Love Him Steady

by E M Lindsey

  Love Him Steady

  Book Four of On The Market

  E.M. Lindsey

  Love Him Steady

  E.M. Lindsey

  Copyright © 2020

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof

  may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever

  without the express written permission of the publisher

  except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This book is a work of fiction. Any events, places, or people portrayed in the book have been used in a manner of fiction and are not intended to represent reality. Any resemblance is purely coincidental.

  Cover by Amai Designs

  Art by Marceau

  Contents

  Foreword

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Epilogue

  Coming Soon

  Afterword

  Acknowledgments

  Also by E.M. Lindsey

  About the Author

  By night on my bed, I sought him whom my soul loves. I sought him, but I didn't find him.

  Song of Solomon 3:1

  Foreword

  Dear Readers,

  I wanted to take a moment to say thank you for sticking with the Cherry Creek journey so far. Wilder and Lorenzo’s story was by far one of the most enjoyable things I have ever written.

  That being said, I’d like to offer a couple of trigger and content warnings. This story deals with the topic of emotional and physical abuse. The abuse itself is mostly in mention, and the abuse recovery in in more detail. It isn’t the focus of the story or the focus of the character’s journey, however if these subjects are difficult for you, please skip this book.

  With that, I hope you enjoy their story as much as I enjoyed writing it, and just know, readers, I appreciate you to the moon and back.

  All my best,

  Elaine-

  Chapter One

  His brothers used to always joke that he had the baby complex, because he was supposed to be the baby. His parents had treated him like a little king up until he was three when his mother’s illness turned out to be another screaming, shitting, angry baby with red cheeks and a full head of dark hair. He remembered feeling betrayed, staring down at the ugly little squirming slug in the bassinette feeling like the world had betrayed him. People stopped looking at him, playing with him, giving him attention. And all for what? The red-faced lump who didn’t know the first four letters of his name the way Lorenzo did?

  It got more complicated though, when his parents came home and tried to explain to all the siblings that Rocco was deaf. Lorenzo didn’t quite know how to process the word, and being three, even his mother’s simple, “It means he can’t hear you,” wasn’t enough. Lorenzo still didn’t like him right away. He still wasn’t sure that this was a good idea.

  It didn’t last, of course. With all of his other siblings off to school, Lorenzo spent most of the day with the baby and watched him grow. He learned to help—he learned to take pride in filling in the spaces where his chubby little hands would fit. He could feed Rocco and hold him sometimes—if he was very careful and had a pillow on his lap. And Rocco started to get bigger, and Lorenzo managed to coax his baby brother’s first smile out of him—and then his first laugh. Rocco made him feel important after that, because he was attached. Because he loved Lorenzo more than anyone else. Because Rocco cried and sometimes only Lorenzo could soothe him.

  It didn’t take long for Lorenzo to start truly understanding the difference in his sibling. He reacted to lights, and to heavy sounds, and to things that made the floor vibrate. He made loud noises because he didn’t know he was doing it, and it annoyed everyone but Lorenzo.

  Rocco was bright-eyed and so smart, and everyone overlooked him because they didn’t want to learn how to speak with him in sign. But Lorenzo did. He enjoyed being Rocco’s link to the rest of the siblings. Where his brothers and sisters got all the attention, it made him feel important. He enjoyed being the big brother with strong fists that could threaten little asshole kids down the street who mocked the way Rocco laughed and the way he sounded when he begged Lorenzo to push him on the swing higher and faster.

  It wouldn’t last, of course. Lorenzo would have no idea how fast things would change when Rocco stepped into the world of porn—but then again, none of their family did.

  Life was mostly a struggle for money before Rocco became Sylent and his career took off. Six kids and two parents were crammed into a three-bedroom house in La Mesa, they rode the bus everywhere, and his mother prepared pasta dishes made from boxed casserole kits and sauce from the jar while quietly mourning her inability to live up to her mother’s expectations.

  Rocco’s first big check had changed everything. His first video that pulled in six figures and offered more money than his parents had ever seen in the entirety of their marriage. And it was just the first of many. Rocco showed up, asking Lorenzo to interpret, as he presented Pietro with enough money to leave his shitty, ambulance-chasing practice and start something that would light a fire in his gut. He bought Lorenzo his first condo and his first art gallery. He sent the girls to Florida, he sent Gio and his wife to New York. The money kept coming, and Lorenzo kept taking, and suddenly, he didn’t have to try anymore.

  ‘This feels wrong,’ he told Rocco one night when his brother was trying to hand him the keys to a new Bentley. ‘You can’t keep giving me this shit. I didn’t even do anything.’

