the one with the pool that you showed me.”
Oh. Gray exhaled and felt a flood of relief wash over him again, more than before.
“There are some conditions, of course.” Kellan watched the numbers fly by above the elevator doors. “We don’t let someone from our community walk away with just anybody.”
Perhaps Gray had had enough of being apprehensive about everything; maybe he was done playing the weak underdog. Maybe he was tired. Or maybe he was just fucking done being controlled by others. Whatever it was, he wasn’t afraid of Kellan. At the moment.
“You may own the Philadelphia underworld, but you don’t own me, and judging by your success rate with bossing Jayden around, you don’t own him either.”
Jayden snickered at Gray’s response.
Kellan said nothing.
Once the elevator stopped, Gray took the lead and checked the pockets of his sweats for his keycard.
His room was only a few doors down the hall, and he let Kellan and Jayden in first.
Jayden snatched up his backpack and walked straight over to the unused bed, where he sat down on the foot of it and clutched his bag as if he was ready to settle down. Was that it? Was he staying here now?
Gray genuinely hoped so. He’d been really worried about the kid.
“Father O’Malley called the shelter in Washington,” Kellan said. “They’re expecting Jayden’s arrival in a few days.”
Kind of. Adeline had said Jayden was welcome, definitely.
“You won’t fly there,” Kellan went on. “You’ll drive.”
That was the plan. Gray wasn’t ready to face his hometown just yet.
Kellan turned to Jayden. “Remember the rules?”
The boy nodded. “I gotta call Malley and Sister Margaret a lot, I won’t run away, I won’t steal, I won’t sell my new phone.”
Gray’s brows went up.
Kellan chuckled. “Good. And you know how to find our numbers in the contact list now.”
Jayden nodded. “You showed me a thousand times.”
This was actually happening. Jayden was staying. Gray was bringing him to Camassia. He was fulfilling his vow to Jonas—or starting to. What he’d told Jayden was the truth. Gray didn’t take his promise lightly; he would be there for the boy.
It gave him a new sense of purpose. It also gave him some strength.
Kellan turned to Gray next. “I’d like a word with you out in the hall.”
“All right.” He grabbed his key again and let Kellan go first.
When it was just the two of them, Kellan leveled him with a serious stare.
“Your story checks out,” he said. “You seem like a good guy—lotta friends and family and all that—and I know what you went through last year. I read the report—”
“Excuse me?” Anger flared up. “Those records aren’t public.”
Kellan’s mouth twitched. “But they were available.”
To him and his mobster buddies with hacking skills. Fucking great.
“Look.” Kellan’s humor faded again. “Like I said, you seem like a good guy. You might be exactly what Jayden needs—God knows we ain’t. We can’t get the kid to stay in one place for longer than an hour. He’s constantly on the move, and he’s spent the last year going from one place to another while waiting for his brother to come back. He needs a break. He’s been through too much.”
Gray sobered and nodded once.
“That said,” Kellan continued with a pointed look, “we’re not backing off completely. Not by a long shot. For now, we’re your friends. You have our protection, even. I’ll be a call away. But if we find out you’ve harmed a single hair on Jayden’s head, what Alfred Lange put you through will be a post-fuck cuddle in comparison. Are we clear?”
Gray took a step closer, not intimidated—for once in his goddamn life. “Have fun watching me.”
Kellan smiled. “I will.”
Kellan left some twenty minutes later, leaving Gray and Jayden alone in the hotel room.
Jayden was inspecting the iPhone that the Irish mafia of Philadelphia had given him.
Gray had been instructed to stop by the church to let Jayden say goodbye to Father O’Malley before they left the East Coast behind. Other than that…Jayden was officially in Gray’s care.
It was scary, but not in an entirely unpleasant way. He needed things to do. He needed a direction. Helping a child had given him a good one.
“Do you have any friends who aren’t connected to the local mob?” Gray wondered, half amused.
Jayden scrunched his nose, then returned his focus to his phone. “What’s a mob?”
Damn. “Never mind.”
Jayden laughed. “I’m fucking with you. I know what the mob is. But I’m a kid. They’re nice to me.”
Gray stared at him. He had a