Lorenzo
The burritos Romero had picked up for Lorenzo and Vince from Moreno’s were as good as ever. Lorenzo and Vince sat in the empty back training room, eating theirs. It was where the lectures and state-mandated videos for their armed security courses were normally held.
Romero, who’d been at the firing range with some of his new hires for a few hours now, walked in just as Lorenzo poured more green sauce onto his burrito. “You got the shrimp and steak, right?” Romero asked Lorenzo as he approached them.
Lorenzo nodded as he chewed the delicious burrito. After wiping his mouth, he was able to talk. “I don’t think I’ve had this one before, but it’s damn good.”
“I got the al carbon burrito,” Vince said, wiping his lip with a napkin. “This shit is good, but I don’t remember this hot sauce being so spicy.” Vince grabbed his soda and took a good long drink.
“Speaking of spicy,” Romero said, grabbing a chair and the bag on the table then straddling his chair as well. He eyed Lorenzo with a dumb smirk, and instantly, Lorenzo knew where this was going. “When I first heard about you and Livi, I thought maybe you were just, you know, hanging out with her. No big deal. But you’re hanging out with the family now too. So I take it this is getting serious?”
Lorenzo stuffed the last piece of burrito in his mouth, crumpling the foil it’d come in and stood up. He nodded as he lobbed the foil ball into the wastebasket in the corner of the room, smiling when it swooshed in beautifully. Wiping his mouth, he turned back to Romero, who was now eating his burrito but still eyeing Lorenzo.
“It’s been serious,” he said, walking to the desk behind Vince. “I’m not in the habit of going out with anyone more than once if I’m not serious.”
“Yeah, no shit,” Vince said with a mouth full then wiped his mouth and turned to Romero. “Rosie really likes her too. She seems like a real nice girl.
“She is. They all are. She and her siblings,” Romero said then smiled still chewing. “And I’m not just saying that because they’re my cousins. They went through some major shit.” He shook his head. “No one should ever have to go through that shit, and yet they pulled through it all.”
Lorenzo had started scrolling through his phone when Romero’s comment got his attention, and he glanced up at him, but Romero had just taken another bite. He thought of Liv’s mom. The night Liv had first told him about her parents passing in the same year she said she’d preferred to hold off until another time to talk about her mother’s death. She said it was too heavy a subject for that night. Ever since then Lorenzo’s cowardly ass had steered clear from asking. It wasn’t just that he could do without hearing any details of a possibly long torturous illness that ended in death for her mom. He just figured if that’s what it was, he didn’t need to know the details, so he didn’t see the point in making his sweet girl relive it. Now he wondered if there was more to it. No one should ever go through that?
“How’s she doing with that by the way?” Romero asked when he was finally done chewing. “Her brothers never talk about it, but Uncle Lou told Manny and Max the two younger ones had been in therapy for months afterward. I think Livi and the older ones passed on the therapy.”
Lorenzo stared at Romero now, feeling stupid about how serious he made it sound and yet here he didn’t even know how Liv’s mom had died. Apparently it was pretty bad.
“She hasn’t talked about it,” Lorenzo said, perusing his phone and frowning when he had nothing from Liv yet. “She started to once but then said it was too heavy a topic to get into and she’d tell me more later, but she hasn’t and I haven’t wanted to push.”
Vince had been eyeing them curiously, and Lorenzo was counting on him asking Romero more about Liv’s mom until his phone rang. Vince pulled it out of his holster and was quickly on his feet. “I’ll be back,” he said as he headed to the door. “I gotta take this.”
It was almost six, and normally by now Lorenzo would have heard from Liv, even if it was a short text saying she was on her way home. He remembered her saying today’s last stop was a high-maintenance one. So he set his phone down, figuring she’d just gotten caught up.
Romero stood up, crumpling up his trash. “So by serious with my cousin you mean you’re done with your ex what’s-her-face, right?’
Trying not to frown, Lorenzo responded as vaguely as possible. “That’s ancient history. I haven’t even talked to her in almost a year.”
Continuing to peer at him curiously, Romero surveyed him up and down for a moment. “Seriously?”
“Yeah.” Lorenzo laughed now though he didn’t feel all that humorous.
