He was going to tell on me. This was a set up.
He would tell on me, and then his daddy would kill me.
I had only been here a week.
His father found me crouched down behind a counter in a bakery that happened to be an underground drug supplier. I didn’t know that. I had a feeling that something bad was going on there, but I didn’t give a shit. I just wanted some bread. I stopped going back to my foster home a year ago. The food and bed weren’t worth it, not when the old lady wanted to touch me all the time. I hated it.
What was the point of taking a shower when you were stared at?
Anyways, Mr. Matthews found me and said he could use me…and that was how I ended up here—in his basement, sleeping on the floor. I didn’t have a mattress or a blanket. He said I would have to work for those. He told me I wasn’t allowed to talk to anyone in the house, including his kids.
But this little fucker couldn’t take the hint.
“Are you going to tell your father?” I asked calmly, standing up and stepping away from him.
Kevin and I were around the same age. He was the nice one; his older brother was dick. Ian Matthews was the biggest dick of them all. He was a few years older than me. Mr. Matthews always talked about how good Ian was at baseball.
He didn’t say that to me, but I had ears and Mr. Matthews had a big mouth. Even though I wanted to smirk, I kept my face neutral for the little prince before me. He stood slowly, dusting off the dirt on his clean jeans and Cubs jersey.
He whimpered a bit when he touched his knee.
Shit. Did I actually hurt him?
“Why did you do that?” he questioned, tilting his head. I blinked.
“I thought you were attacking me.”
“Why would I attack you in your sleep?”
Geez, this kid knew nothing. “People do that.”
“Do you do that?”
I shrugged. “I have before.”
“Why?”
“What are you doing down here? I am not supposed to be talking to you,” I snapped.
He flinched and kicked the dirt. He sighed after a moment, looking around the dark, cold basement. This was probably a horrible condition for him. It was a fancy hotel for me.
I hadn’t had a roof over my head in six months. It was nice.
“Aren’t you cold down here?” he asked.
This was a trick. He was testing me. To get me in trouble.
Anger rose inside me, and my mouth moved before I could stop it. “Stop being a little pussy. If you want to kill me, then fucking kill me.”
“You have a potty mouth,” he noted with a raised brow, his eyes filled with an innocence I'd never known.
We stared at each other for a few minutes.
“Father’s boss is coming today. I just came down here to warn you,” he explained, sniffing a bit. “It really is cold down here. How do you sleep?”
My anger went away as I continued to stare at him. “I thought Mr. Matthews was the boss.”
Kevin rolled his eyes. “He is only the boss in Chicago. Mr. Romano—”
