Chapter 36

I have a family. It’s official. The paperwork has been signed. So much has happened in the past few months I’m finding it hard to believe it’s all real. I sit back and watch the chaos that is family game night as Laney likes to call it.

Storm, Maree, and I are all working on a puzzle together. Turns out that Rhea and Rick are a couple. After they spent a few months on the street together, an attachment formed and they have been inseparable ever since. They ran away from the system at age eleven and were picked up by Ronan’s goons a year later.

It has been interesting getting to know everyone. I feel like some of the guys don’t really trust me yet, but the three girls and I get along well. Rick has been helping me get to know all of them, but it has honestly been overwhelming.

Pokey, who has officially adopted the name Peter, no longer needs me to sleep with him at night. Most of the kids are coping better, and Ami and Ani seem so happy with their adoptive dads.

It’s funny to me how most of us came from foster care or parents who didn’t love us, and yet we find the most love and acceptance from a family of assassins. There has to be some kind of irony in that.

Once we finish the puzzle, the girls yawn and announce they are going to head up to sleep. Not once in the five days they’ve been here has any of them talked about leaving. They are all excelling in classes online now.

Dr. K thought they might be behind after missing so many years of formal school, but it turns out that the only subject where any of them are fuzzy is history.

Apparently, they took other classes while being held captive because Ronan couldn’t afford to sell ‘dumb’ kids. It’s paid off for them now though, and Dr. K believes that they could all test out of school and go to university early if they want.

“They could go to the island,” Evie suggests to Laney and Nessa while they all play Uno.

“We are trying to fill up attendance for the class in five years. Not many in the underworld are reproducing like they were before,” Laney adds.

“What’s the island?” I ask, sitting beside them and watching them play.

“It’s a university for the children of the underworld. After you go to college, you can request an invitation to Elysium. Evie’s the head of the society that runs the university,” Nessa says.

“What do you learn there?” I ask, grabbing a few extra salty chips out of the bowl in the center of the table.

“Whatever will help you succeed most in the underworld,” Laney says. “Before Evie was running things, everyone was required to take the same classes, but now she has it set up so you can better learn whatever you need to run the family business or choose a different path.”

“Like mafia businesses?” I scrunch my nose. “Aren’t you against that kind of thing?”

Cillian laughs behind me. “We’re still mafia, Kai. Don’t think that just because we have a few morals means we are above selling drugs or killing off our enemies.”

I roll my eyes at him. I knew they were some type of mafia or secret society something or other, I just don’t know their inner dealings.

“Don’t worry, Daddio. I have no delusions of you being heroes. Morally gray is still a thing.”

“Daddio?” Cillian mimics with a slight curve of his lips. I’ve been thinking about what I wanted to call them, and they all told me to do what feels right on my own terms.

They said they were comfortable with me calling them by their real names, but I could do whatever I wanted. I have been waiting for so long to have a family that I decided just calling them by their names wasn’t for me. I don’t quite know what I want to call Nessa yet, but Boris was easy.

I needed something they could both laugh at but also felt right for them too. Pops made sense because of how Cillian teases him for being an old man. Daddio fits because it’s sarcastic without being creepy like ‘daddy’ would feel. That’s for toddlers.

“I like it,” Nessa says, nudging me.

“Does that make you Mommio?” Cillian asks.

I shake my head at them. “I haven’t decided.”

I was worried Nessa would be offended that she was the last for me to figure out, but choosing the name I’m going to call her for the rest of our lives feels more important. I need it to be right for both of us. It needs to be a name that reflects the rock she is for me and how monumental she is in my life.

“Take your time, Kai. I’m not going anywhere,” Nessa reassures me, just low enough for us to hear. I lean my shoulder against hers. This is why she’s the most important. She grounds me, she understands me, she makes me feel safe even in the littlest of things.

I was a nervous wreck asking her if she would adopt me. I wanted to cry because I was so anxious to get the words out.

“Can I go to the island one day?” I ask Evie.

She lays down a card that has Nessa huffing in frustration as she draws a bunch from the pile.

“After you go to college, if Nessa allows it, I will personally send you an invitation.”

“Only if that’s what you want, Kai. I have no expectations of you going there,” Nessa tells me.

“I know.” I pop a chip in my mouth. “But it’s where you went, and from everything I’ve heard, it’s the place you found your family. What if it’s the place where I can find mine?”

Not that I don’t love the family I have, but I also know I’d like to make a family for myself one day. Besides, I have a feeling that this island is so much more than just a university.