“But I thought you two were engaged and everything,” Romero said, throwing his own trash in a nearby wastebasket. “I thought for sure by now you’d be married with kids like your brother. It looked pretty serious to me anyway.”
“I thought it was,” Lorenzo said, glad he didn’t feel even an ounce of the bitterness as he once had, and he knew it had everything to do with Liv.
Just as Lorenzo was about to get into his brief explanation of how Linda hadn’t been as serious as he was, Robbie, one of his newer employees, rushed in the room.
“One of the new guys is having some kind of seizure.”
Both Romero and Lorenzo rushed out. It turned out the guy they thought was having a seizure was diabetic and got a major case of the shakes and cold sweats when his blood sugar got too low. Still, it was alarming enough that someone had called 911. Lorenzo, Vince, and Romero dealt with the unexpected excitement, and in the end, the guy calmed enough after having some orange juice that he even seemed embarrassed by the whole thing.
With all the commotion, Lorenzo hadn’t even realized he’d left his phone in the training room. It was nearly an hour later—way past seven even, and he was sure by now he’d have heard from Liv. He let Vince and Romero know he was out and headed back to get his phone, certain he’d have at least one if not more missed texts or calls from Liv.
He had none.
A little alarmed, he hit speed dial immediately. When it went to her voicemail, he hung up and checked his phone again. Maybe his phone had done something weird as it did sometimes and she had texted him, only there was no indicator. After double checking, he came up with nothing.
He was about to try her again when a text from Liv popped up on his screen and he read it.
Having a bit of an issue. But no worries nothing bad. I’ll talk to you about it in a few.
Normally, he wouldn’t think much of something like this, but his gut said otherwise. Suddenly, the voicemail indicator popped up at the top of the screen, and Lorenzo frowned, figuring the call and the text had come in at the same time.
Anxious to see if by chance it had anything to do with Liv, he hit voicemail. The moment it began he knew it wasn’t her. It was an emergency temporary deployment assignment that needed to be filled ASAP. He hadn’t been on one in a while, but anytime they said it was a two-weeks-or-less assignment, he usually jumped on it. If he passed up too many, it didn’t look good, so he preferred to pass up the longer ones, especially now that he couldn’t imagine going longer than that without seeing Liv. It was just slightly later than he’d normally meet up with her at the end of the day, and already he was feeling antsy about it.
The voicemail said it would likely be a few days but they needed an answer immediately because the deployment would happen in the next twenty-four hours. Even a few days away from Liv would be hell, but it was better than the usual two-to-six week deployments. So when he called back to get the details, they explained it wasn’t mandatory because it wasn’t an emergency deployment as he thought it might be since he’d be expected to leave so quickly. They were giving him first dibs to come in and sub for a pilot who fell ill just finishing up a two-week training exercise. Only a couple days remained of the exercise, and they didn’t want to cancel it. It was a sweet deal because it would still count as a full deployment, so he accepted immediately.
It wasn’t until after he’d hung up that he thought about it: something that hadn’t so much as crossed his mind while he’d been on the phone. It was a strange thought but a valid one. Maybe he should’ve discussed it with Liv. She was his girlfriend now. It’d make sense that he might want to check with her first in case she had anything going on those days he’d be gone where she might need or want him to be around.
The clock on the wall got his attention. It was almost eight now, and still he hadn’t heard back from Liv. What the hell kind of an issue could she be dealing with?
Waiting until way past eight, he decided he’d just take off and wait for her to call at home. The unease crept through him as he drove home and wondered if maybe he should just stop by her place on the way. But he decided against it because it could be something with her siblings—some private family issue she was dealing with. Romero’s words about her two younger ones needing therapy came to him.
Suddenly he was pissed at himself for not having asked about her mom again. It sounded pretty significant, and given the fact that her younger siblings had needed therapy and she’d refused it, it stood to reason she might benefit from talking about it. His coward ass should’ve manned up sooner.
He saw it almost as soon as he turned onto his block but didn’t immediately put it together. The big van was parked out in front of his place. The closer he got he realized it was Liv’s grooming van. This was a first, and it alarmed him a bit, but he was relieved that he wouldn’t have to sit around and wait to hear from her.
Pulling into his driveway, he could see she had the side door of her van open, and she sat at the doorway, petting a small white dog. He’d never heard of her keeping a client’s dog overnight, but that might not be unheard of. Her issue could be as simple as maybe the owners taking off while she’d groomed the dog and hadn’t gotten back so she’d been stuck waiting.
