Page 2 of My Debacle with De Lorenzo

“Ooh, the heated tension is crackling in the room,” Dr. Burkman announces, like we can’t feel the growing friction. “Let’s bring it down a notch before something catches on fire. So, the judge ordered sixteen sessions of anger management therapy, two sessions a week for the next eight weeks. It appears both of you have some issues with controlling your temper.”

“I don’t have anger issues,” Dylan spits out, growing more irritated. “I shouldn’t even be here because she embellished the truth when the cops got there.” He drops his head into his hands, running agitated fingers through his short brown hair.

“Don’t let that sweet face fool you, Doctor. He’s very temperamental.”

He turns to give me a hard look, and the tightness of his jaw reminds me that his face may not be as sweet as I’m implying. Time has chiseled out his features some. His rounded cheekbones are a little more defined. The outline of his jaw is just a fraction harder. The face of his younger self used to toe the line between boy and man. Puberty left it in a state of limbo where it couldn’t decide if it wanted to be boyishly cute or ruggedly handsome, so it was just both. There was a playfulness about him that made his face irresistibly adorable and, damn, his smile could turn me into a puddle of mush, but time seems to have pushed him more toward the manly side. His features are sharper, more pronounced, but there’s still that hint of boyish charm when he smiles – charm I am utterly incapable of resisting, which is why we now find ourselves in this situation.

“Is this true, Dylan? The court documents state you admitted to the judge that you have a history of violence. That sounds like anger issues. The first step is admitting it.”

“I’m not temperamental,” he explains, facing Dr. Burkman again. “And Idon’thave anger issues. I’m actually a really nice guy. Mellow. Calm. Sweet, they call me.” He points to me with his thumb. “But this chick comes with all kinds of shit that makes me fly off the fucking rails. I go from zero to sixty in ten seconds flat and then I’m hitting guys in the face, throwing punches at people I don’t even know. All because of her.”

“I never asked you to defend me against any of those guys.”

“You didn’t have to. I wouldn’t just sit back and let anyone disrespect you. You know me better than that.” His focus shifts back to the doctor. “Let’s get this straight. I don’t like violence but being with her brought out the psycho in me. It was like I lost my goddamn mind.”

“Now, now, De Lorenzo. Balance the scales a bit.” I bite my thumbnail to bring his attention to my mouth and lightly lick the tip. “Tell her about all the times I made you feel like that in a good way.”

He sucks in a sharp breath, shutting his eyes to the assault of the memories. I know he’s thinking about it—all the times he was so lost in ecstasy it almost drove him crazy. I smile to myself, amused at how easy it is to rile him up. He breathes in through the nose, out through the mouth, and thumps his fist on the armrest again. Volatile indeed.

“It’s getting heated again, kids,” Dr. Burkman says in the same exuberant tone. “Let’s put the lighter fluid away, shall we? Alright, why don’t we get to the root of the problem? How did all of this start?”

I sigh and cross my arms over my chest. “Well, we were both at the same Christmas eve party a few weeks ago...and somehow we ended up under a mistletoe. Now, let me just say that I had been celibate for a while. I was waiting to find someone I had a connection with. I’ll be the first to admit that I have a...colorful past, but I was saving the next time I was intimate with someone for a guy who wasspecialto me, but Dylan didn’t seem to care about that because?”

“And what makes you think I would care about you saving yourself foranotherguy?” For the first time, I see a glimmer of a smirk because he’s thinking about how the events played out, too. “Besides, it’s not like you said no.”

“I tried to.”

I get an outright chuckle this time. That naughty grin curves on his perfect cherry-red lips because we both know how easily I gave in to him that night. “And how’d that work out for you, Bella?”

Fuck, he is so cute, but I don’t want to get distracted by that because I’m still mad at him and he can go straight to hell. I try my best to ignore him and turn back to Dr. Burkman. “Anyway, as I’m sure you’ve already guessed, we got kinda...carried away after that...”

“It escalated very quickly,” Dylan adds.

“Uh-huh.” She scribbles as we speak. “And this was the first time the two of you met?”

“No, we dated for almost a year in high school.”

“We neverreallydated,” I correct.

“Oh, sorry. I forgot.” And his good mood instantly disappears. “I was the only one stupid enough to believe we were actually a couple. I misread all the signs. The sex. The intimacy. The late-night phone calls. The constant text messages. The fuckingI-love-yous. I misconstrued all of that and thought we were in a relationship.”

Dr. Burkman gets hella excited hearing this. “Well, that little nugget makes me want to get the full ten-piece meal with fries. I can see the issues that led to these charges are obviously rooted in a past the two of you share.”

“Can you stop saying the wordchargeslike we’re criminals?” Dylan requests a tad too aggressively. “We both agreed to drop the charges, and the judge allowed it if we committed to this stupid anger management therapy.”

“That tone was unpleasant.”

He simply shrugs. “No offense, Doc, but I’ve spent a lot of time in therapy, and I can tell you for a fact that it doesn’t work.”

“O-o-kay. Thanks for nullifying all my years of studying and...myentirecareer.” She fakes a smile. “Moving on. Let’s delve deeper, shall we? Tell me more about your relationship...or lack thereof.”

“We had...an arrangement,” I reply. “The terms of engagement that webothagreed to was that it was just going to be a hookup, a situationship...as Jada Pinkett would call it—an entanglement.”

“An entanglement?!” He glowers at me, on the verge of spitting fire. “You can’t be serious. Almost a year, Bella, and you want to call it an entanglement? Though, I shouldn’t be surprised. If I ever meant anything to you, you wouldn’t have stomped all over my fucking heart.”

“You were the one who insisted that it was nothing more than an arrangement, De Lorenzo.”

“Oh, my God! Why are you still bringing that up? I said that years ago,onetime because I was angry, and I apologized immediately, but your crazy ass will hold on to shit like thatforever.”

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