I didn’t know why someone had taken us that day. There’d never been any real explanation. I missed my parents and I missed my childhood. And I also missed that feeling of being so safe in their arms where nothing and no one could ever hurt me. The man who had killed them—the one who had kept me in a cage and who haunted my nightmares even now, twenty years later—had taken everything from me. I was still a broken seven-year-old little boy living in a filthy cage a lot of the time. I didn’t want to be him anymore.

  I fell asleep on the couch, crying.

  Chapter Nine

  “Shh! He’s asleep!” I heard CJ say the next morning.

  “No, he’s not.” That was Rex.

  “Both of you shut up,” Malcolm said.

  I smiled into the back of the couch. Bandit was on my head. My mouth tasted disgusting and my hair was probably a mess. I didn’t want to be seen when I wasn’t at least showered first, if at all, but I still sat up and pulled the blanket around me as I looked over at them.

  “Hi,” I said.

  Rex winked at me. “Are you getting up to make us French toast or what? We’re spoiled.”

  I rolled my eyes and looked down at Bandit, who was currently kneading my lap with her little paws and scratching at my blanket with her claws. “I need to shower first.”

  Rex smirked and stepped back, taking CJ and Malcolm with him and giving me the room to walk past them, dragging my blanket up the stairs behind me. I let myself relax in the shower. They were downstairs. They could handle whatever came. I had to believe that.

  When I came back out, the file was in front of my main doors. I picked it up and took it back to my office where I locked it up. Maybe someday I’d let Sophia know what had happened to me, but probably not. I didn’t want her to pity me, too. The three men downstairs currently feeling sorry for me was bad enough. I put on my fuzziest socks and I had planned to wear my massive black hoodie, but I decided on my rainbow one instead.

  They were in the kitchen talking when I came back downstairs. And without me having to say a word, Malcolm left to go do patrols. But first he kissed both CJ and Rex goodbye. I was watching, though, despite trying not to. But since Rex winked at me, I knew I’d gotten caught looking at them.

  I blushed and started getting the eggs, bread, cinnamon and vanilla out as Rex and CJ went to the other side of the room and started talking. I could feel them watching, but I didn’t let it bother me—or at least I tried not to.

  My hands were shaking when I pulled out my sedative and put it on the counter so that I didn’t forget to take it with some milk while I cooked.

  “What’s that?” Rex asked.

  I didn’t have to look to see what he was getting at. “My sedative.”

  “What happens if you don’t take it?” CJ asked.

  I’d only done that a few times and the results had never been good. I kept cooking, which had my back to them, while I spoke. “I have enough in my system to get me until ten in the morning before I really start to feel it not being there. After that, the panic would set in. I’d be upstairs shaking and crying until I either took a dose or I needed to be hospitalized.” That was what had happened last time, with Steven, a previous bodyguard. I’d been mad at him for making a lot of noise while he’d been working out, and I had forgotten to take it. I hadn’t remembered that I hadn’t taken it, so I hadn’t known why I’d gotten so sick or why I’d felt like such crap. But that had been a long time ago. Steven had been the one before Robert. And before him had been Ben. He’d gotten bored too easily and quit right away.

  “How long have you had bodyguards?” Malcolm asked me as he came in.

  That was a really short walk. “Part-time? Since I got out of the hospital when I was seven. I couldn’t be left alone and a babysitter wouldn’t cut it for Uncle Phin while he was at work. He was too afraid of losing me, too—or someone coming back to finish what the others had started.” I’d heard the phrase enough that I’d become immune to it. I turned around and put the first stack of French toast on a plate for whoever wanted it. No one came forward, so I figured they’d all eat together.

  “When did they start living with you?” Malcolm continued his questioning.