The second he put the car into park and pulled the keys from the ignition his mind was off the dog and onto Liv. He jumped out of the car and came around it toward the van. Liv looked up at him with a weak smile as she petted the dog, which upon a closer examination appeared to be a puppy. A big puppy.
“Meet King,” she said, scratching the pup under the chin. “He’s my new baby.”
“You got a dog?” he asked a bit confused.
Alright, this made sense. She’d been caught up picking up a new puppy. She probably could’ve said so and saved him any concern.
“He was kind of a surprise.” She picked up the dog, bringing his face to hers, then nuzzled his head against her neck and cradled him. “Actually, a big surprise.”
Lorenzo leaned in and kissed her then petted the pup’s head. “Is this what kept you out late?”
Her eyes dropped immediately onto the dog, and she shook her head. “Elton brought him to me. He and I had talked in the past about pets and such.”
“He bought you a dog?”
She finally looked up at him. “He’s not just any dog, Lorenzo.”
Lorenzo stared at the dog, wondering what the fuck that meant but trying his best to stay cool.
“He’s a Komondor pup. They’re extremely high maintenance, not to mention rare in the States and very expensive.”
“And Elton got you one. Why?”
She shrugged, looking back down and running her fingers through the pup’s fur. “I’d forgotten I even mentioned it, but I guess way back when he’d come in during my training and made small talk it was one of the obvious questions to ask. Did I have any pets? I told him about my brother’s Rottweiler named ‘D.O.G,’ but then in an effort to keep the conversation from veering into anything personal or uncomfortable, I mentioned what my dream dog was.” She looked up and met his eyes. “Being in this business, Elton knows people: breeders and show dog trainers. That was the furthest thing from my mind when I mentioned it to him way back, but apparently he knows someone who knows someone that breeds Komondors. He said the lady who got him pick of the litter and a huge discount owed him a favor. So according to him, he didn’t pay anywhere near as much as one would normally spend on a dog like this. He said he was practically free.”
“So what?” Lorenzo asked, losing the battle to remain cool. “Does this mean he thinks he’s back in? That his visits are gonna start up again?”
“No,” she said, shaking her head. “He said he’d reserved the dog months ago before King was even born. Elton just recently got the call that this little guy was ready to go, so he brought him to me, but he did promise he had no ulterior motives. He’s respecting my request that he stay away.”
While that calmed him some, the burning question remained. She was normally done for the day about six. Six-thirty at the latest. It was close to nine now. “Is he the issue you were dealing with all this time?”
“No,” she said then suddenly began to get up. “We need to talk.”
On her feet now, Liv leaned in, kissing him softly. As tense as Lorenzo was still feeling, he couldn’t fight the urge to bring his arms around her waist and pull her to him. The pup in her arms kept him from smothering her body into his the way he wanted to, but he was at least able to feel one side of her warm body against his. He kissed her longer, a little alarmed at how much he’d missed seeing her at their usual hour. How the hell was he going to manage several days away from her?
“Elton wasn’t the only one to drop by tonight,” she said against his chest.
Lorenzo waited, but when she didn’t go on, he pulled his face away to scrutinize her. “Who else did?”
“Jay.”
It was all she offered as Lorenzo stared at her, knowing full well that no amount of effort would keep him from blowing up if she did the pausing thing and didn’t say more soon. Jay was the issue she’d been dealing with all this time? Without thought, his hands were off her instantly, but she reached for one of them with her free hand, slipped her fingers through his, and squeezed.
“Margie’s missing,” she blurted out as scorching thoughts of Liv hanging out with her fucking ex all this time still ricocheted in his head. “Well, technically. I think she’s hiding from him. He doesn’t know this because I called her parents after he left to see if I could get any clues. They said she was at a church retreat for a week: some uber spiritual thing that required her to give up all technology so she’d have very little contact with the outside world the whole time she’s there. It’s not the first time she’d be attending such a retreat. So it’s a smart move to cover herself on both ends. Her parents won’t be sending out search parties, and she has the perfect excuse to not respond to Jay’s calls or texts. I just don’t understand why she wouldn’t have called or told me if this was what she was planning. Ever since we started talking again, things were back to the way they used to be. She told me everything, even stuff I thought for sure might be unbearably uncomfortable . . . like listening to her go on and on about her feelings for Jay. Surprisingly, it wasn’t nearly as difficult as I thought it might be.”
