Page 12 of The Royal in Room 3

“Oh, great, you’re up.” The slender young man, who looked a couple of years younger than me, grinned. His tightly wound black curls made an Afro hairstyle about his head, and the ring in his left nostril gleamed. “Excuse me!” he said as he slipped past me into the room and ran over to the window, climbing up on the long cushioned seat and pressing his face to the glass pane pretty much the same way I had been doing a minute ago.

“Dean, you’re being rude.” The other guy hung back at the door, giving me an apologetic look while he wrung his hands.

“They’re doing it!” Dean cried with glee, ignoring his friend’s words. “I told you Tony and his Daddy had started having sex, and you didn’t believe me.”

“It’s none of your business.” His friend rolled his eyes and shifted from foot to foot. “I’m sorry about this,” he said to me. “We didn’t mean to intrude, but Dean’s a bit of a voyeur, so if you’re going to have sex, do it in private where he can’t watch.”

“Dude, when you say it like that, it makes me sound creepy,” Dean said, but his nose didn’t once leave the windowpane, so I was inclined to believe his friend. “It’s not like I’m going around looking for people having sex.”

“Hmm, so you just happened to catch Shannon and her stud Daddy in the act last week?”

Dean finally turned around. “It was innocent, I swear.” His friend didn’t look like he believed him, and Dean fixed his gaze on me. “Hey, new guy⁠—”

“It’s Soren.”

“Okay, Soren. If someone has sex in the open, doesn’t that mean they’re open to being watched?”

As someone who’d always been private about my sex life, given my status as royalty, I wanted to say no, but at the same time I kind of saw his point. Wasn’t the risk of getting caught part of the reason why people engaged in public sex? They could hardly be upset if someone then enjoyed the view.

“I guess,” I said, drawing out the last word.

Dean grinned. “See? Soren’s on my side. I can tell we’re going to be good friends.”

I smiled weakly. This definitely wasn’t how I’d anticipated starting the day, with one boy who seemed to be an eccentric chatterbox and another who looked like any minute now he was going to be sent to the principal’s office.

“By the way, this is Jorge, and he’s my best friend,” Dean continued. “He has lots of cool stuff that his two Bigs buy him, so drop by anytime you want. He and I share room four. Not that we have to, but we wanted to.”

“Oh, okay.” I didn’t know how else to respond. Halo House seemed more bizarre than Aaron had let on. He’d promised me no one would expect me to have sex for money, but there was a guy outside my window engaging in the act.

“Can I ask you guys something?” I asked.

“Ask away,” Dean said.

I nodded at Jorge. “Why don’t you come in and shut the door?”

“Oh, thanks.” Jorge slipped inside and quietly shut the door. He ran over to the bay window on the tips of his toes and plopped himself into Dean’s lap, tucking his thumb between his lips. Dean adjusted his body to make his friend more comfortable and brushed back Jorge’s short black hair in a soothing gesture.

“Jorge’s a little,” Dean said with a smile. “He will cuddle with anyone once they’re okay with it. He’ll literally climb into anyone’s lap, but only when his Bigs aren’t around. What did you want to ask?”

“Aaron—Officer Vale brought me here last night,” I said, taking a seat on the edge of the bed. “But I’m still not sure what Halo House does and what they expect from me.”

“It’s a temporary shelter for those of us who need it,” Dean said. “Think of it as a homeless shelter but with an upgrade. Phoenix works to find us sponsors who can help us get on our feet.”

I stiffened. “You mean financially?”

“Not always,” he said, frowning. “But that too, because let’s be honest, if any of us had two pennies to rub together, we wouldn’t be here. We all contribute to the household in one way or another doing chores, and we can work at Club Halo if we want to earn some money.”

“So it’s really not a…brothel?”

Dean laughed. “No, it’s definitely not that, but let’s just say that Phoenix is open-minded. For some of us, our bodies are our assets, so we don’t mind using them to achieve our goals. Phoenix doesn’t stop us from doing that, but he’s anal about us being safe, so the house is not primarily for hookups. It’s a residence first. We do entertain from time to time and have our sponsors over for parties and dinners, but it’s all aboveboard. Those of us who are paired with partners also have them visit us from time to time.”

“Partners? Like he picks partners for you?”

I didn’t like the sound of that at all. After everything I’d been through, I wasn’t looking for another disastrous love affair.

“He doesn’t pick them specifically for us, but he may suggest someone based on what he knows we need. For example, Shannon’s dream is to go to college and become a nurse. Her Daddy is a professor, so Phoenix recommended him to help Shannon grow, and it worked. Shannon just got accepted into community college, and she’s also madly in love with her Daddy.”

“Oh.” Slowly, everything was beginning to make sense, and I could sense my guard lowering. From everything I’d heard, consent seemed like an important part of this arrangement. “And what about the couple in the maze? You said the residence isn’t used for sex.”