Please tell me it's not a bail situation, Jason types.
No. Just... checking something.
Silas...Knox's message trails off, then:Get back here. Safe.
I send a thumbs up, but don't move. The shelter looks decent from the outside. Clean windows, maintained entrance, security cameras. But it's still a shelter. Still a place you go when you have nowhere else.
Devin appears in a third-floor window briefly, silhouetted against cheap blinds. Then gone.
The rain soaks through my jacket as I stand there, processing. He works full-time at the café. Robin wouldn'tunderpay him. So either he's saving every penny for something, or he's aging out soon and trying to get ahead of it.
Twenty years old. Who does he have besides Robin's casual kindness and whatever books he can lose himself in?
My phone buzzes again. Knox:NOW.
I turn back, walking fast through the rain. The note in my pocket is probably illegible now, ink running, but I can still see that careful handwriting, that hopeful little smiley face.
Tomorrow's Friday. He works noon to six.
I'll go back. Order the same coffee. Maybe mention I put Dragonflight on hold at the library.
Maybe ask what he's reading.
Maybe find out why a kid who should be in college or starting his career is living in a shelter and working himself exhausted to save forty dollars here and there.
The bar's warm and loud when I push through the door, shaking off rain. Everyone's there. Knox and Toby wrapped around each other on the couch, Vaughn and Robin arguing about something while Robin gestures wildly, Jason and Ash playing poker, Ezra and Nico doing something with the bar's books. Nico's got his laptop open next to Ezra's, the two of them shoulder to shoulder on their stools, and I catch something about NSRC case files before walking away. They've been like that since Nico moved in, working side by side, finishing each other's spreadsheets, the kind of quiet partnership that makes the apartment down the hall feel even smaller.
The bar smells like garlic and wine and the warmth of a space where too many people are crammed into not enough room and nobody minds.
"You're soaked," Jason observes. "And you missed my carbonara."
"Sorry. Had to check something."
Knox gives me a look that says we'll talk later. I nod, grab a beer, and settle into my usual chair.
"So," Robin says, abandoning his argument with Vaughn to flop next to me. "How was the café?"
"Good."
"Just good? I make incredible coffee and you give me 'good'?"
"Really good?"
Robin rolls his eyes. "Did you meet my new barista? Devin? Kid's a genius with the espresso machine. And he reads constantly, like you. You'd probably get along."
The pride goes quiet in that way that means they're all listening while pretending not to.
"He made my coffee," I say carefully. "Seemed nice."
"Nice," Robin repeats. "Silas, the kid memorized everyone's orders in a week. He reads fantasy novels on his breaks. He's so shy he literally hid in the storage room the first time Vaughn raised his voice about something. And you're going with 'nice'?"
"What do you want me to say?"
"That you'll come back tomorrow and actually talk to him?"
I take a long drink of beer. "Maybe."
"Oh my god," Robin throws his hands up. "You're both hopeless. He spent twenty minutes today telling me about your reading habits and you're sitting here like —"