. When I went after the men who assaulted my mom, word got around. People started coming to me, people who couldn’t go to the police for fear of retaliation or being deported.”
Atticus leaned back against Jericho, sighing as his hands slid up under his sweater to caress over his abdomen. “You’re a good man. They held their own in the extraction.”
“Better than me,” Jericho said, his tone suggesting he was only half joking.
Atticus craned his head to make eye contact with Jericho. “There was no way you could have known that bitch would be there on the other side of that door.”
“I dropped my guard. I should have had my gun at the ready, then I could have just fired. I would have had the element of surprise.” Jericho shook his head. “Yeah, but if you hadn’t been there—”
“But I was. I’ll always be there,” Atticus said, knowing deep in his bones it was true. There was nobody but Jericho. Nobody. Nobody even came close.
Jericho still gazed down at the boys, his voice quiet as a confession. “Sometimes, I wonder if I fucked them up for life. I never set out to create an army of teens. I just couldn’t handle everything on my own. There were too many people who needed help. At first, I tried to keep them away from the violence. They just gathered information for me, but eventually, they began to see it as a…”
“Calling?” Atticus supplied.
Jericho nodded. “It didn’t happen all at once, you know? Felix was being tormented at school for acting too feminine, wearing girl clothes, whatever the fuck that means. He was miserable, cried every single day. Then he became friends with Levi, who was also out and a little too pretty for the liking of his classmates. Whenever his mom was working, he would come here so he had a safe place to sleep. They just kept showing up, looking for a safe space. I just wanted everybody to feel safe.”
“You must have done something right. They’re still here.”