  Rocco had just laughed though and pulled him into a hug, because Rocco was always freer with his affections than any of their other siblings. He was the baby, but he held Lorenzo like he was younger, and smaller, and waited until Lorenzo’s body went relaxed in his embrace. ‘You spent your entire childhood taking care of me. This is the least I can do.’

  Except, it never did feel right. He’d lie in his bed with sheets that cost more than his first car and stare up at the ceiling and wonder what the fuck any of his life even meant anymore. He’d stopped trying, but then he was forced to wonder if he’d ever really even started.

  And maybe his sad, sorry little life was his own fault. Pietro had taken what Rocco offered him and made something of himself. He used it as just a place to jump off and held his own, and his real wealth had come from his own hard work. And what did Lorenzo have? He was the patron of a handful of art galleries, he owned an expensive car, a posh condo steps from the water, and constantly entertained a crowd of so-called friends who were with him only because he was free with his time, and his cash, and his booze.

  He was miserable, and he was lonely. But more than that…he was empty. While his siblings had worked hard for what they had, Lorenzo had simply allowed them to give—allowed himself to take—and that was where it ended. In the quiet moments, when he was alone in his condo with his too-expensive furniture, paintings he didn’t understand, and the bottles of wine more expensive than his college rent, he hated himself.

  Deep down, he knew that made him more of a bastard, because there were so many people just blocks away that would have given a limb for even a fraction of what he had, and he somehow found it in himself to lie on his bed and stare at the ceiling and wonder how he could stop being such a shallow prick.

  And it only got worse when Rocco abandon
ed his entire life, disappeared, and came home practically married to a small-town baker with a crooked smile and a sea of freckles across his cheeks. And Lorenzo wanted to laugh, at first. He wanted to pull his brother away from this man who clearly didn’t fit and ask him what the hell he was thinking. And he almost had, the first night Rocco brought Simon home for Sunday dinner. And then he watched Rocco watch Simon—like the man hung the moon and lit the sun, and he knew that whatever those two had was important. And he knew it was something he would never, ever have. Not as the person he’d become.

  Two years passed, with Simon and Rocco together, and it killed him to watch a little bit more each day.

  His envy was cruel, and it was vicious, with sharp teeth and jagged claws. He was grateful that they were in LA, that Simon’s schooling and Rocco’s work kept them busy and occupied. Lorenzo’s envy often felt too close to hate, and his brother deserved happiness without complications. It was easier to like his Tweets, and to send him the occasional texts, and to keep himself apart.

  Lorenzo’s coping mechanisms had never been particularly healthy, and he was aware of that as he buried himself further into more bottles of wine and familiar arms belonging to people who would never truly love him and in throwing cash at people whose attention could distract him from the ache in his gut. He was well aware that no one in his life was permanent, and no one in his life cared about him for the person he was instead of the zeroes lining his pockets, but he’d take what he could get. But something had to give. He was feeling a desperation unfamiliar to him, and he knew if he didn’t address it soon, he’d do something reckless. That, he knew, was the last thing any of his family needed.

  “Lor?” came a soft voice to his right. The room smelled like wine, sweat, and sex, and his body was deliciously sore from their late-night acrobatics. “Why are you awake?”

  Gabrielle was probably his longest friend—or at the very least, his longest fuck-buddy. They’d been introduced at a gallery showing, and he was drawn in by her quiet snark about modern art, and they spent the night sitting in the rafters sharing a bottle of cheap gin and all the cheese he managed to sneak off the buffet table. At the time finishing up her undergrads with her sights set on grad school. She desperately craved rising above the expectation the world had for a daughter of immigrants—her sights set on Stanford, and Lorenzo had truly liked her. It was no trouble at all to pay the tuition, no trouble at all to make sure she didn’t want for much, if anything, while she worked her ass off to become someone he could never be. And he understood why she stuck around. Maybe she liked him a little as a person, and she was one of the few people he trusted with his vulnerable spots and existential crises. Maybe it wasn’t much, and it most certainly wasn’t forever, but it was something, and he needed her right then.

  Lorenzo turned his head to stare at her with a soft smile. Gabby had fallen asleep after his tongue had given her three screaming orgasms. After she was out, he crept into the bathroom and got himself off, then curled back up around her in bed to stare at the wall until the sky started to lighten along the horizon.

  Lorenzo reached down and brushed a stray curl behind her ear. “I haven’t slept.”

  “Jesus.” She pushed up on her elbow and narrowed her eyes at his alarm clock. “Does that say five? Like AM?”

  He shrugged. “I’ve stayed awake longer, babe.”

  “You’re going to die. You’re too old for that shit.” She flopped back down and buried her face in his pillow. “What’s wrong?”

  And he knew she was no stranger to his occasional, who the fuck am I, freak outs. She’d suffered all his late-night calls and 2 am runs to the Taco Stand for the thirty-eight-cent chicken soft tacos that always, always gave him food poisoning. But usually, somewhere between worshipping the porcelain throne on his knees and chugging down a gallon of room temperature Gatorade, he found himself again.