  I went back to making piles of French toast. The routine of it was comforting to me, especially since we were talking about things that were not my favorite subject. “I was ten with the first one who stayed the night. Uncle Phin couldn’t be here all the time anymore. It hurt him too much. And when he’d tried to take me away, I’d—” I shook my head. I’d tried to kill myself. I couldn’t be away from my home. I’d lost everything, and this was the one thing I had left of myself and my parents. I continued, “So I was allowed to keep living here, as long as I had constant supervision.”

  I turned around to find CJ frowning at me. “But you don’t. Have constant supervision, I mean.”

  Shrugging, I put more French toast on another plate. “People can talk to me. I press the button. They know I’m alive. It’s good enough.” Generally. At least it had been until these three had shown up and decided that wasn’t nearly okay. I’d never met such a group of pushy people in my life. But they were the reason I was currently downstairs instead of hiding in my rooms.

  Bandit got on the island and I put her back down on the floor. She howled at me for a bit, but I went right back to cooking. She had food and water upstairs. She was going to be okay for a little while as I made breakfast.

  My front door opened and I froze with the spatula in my hands. The three of them moved forward immediately. When they came back with Uncle Phin, I relaxed and kept cooking.

  “Well… This is unexpected,” he said.

  I nodded. I was feeling a little overwhelmed, too, but tried to hide it. “Are you staying for breakfast? I’m making French toast.”

  Uncle Phin smiled at me. “I can see that. And you’re downstairs. And your hood is down. When your therapist called me yesterday and told me the good news, I wanted to see it for myself.” He came forward and I backed up quickly, nearly burning myself on the hot pan I was putting more French toast into.

  Uncle Phin frowned and stopped where he was. “It’s only been a little more than a week. I guess they couldn’t work miracles on you.” He shook his head and looked sad. I wished that I didn’t make him feel that way. “Take your pill before it starts to wear off. Remember, you have to stay ahead of your anxiety, not try to play catch up when it comes over you.”

  I knew this. He didn’t have to tell me again. But since he was there, I stopped cooking for a few seconds and drank a glass of milk with my pill. “Are you staying for breakfast?” I asked him again.

  Uncle Phin nodded and started getting things in the dining room. Rex and CJ helped him set five places. I kept cooking while Malcolm leaned against the cabinets beside me. But he still kept at least five feet away from me. I watched him while I was cooking. “You’re the only one who doesn’t push me or tease me.”

  Malcolm smiled at me. “I figured you got enough of that from them. But, I was the first one of us to touch you.”

  I frowned. He had been? “When?”

  “I pulled you out of the pool.”

  I ducked my head. I hadn’t really been aware of any of that when it had happened.

  “We were all so afraid. Don’t do that again.”

  I nodded. “I won’t make you lose your jobs,” I promised him.

  But Malcolm quickly shook his head. “We aren’t worried about our jobs, Blake. We were worried about losing you.” I didn’t understand why they would have been, since they had only really just met me then, but I was saved from having to think about it anymore since the French toast was done. I went into the dining room first and everyone followed a few feet behind me. I chose my seat and they all sat at least one seat away from me. It was good that the table could seat eight people, since that gave me a nice buffer away from them.

  “This is very good,” Uncle Phin said. The rest of them nodded. “Why don’t you cook like this all the time?”

  That answer was complicated, and I wasn’t sure how to go about it without hurting his feelings. “Because…when I’m cooking, I’m vulnerable. I’m downstairs and I can’t just run back up to my rooms when I get scared, because then I might burn the house down or something. So I need to feel absolutely safe when I cook and, generally—usually, anyway—that means being alone, but knowing someone is around if I need them. I’m trying to be down here more, though.”

  Uncle Phin smiled at me. “I’m glad. There are so many things I’d like to show you when you’re ready. The botanic gardens are having a night blooming plants exhibit right now and the zoo has a new baby red panda.”

  I’d lost my appetite before he’d even stopped speaking. I knew that he meant well and that he was trying to help—and that he loved me. But I’d been struggling just to be downstairs with three people—and him being around was four people—and I hadn’t been doing all that well. I was starting to wish that I hadn’t come downstairs at all that morning. I hadn’t been outside in twenty years and the zoo sounded terrifying.