Liv shook her head as Lorenzo too tried to shake off the burn he felt from hearing her say she thought it might be unbearably uncomfortable to listen to her friend talk about her feelings for Jay. A guy she was supposed to be long over.
“She supposedly left for her retreat two days ago. Jay’s been searching everywhere for her. He thought maybe she’d come here. And since he couldn’t get a hold of me any other way . . .”
Lorenzo listened, trying to focus on the real issue here: where Margie could be. But his mind kept going back to one thing. It really took them nearly three hours to discuss this?
He continued to listen silently and as patiently as he could as Liv went on about her theories. She was certain Margie had yet to tell her parents about the pregnancy, and if she, in fact, was just hiding out, she was likely doing it to buy time until it was too late for an abortion to be considered.
“Why wouldn’t she just tell him she wasn’t having it and that’s that?” Lorenzo asked as the unrelenting annoyance continued to mount. “He couldn’t have forced her to.”
The expression on Liv’s face was troubling. He hated to even think it, but it was as if she was already hiding something from him about this guy.
“Jay can be very . . . persuasive. He has a way about—”
“Are you kidding me?” Lorenzo’s patience had finally broken and with it his temper. “Are you telling me you think this asshole has that much control over people? Should I be worried, Liv? He did persuade you to give him three fucking hours of your life tonight just so he could ask if you knew where Margie was. What else did you discuss after you told him you had no idea?”
“It’s all we discussed,” she said, raising her own voice along with an angry little brow.
“Really?” He forced himself to lower his voice because he was getting way too loud. “For three hours?”
“It wasn’t three hours,” she practically hissed. “I’ve been sitting here waiting for you for over a half hour, and before that, I stopped at the pet store to buy dog food and a doggie bed. My last stop did take longer than usual too. I told you it might.”
“So why didn’t you call or text me?”
“Because I knew you’d be home soon and”—she glanced away, unnerving Lorenzo further—“I needed time to think.”
King flinched in her arms, and Liv’s hand slipped out of his as she used both hands to put him down. A good thing because hearing her say she needed time to think after just one reunion with her ex—a guy she’d admitted to being obsessed with once upon a time—had Lorenzo’s insides on fire. He didn’t much feel like holding her hand anymore.
Liv reached into the van and grabbed a leash, hooking it onto the collar around King’s neck. By the time she straightened out and looked up at Lorenzo, he thought he might lose it, but he managed to remain composed—for now. Instead, he asked what he needed to know in the calmest voice he could conjure. “What did you need time to think about?”
“Everything Jay laid on me tonight.” She must’ve seen the rage in Lorenzo’s eyes because she continued quickly, “About Margie, the pregnancy, and their relationship.”
The telling way she avoided making direct eye contact with him was only making him more anxious. He hated that her ex still had any kind of effect on her. But he reasoned that the guy had been her first everything—something pretty significant in anyone’s life—and this was the first time she’d seen him in years. Of course, she was bound to have a reaction to it—be pensive about it. He should be understanding, but his jealous and possessive heart was working against him now. Lorenzo tried to shake it off because he feared he was moments away from saying something he might regret.
“Look at me,” he said suddenly and a little terser than he wanted to, but he at least had her attention. “Why else did he come all this way to see you?”
“He’s still claiming to have feelings for me,” she said without hesitation and sounding as annoyed by that as it made Lorenzo. “He said since he never got a chance to explain himself completely before I cut him off while he was here he wanted a chance to do so. It was just for the sake of argument that I even listened to all his bullshit, Lorenzo, but that was it.”
“Is he gone?” Lorenzo asked through his teeth, despite attempting to remain collected.
