“Brat.” I snapped it up and helped myself. “Last one.”
“Uh-huh.”
Darcy lit his and then offered me the Bic.
We leaned on the railing, admiring the sleeping city.
“You’re up early,” I said after a few minutes.
Darcy blew a smoke ring. “Echo kicked me in the bladder, so I got up to pee. Saw you out here. Why are you up?”
“I never sleep well.”
“Dreams?”
“Sometimes. Does your landlord know you live in a practical drug den?”
Darcy shrugged and hauled on his cigarette. It wasn’t an answer, but it conveyed the answer I expected.
“Is your landlord your drug dealer?”
“No, but he has connections. If we go through his people, he doesn’t care that we get high. It’s part of the deal.”
“How many people live there?”
Another shrug. “Depends on the month. Sometimes two or three. Sometimes as many as six.”
“Fucking crack house,” I growled. “What’s your landlord’s name?”
“Andreas. Don’t know his first name.”
“Does he live in the building?”
Darcy snorted and shook his head. “Fuck no. He’s too stuffy for that. He runs a bunch of places around the city, or so I’m told.”
“Was he who hooked you up with Lukyan?”
“Yeah.” Darcy spat over the railing and watched it splatter below. “Told me if I didn’t make rent, he’d kick me out. Gave me Luke’s number and said he hired kids like me to do work on the DL. Cash in pocket. I told him I didn’t suck cock for nothing and nobody. No offense. Not my thing. He said it wasn’t like that.”
I turned, leaned against the rail, and studied the kid. He squirmed at the attention.
“What?” Darcy asked.
“This is the first time we’ve had a proper conversation, and I actually feel like you’re telling me the truth for a change.”
“I am.” His cheeks pinked. “I didn’t trust you before. I was scared that if I gave up Andreas, I’d end up on the street. I already did that for a while. I don’t want to go back.”
“You aren’t going back to that apartment. I don’t know what the fuck I’m going to do with you, but you aren’t stepping foot in there again. Got it?”
Darcy nodded, keeping his gaze averted. “Why are you so nice to me? No one’s ever been nice to me.”
It was a simple question with a complex answer. I was still trying to figure it out myself, but at its core, it came down to one thing. “You remind me of myself. Angry. Defiant.” I paused and presented the real truth. “Alone. I know what it’s like to feel like you’re drowning and no one cares. Everyone you meet would sooner push your head under water than save you. I know what it feels like to be out of control. Screaming on the inside. No one listening.”
“But you have Tallus.”
“I didn’t always. For years, the only person I had was my grandmother, and she’s sick. Doesn’t know who I am half the time. My dad beat me. My mother couldn’t love me. And I was too angry with life to make proper friends. I pushed people away before they could push me away. I drank. I smoked. I did drugs. I fought. It’s a wonder I didn’t land in prison or wind up dead.”
Darcy said nothing, staring down at the street below.