  I didn’t know how to tell him that I couldn’t do those things right now—or ever. He’d said that they would happen when I was ready, but I could hear it in his voice how excited he was. Like he thought he should start buying zoo memberships for us and we could start going weekly, starting next Saturday. Just the idea of it made me feel sick and completely terrified of ever leaving my bedroom again. I couldn’t do that—any of it—but I didn’t want to disappoint him either.

  “We’ll work up to that. Take it slow. Baby steps. Right?” CJ said, trying to pull me back from my fear and panic.

  I looked over at him and wished I were back on the couch and lying with his hand in my hair and my cheek on his thigh like we had been the night before when I’d felt relaxed with another person for the first time in a long time.

  “My nephew isn’t a baby. He doesn’t need to be treated like one,” Uncle Phin snapped at him.

  Malcolm and Rex looked like they were about to say something, but I beat them to it. “Yes, I do. I haven’t stuck my hand outside the front door in twenty years. I don’t know how to be out there.” I gestured with my fork to the back yard and all of the world outside of it.

  Uncle Phin frowned at me. “You haven’t? But I could have sworn that Steven said in his reports that you two used to go for walks in the woods.”

  I snorted and took a little bit of my French toast. “If we did, I wasn’t conscious for it.”

  His expression turned dark. “Don’t say things like that.”

  I quickly nodded. I knew better than that. “I’m sorry.” I quietly went back to eating, as did everyone else.

  When we were done, Rex took our plates. “Thank you,” I said as I looked up at him.

  He smiled at me, then gave me a wink, and I blushed, just like every other time I did when he paid even a little bit of attention to me.

  This time, though, Uncle Phin noticed, and he looked between us. “I’m not paying you to flirt with him,” he snapped at Rex.

  I sighed loudly and shook my head. He was glad that I was out of my rooms, and the three of them were a huge part of that, but when he saw them being nice to me, it wasn’t okay with him? “You don’t get to have it both ways,” I told him quietly, bringing Uncle Phin’s attention back to me. “Rex pushes me, CJ babies me and Malcolm watches over me. That’s how they work and why I’m down here to begin with. If you don’t want me to be social with them, then I can’t be down here, because they are the reason I’m not in my rooms.”

  Uncle Phin backed up and quickly relented. “No, I want you to have your progress. But if they are inappropriate with you in any way, I don’t want them here.”

  I looked down at the dining room table and blushed as I remembered what Rex had told me that he wanted to do to me—and with CJ and Malcolm, too. But before I could say anything about how they were nice to me or how they took care of me, Uncle Phin was already on his feet and pointing toward the door. “You three, get out. Right now. Whatever you’ve done to him, it ends now. You’ve clearly manipulated a vulnerable child. Get your things together and leave.”

  Rex was the first to start yelling. “We haven’t done anything to him! And he’s not some kid!”

  “Uncle Phin.” I wanted to say something. I had to explain to him that they’d been nice to me, that they were my friends. But no one was listening to me.

  Malcolm got in Uncle Phin’s face, too. And I stared up at him, hoping that he’d be able to come up with a solution for this problem. “We’ve done nothing to hurt him. If we could all just sit down and talk about this, I’m sure we could figure this out with level heads and a bit of communication.”

  But Uncle Phin wasn’t having any of it as he shook his head at them. “You need to leave. Now. If you don’t, I’m going to start calling the police and they’ll take you out by force. You’ve done enough damage to my nephew. I want you all out this instant.”

  CJ tried, but my heart was sinking. I knew it probably wouldn’t help. No matter what he had to say. “Blake needs us. He needs friends and he needs to be taken care of.”

  “I’ll be taking care of him, better than you three ever could have. I should have never allowed you three to come in here.”