It came as a strange relief that what he felt for her now hadn’t so much as blurred his stand on this. He’d questioned whether or not his feelings for her might weaken his resolve when it came to issues of this sort. But the annoyance he was already feeling that she’d still have such a reaction to seeing her ex again trounced any thoughts of backing down. In fact, while he didn’t like the feeling because it was an ugly one, it was irrepressible. Unlike when the utter disgust he’d felt over Linda’s betrayal had instantly sucked any and all feelings of love for her, the very thought of Liv so much as having enjoyed seeing Jay again terrified him. Yet that terror only manifested the ugly feelings further. He’d be damned if he’d consider any leniency just because walking away from her now felt so impossible. He’d sooner walk than ever go through something like his experience with Linda again even though he already knew without a doubt having to do that with Liv would be a million times harder.
“I don’t know,” she said as Lorenzo continued to glare at her. She reached for his arm, but he flinched.
Already, his self-preservation instincts were kicking in. He’d be a dick before he got dicked around again. It was the only way he’d be able to deal with this. He watched her calm expression begin to unravel.
“Don’t do this—”
“What do you mean you don’t know?” he asked before she could go on.
Her eyes searched his as the realization seemed to sink in. Lorenzo hadn’t been lying when he said he would not tolerate her ex in her life.
“I mean I told him about you. That on top of the fact that I wanted nothing more to do with him my boyfriend was dead against it also. Then he got rude, so I told him to leave.”
“Rude like how?” he asked as his irritation took a turn he preferred.
He’d rather feel a need to want to rip someone apart than the unease of wondering what was going on in Liv’s head. What else did she need to think about?
“What did he say to you?”
Liv shook her head as Lorenzo tried in vain to remain calm. His insides were already a boiling chaos, and it was only getting worse.
“Stupid stuff,” she said quickly. “Of course, he’d say he didn’t care what you wanted and insisted that I was lying about being over him. We started to argue, and then the owner of my last client came out of her house. He walked away when I got caught up talking to her. By the time I was done with her, he was gone. So I have no idea if he’s gone back to Dallas or not. But, Lorenzo . . .” She reached out for his hand again, and this time he didn’t flinch. She brought his hand to her face, leaning her cheek against his open palm. “Baby, you can’t hold it against me that he showed up or that he might possibly still be around. I’ve done everything you’ve asked. I want nothing to do with him, I swear to you. But I can’t control what he does.”
Lorenzo brought his other hand to the other side of her face, cradling it as a slow sense of relief began to wash over him. He stared into her eyes, debating whether or not he should tell her something. He didn’t want it to sound as if he were demanding she get a restraining order on the guy. It’d be just a simple suggestion, but the way he was still feeling about all this he wasn’t sure it’d come out that way. Then he remembered. He did have one big thing on his side when it came to dealing with this asshole. Her brothers.
“You are gonna tell your brothers about this, right?”
She nodded, but the sudden flicker in her eyes and expression she wore was exactly what he’d expected. During the time she said she’d taken to think, her brothers’ reaction to this hadn’t been part of that thought process. She’d likely been too consumed with thoughts of Margie’s disappearance and explaining Jay’s unexpected visit to Lorenzo, not to mention the furry new addition to her family.
At least that was one thing he wouldn’t have to worry about: this guy thinking he could show up at her house. But if he’d already showed up while she’d been on the job once, what was to stop him from doing it again? And then it hit him.
“How’d he know where you were?”
“I don’t know.”
“You didn’t ask him?”
“No.” She shook her head with a strange expression Lorenzo couldn’t quite make out as she brought her hand to her forehead. “I . . . I didn’t even think to ask. I was more concerned about what was going on with Margie; then we started to argue. Once Ms. Upton walked out of her house, we stopped talking. It was a brief conversation, and then he left.”
Lorenzo forced himself to calm down. “Liv, sweetheart,” he said, kissing her softly in an attempt to show her he wasn’t mad at her. “I’m only asking because I want to know what to expect. Do you think you’re in any danger with—?”
“No!” she said way too quickly then seemed to catch herself and shook her head. “He’s just being stubborn, and he’s always played mind games. I wouldn’t put it past him to think he can still manipulate me into letting him back in my life. Maybe he’ll show up again and continue to try and convince me we’re meant to be, but he’d never hurt me.”
Was she defending the guy? Swallowing back the anger, Lorenzo struggled to remain calm. “Why would he show up again?”
“I’m not saying he will. It just felt like we got off track about whatever he’d come all the way down here to discuss about Margie.”
The pup, which was beginning to whine around her ankles, jumped up against her legs, and she bent down to pick him up, cuddling him lovingly. Thoughts of who gave her the damn pooch had long been drowned out by the galling thoughts of Jay.
