Page 15 of Lorenzo & Lily

As Rio stepped to the small kitchenette near his office, Eddie pulled Lorenzo to the side. “You all right?”

Lorenzo crossed his arms over his chest. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Because this morning you were pissed off at us, then you got pissed off at some woman on the beach.”

Fucking hell. “I told you not to follow me.”

“And I didn’t listen.”

“Jesus. You just can’t mind your own fucking business, can you?”

“No, not when you’re terrifying random people on a beach. She had a kid.”

A small wave of relief swept through him. If Eddie thought Lily was a random woman, his secret wouldn’t be revealed just yet. “Did you see me treat that kid like shit? No,” he said, without waiting for Eddie to respond. He gestured with his head towards his office. “You tell the rest of them about this?”

“No, but I will if you don’t get a hold on your anger.”

“My anger is under control.”

Eddie gave him a disbelieving look. “Yeah? This is what you call having your anger under control?”

Lorenzo fisted his hands, not to fight but to tamp down the rage burning within him. It was times like these that no one understood him, not even his fucking brothers who had served. Not even Eddie, who’d lived through personal horrors of his own and should have understood him. “Let me tell you something about me, since you clearly don’t get it.”

“Loren–”

“I am allowed to be angry. Just because I suffered from PTSD doesn’t mean I can’t get angry. Anger is a human fucking emotion and, the last time I checked, I was a human.”

“Lor–”

“We’re done.” Lorenzo turned away, and took a deep breath on his way to his office.

“Goddamn it, Lorenzo.”

He didn’t bother responding. He walked into his office and sat down just as Eddie followed him in and stood behind Marcello and Nate, who were seated in front of his desk.

Nate eyed him over his desk. “Took you long enough to get here. Do you always run so long?”

Lorenzo’s hands clutched the arms of his chair and tensed. “Not that I answer to you, big brother, but I stopped at the MARC after my run.”

“You’ve been running a lot lately,” Marcello noted.

Goddamn security. He always forgot they answered to Marcello. He wondered if they’d told him about his Lilys and the additional security he’d ordered. If they had, Marcello was keeping a good poker face. “I like it. You have an issue with me running?”

“No.”

“Then shut the fuck up about it and let’s move on. You’re here about the dock strike, which hasn’t happened, by the way.”

Nate leaned back in his chair, and steepled his fingers in front of him, an action their father often did. “We think one’s imminent.”

“What you think, and what the reality is, are two entirely different things. I’m at the docks almost daily. Not just overseeing our family’s interests or Valleria’s, but overseeing port business. I know those workers. They’re not happy, but they haven’t decided to strike. Not yet, anyway.”

“How can you be so sure?” Eddie asked.

“Because a lot of those men and women came through the MARC. The docks and the shipping companies are the top job placement locations for our service personnel, either during or after recovery. And, because they came through the MARC, they know me. They trust me.”

Marcello gave him an even look, giving nothing away. “I didn’t realize that many former service personnel worked there.”

“You would if you bothered to give a shit about what I do here, instead of criticizing me every four fucking seconds.”

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