  Uncle Phin put his hand on my shoulder, and I froze as his fingers tightened on my arm. I couldn’t move. I just shook and stared at them all. They didn’t argue with him anymore. They didn’t defend themselves, and they didn’t stay. Uncle Phin moved his hand to my hair as they got into their cars and left. As soon as he let me go, and I could move again, I bolted up the stairs then sobbed into my pillows. They’d been my first friends in twenty years, and Uncle Phin had sent them away just because I’d blushed so stupidly.

  I heard honking outside and I went to my window. Uncle Phin was yelling at them, but the three of them were standing in front of their cars and waving at me. I waved back and wiped at my eyes until Uncle Phin chased them away.

  Chapter Ten

  Uncle Phin came into my room a half hour later. I was lying on my side facing the windows and holding Bandit tightly against me. I was still softly crying, and I jerked away from Uncle Phin when he came over to touch my arm.

  “Whatever they did to you, I’m so sorry. It’s my fault that I hired them.”

  I didn’t look at him. “They didn’t do anything,” I snapped at him in between my sniffles. “They are my friends.” Or they were my friends.

  Uncle Phin was being as unreasonable as before, though. “I’ll get you someone else by morning. For tonight, I’ll stay here with you. And, Blake, you will tell me how they hurt you.”

  “They didn’t,” I repeated. But he was already walking away from me, leaving me alone again. I’d had people that could be my friends for the first time in my life and he’d gotten rid of them. I felt more alone now than ever.

  * * * *

  At eight the next morning Uncle Phin was replaced by David, a tall man in his forties who loomed over me when Uncle Phin brought him into my office. It was an invasion and I stared at Uncle Phin, too shocked to say anything.

  “David, this is my nephew, Blake. He is to be downstairs at least four hours each day. Make sure of it.”

  “But—” That wasn’t fair, and Uncle Phin had never said that before. I’d never had those kinds of demands put on me. Was this all because of Rex, CJ and Malcolm?

  Uncle Phin looked angry as his gaze snapped over to me. I shrank back away from my desk and rounded my shoulders. “You did it for them. You can do it again.”

  He didn’t understand and I had no idea how to tell him. “They were my friends!” I cried out, my voice louder than I’d used it in years with him. “I don’t even know him.”

  Uncle Phin went over and clapped David on his back. “You don’t need to know him. He won’t hurt you like they did. That’s all you need to care about at this point.”

  I dropped my head and sighed. “They didn’t hurt me. They didn’t do anything. They were my friends.”

  Uncle Phin shook his head and left with David. Uncle Phin was gone by nine, leaving me alone with David. I had a little time to work before he came upstairs to get me. But when that time was up, he didn’t knock on the outer doors. He just came into my office.

  “I need these rooms to myself,” I told him. My tears had long since dried up and now I was just angry.

  “That’s not what your uncle said,” David snapped at me.

  I had no idea what he was doing until he’d come around the desk and grabbed me by my upper arm. He wasn’t hurting me, but his grip was firm. I tried to struggle out of his hand, but that only made him hang onto me tighter. “Let me go!” I was close to screaming and already shaking. I hated that he was touching me. He wasn’t gentle or kind to me as he dragged me to my feet.

  “Oh, stop being a brat!” David shouted at me, shutting me up instantly. But he couldn’t stop the tears that slowly tracked down my face.

  I went with him downstairs, but only because I didn’t want to fall. “I’m going to tell my uncle that you’re being cruel,” I told him with all the venom I could muster as he sat me down on the couch in the lounge.

  “Your uncle told me to get you out of your rooms, however I had to do that. So sit here for a while and watch TV or something.”

  I hated David. I realized that as he put on some daytime talk show and laughed like an idiot. My arm hurt from where he’d grabbed me, and I really wanted to trade him for the guys. But they were gone and I was stuck with him, which sucked.

  My phone was in my pocket, so I pulled it out to be able to text Uncle Phin.