“I just think if he came out all this way he probably had more to say, but we were interrupted.”
That sounded too damn much like an excuse, the kind Linda used to make for why she had to talk to her ex so often. But Lorenzo took a deep breath, reminding himself of his vow, the one he’d made that he wouldn’t let this guy or Linda ruin things for him and Liv.
“Have you tried calling Margie?”
“Yes,” she said, looking up with a frown, “a bunch of times. I texted her too. I even tried calling a number from two missed calls I had earlier today. I didn’t recognize the number when I saw I had two missed calls from it but didn’t think any of it until I found out she’s missing. It’s not a Dallas number—it’s local—but still I thought maybe she’s somewhere close by, but it went to a generic voicemail.” She shook her head, still frowning. “It worries me because it’s so not like her to just ignore my calls. I’m sure she’s a mess, and unless she’s told anybody else, I’m the only one she can talk to about this.”
“Is there any chance she’s actually at the retreat she told her parents she’d be at?”
She shook her head adamantly then kissed the puppy's head before looking up again. “She would’ve mentioned it to me. It doesn’t make sense that she’d just disappear.”
Another thought suddenly came to him, and instantly he felt like growling. His deployment. He was scheduled to leave tomorrow morning, and he had no way of knowing if Jay’s visit was a onetime deal or if he’d be sniffing around for a few more days.
“Fuck,” he muttered, bringing his fist to his mouth.
“Lorenzo,” she started to say. “Just because—”
“I leave tomorrow,” he said before she could finish. “I got a deployment call today, and since it’s only for a couple of days, I took it. I would’ve waited to talk to you, but—”
“Deployment?” Liv’s wide eyes were suddenly riddled with an altogether different kind of concern as she searched his eyes. “Where to?”
“Nothing overseas,” he said quickly because she looked ready to freak out. “Or even anything serious. They need someone to come in and sub for a helicopter pilot who got sick during a training exercise. There are only a few days left, so I’d only be gone two maybe three days. This just couldn’t have happened at a worse time.” He pulled his phone from its holster and started tapping on the screen. “Maybe I could get someone else to cover—”
“No.” She reached for his arm. “From what you’ve told me and Rosie’s said it too, your work ethic is impeccable. I know you’re proud of that as you should be. I don’t want you jeopardizing anything because of this. I’ll be fine. It’s just a few days.”
“If he comes back—”
“If he comes back,” Liv said firmly, squeezing his hand, “I’ll put my foot down. I promise. I’m letting my brothers know about this, but there’s only so much I can tell them because, as you know, I’ve never told them the whole truth about my past with him.” Lorenzo began to protest, but she shook her head and went on quickly, staring straight into his eyes. “I will tell them about his being delusional now and insisting we were meant to be and that I want nothing to do with him. I’ll even let them know you’ll be out of town and worried that he might try something while you’re gone. Trust me. They’ll be more than on it. They just don’t need to know the details of everything that went on between Jay and me back then. It was a long time ago and irrelevant now.”
Lorenzo stared at her for a few moments without saying anything. He still didn’t like the idea of not being around while this guy could still be in town and likely be coming back to see her again. But this was exactly what he’d been counting on. He had no doubt just by what he’d seen and knew so far of her brothers. Just as he suspected, especially after Vince mentioned her younger brother’s nickname that first night he’d seen Liv at his brother’s place, they were Romeros through and through. If this fucker tried anything with or without Lorenzo around, they’d be all over it.
Left with no other choice but to accept that once again Liv was doing and saying all the right things, Lorenzo couldn’t possibly be mad at her about this. He’d just have to hope this guy didn’t get stupid and had gone home. He smiled, kissing Liv’s forehead. “Maybe this little guy can take a long nap because I need to get my fill of you tonight if I’m going to be gone for days.”
Looking especially relieved, Liv let her tense shoulders fall, and she wrapped her free arm his neck. “I’m beginning to think you just might be perfect.”
“Far from it,” Lorenzo said, kissing her softly and trying not to think about how close he’d come to losing her tonight. “But I still won’t be pointing out any of my imperfections; that’s for sure. You’ll see them soon enough. For now, let’s go get our fill of what always feels so damn perfect.”