EDGE (Gentry Boys) by Cora Brent

Author:Cora Brent [Brent, Cora]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: UNKNOWN
Published: 2016-08-20T18:30:00+00:00

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CONWAY

The day had gotten off to a strange start.

First thing this morning I found a kid picking through the trash bin in the lobby.

Not a little kid – closer to a man than a kid – but still young enough that life hadn’t made him hard yet despite the wariness in his eyes.

I’d been on my way out, thinking I’d drive up to Flagstaff or something and celebrate two weekends of lucrative race winnings but seeing that scared kid rooting around in a wire trash can in search of scraps made me change my mind. He jumped at the sound of my voice and cautiously said his name was Ranger. To me that sounded like a lie that he’d made up on the spot but it wasn’t important. Once I swore I wasn’t a pimp or a dealer or a secret government agent he loosened up and let me buy him breakfast. Even Kilt couldn’t shove food down as fast as this poor kid. I found myself really feeling sorry for him after a more thorough appraisal told me he wasn’t quite making it on the streets. He was skinny and nervous and plainly tired. When I mentioned that I knew of an extra room he could have if he would just help with some housekeeping work around the hotel because the tweakers were really making a mess of things he almost dropped his milk glass in shock. He recovered, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and stared at me with a little suspicion.

“Why would you do that for me?”

I shrugged. “I’m feeling generous today.”

When he still seemed unconvinced I tried again, choosing my words carefully. “Look, Ranger, I’m not really doing you a favor. I’m just sick of living in a pigsty and anyway the owner’s been making noises about shoving the lot of us out and selling the place so it’s in my best interest to get it looking a little nicer.”

He thought about it. “If it’s a pigsty why do you want to stay there so bad?”

“I like it there.”

He grinned. “I used to help my dad out when I was a kid so I know how to fix things.”

“Yeah? Was he a handy man or something?”

The grin fell away. “No. He was the janitor at a high school.”

I didn’t miss the fact that he referred to his father in the past tense or that he didn’t seem to want to elaborate. Whatever his story was, he would fit right into the motley collection of humanity that ran around the San Gabriel.

When we got to the sixth floor, Eli was hanging out in the lounge. He gave me a ‘What the fuck’ kind of look when I explained about Ranger but I flipped him off and showed the kid to the room at the end of the hall.

Then I decided I’d had enough of babysitting today so I handed him a few hundred bucks and told him to go shopping and get what he needed.

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