Page 75 of The Royal in Room 3

Silence filled the room at Phoenix’s outburst. A pained expression crossed Vale’s face, and he looked like he was about to be sick. Without a word, Phoenix stomped out of the room, and Shannon went after him.

“You know he doesn’t mean it, Vale,” I said.

“Yeah, well, I think he’s made it very clear the way he sees me,” the cop said hoarsely. “I’m off today, so I’ll look into this possible lead with Dean.”

“Keep me posted.”

“Of course.” He headed for the exit, his shoulders slumped in defeat.

“Vale,” I called to him, and he turned around.

“Yeah?”

“Thank you for looking after him. I know you’ll do everything you can to prove his innocence, and I appreciate that.”

“Of course. Soren’s a friend.”

When he left, I sagged against the backrest of the chair and stared into the murky black coffee that I hadn’t taken a sip of yet. The hardest part of this whole thing was waiting for the system to be up and running so we could make a move.

Hang in there, little prince. We’re doing everything to get you out.

Shannon returned a few minutes later, worried. “You should talk to him,” she said softly. “He’s taking this very hard.”

“Of course.”

Phoenix treated every single one of these boys as his own. Once, four years ago, Halo House had closed for almost a year because one of the Daddies Phoenix had introduced to a boy had ended up abusing him so badly that the boy killed himself. Phoenix had taken it personally, focusing on the one failure instead of all the successes he’d had. It had taken him a long time, with the help of therapy, for him to let go of the blame and focus on the number of abandoned people in the community he’d helped.

I took the stairs up to the third floor, which was Phoenix’s quarters, and no one else was permitted up there unless invited. It was the place where he was able to put down the label of Guardian Angel of Halo House and be human after giving so much of himself to others. I found him in the expansive sitting room, standing by the floor-to-ceiling windows with a glass in his hand.

“Isn’t it too early for a drink?” I asked, coming to a stop a few feet behind him.

“It’s happy hour somewhere.”

I sighed, slipping my hands into my pockets. “Why are you being so hard on Vale? You know he’s just doing his job and that this would have been much worse for Soren if he hadn’t gotten involved. He’s not the bad guy here, Phoenix.”

“Isn’t he?” He turned around to face me. “We talk every single day. Do you know that I wake up every morning with a text from him? And when it matters, he fails to reach out to me, knowing this concerns Halo House and me?”

“So you expected him to tip you off that they were going to raid Soren’s locker? You know that’s not the kind of cop Vale is. He’s a decent man.”

“Well, maybe that’s the problem.” Phoenix gulped down the rest of his drink. “This just reminded me that we are different. I can’t be with a man who follows the law so rigidly, Jude. I just can’t. Do you know what kind of life some of these boys who end up here have lived? So what if Soren had drugs in his locker? Not that I believe they are his, but even so, why does he need to be locked up for it instead of being given the chance to be better? These angels have learned to do what they must to survive. They don’t deserve to go to prison for that.”

“So that’s what’s been bothering you?”

“Don’t you see that it’d never work between us? Our work puts us at odds with each other.”

“Did you want to give it a shot?”

“Maybe. I’ve been thinking about it lately, having hope again, but now I know better.” He turned around and inhaled deeply. “Enough about Aaron. What’s the plan? We have to get Soren out even if it means breaking him out of jail. I have a connection you don’t know about, Jude.”

Despite the seriousness of the situation, I chuckled. “You’re not breaking him out of jail. We’re going to prove his innocence and get him out the right way. And then I’m going to lock his ass up at home so no one has the chance to frame him again.”

Phoenix nodded. “Yes, I very much support that.”

By ten that morning, I was seated beside my attorney in the lobby of the Headland Bay Police Department, bouncing one knee so hard that it shook the row of plastic chairs.

The station looked exactly the way I remembered police stations looking: dull tile floors, pale walls, and the constant opening and closing of doors. Officers moved in and out carrying folders, coffee cups, and evidence bags while civilians waited beneath signs explaining procedures.

The familiarity made my stomach turn. I had spent years trying not to remember the day I had been brought into a place like this. The confusion. The humiliation. The certainty that someone would realize there had been a mistake and let me go.