  This time, after Rocco brought home Simon, it felt more profound.

  “I don’t think I can do this anymore,” he said, his voice barely above a whisper.

  Gabby let out a small chuckle and turned her face toward him. “Are you breaking up with me?”

  “Yes.” He leaned over and kissed her full, plush mouth, not caring much that she tasted like he imagined a dead raccoon might after binging on a Joe’s Crab Shack dumpster. “But it doesn’t matter, because you’re going to forget all about me. You’re going to be an amazing attorney. You’re going to make waves, and get rich, and I’ll just be the guy somewhere in his sorry little condo saying, I knew her when.”

  “It took your brother like seventeen years to have even half that,” she reminded him—and he hadn’t forgotten.

  He even missed when things were simpler—when he was some kid at UCSD on too many loans and too few grants. But he’d liked living in the dorms and eating stale ramen straight from the pack. He missed when his friends were genuine, when he had nothing to offer anyone except himself and maybe a little bit of stale weed and old pizza when he was assistant manager of the little shop near campus. Once upon a time, he was just a guy who didn’t have much. Once upon a time, he had nothing for people to use.

  “I have to get the fuck out of here,” he told her as he unwrapped her from his embrace. “I need to…I need to get away for a while.”

  Gabby laughed quietly. “Well, I saw that coming.” She kicked her feet until the sheets slipped from her body, and he was momentarily distracted by the curve of her hips. He liked those quiet, unsuspecting parts of her body that no one ever paid any mind to. Like the top rib near her under arms, like the spot just below her belly button, like the backs of her knees, and the dimple below her ankle. She stretched her arms wide, and he ran the tip of his first finger between her naked breasts. “It was only a matter of time. You can never let Rocco one-up you.”

  “I—” he started, flustered. “This isn’t about him.” He rubbed a hand down his face and forced himself to acknowledge the truth of how he was feeling—without his usual mask of arrogance, without his usual dismissal of anything real. “Gabby, I’m miserable.”

  “You’ve been miserable your entire life, babe.” The honesty of her words was sharp and stabbing, but he deserved it. Sitting up, she grabbed him by the hair, kissing him slow and soft. “What’s different about it this time?”

  He didn’t really have an answer. It was impossible to put words to the red-hot, searing fire in his belly. It was small now, just a single, flickering flame deep inside him, but he knew it was only a matter of time before it erupted into a wildfire, consuming every inch of him. He needed to get away from the people he cared about so none of them would be caught in the destruction.

  “I don’t know,” he finally answered, “but I’ve made up my mind.”

  She lifted both brows, her forehead wrinkling with one single crease. “Where are you going to start?”

  He wasn’t quite sure about that, either. But his brother had been singing the praises of Cherry Creek for two damn years now. Every time he and Simon went back to visit, he’d come home and wax poetic about the someday when they moved back there—after Simon was done with school, after Rocco was ready to retire. Lorenzo had hated that place at first, but now he was starting to wonder if maybe there wasn’t something there for him to find—if he gave it a chance.

  And if not…well. There was an entire world out there. He’d seen a lot of it, but maybe he could find more beauty with fresh eyes. But he had to start somewhere.

  Chapter Two

  ‘We named you Wilder, because you are our wild boy. You are the child we dreamed of having the day we agreed to marry each other. You spent nine months never letting me forget you were inside me, and the moment you were out, you looked at me with these big, brown eyes, and I knew you were mine.’

  It was a single entry in his baby book—the first hour of his life with a Polaroid photo of himself nestled in a bassinette with a shock of dark hair and his thumb in his mouth. The photo was dated—a mark of the late eighties with
the ancient medical equipment and the Care Bear blanket that had kept him swaddled. A nurse had taken the photo, and she had pasted it into the book that night as he slept. His father had been the one to tell him this story after he found the book, when his questions flicked over his fingers, ‘Did she ever love me?’

  The answer was yes. For a moment, she did.

  It was irony at its finest that he was too young to remember what might have been the only kind words his mother ever said about him. They were written in the book, memorialized as maybe a way of mourning that she had lost the one child she had desperately wanted.

  Twenty-four hours after his mother had looked into the face of the one child she had been dreaming about, the nurses returned with a smile and a certificate with a little bunny on the front declaring him an outsider.

  ‘Today I passed my hearing test!’

  The very birth of him had denied her the child she’d been wanting since the day she married her husband. Twenty-four hours of life and would remain then and forever, a constant reminder that he was never going to be enough.

  His sister had come along after that, three long years of waiting for the child his mother could finally call her own. Wilder had been raised no different than a Deaf child, but to her, he was an outsider.