Page 87 of Enforcer

Lorenzo breaks into a laugh, putting his gun back. “So was I.”

“Fuck you, asshole,” Antonio spews, shakily moving the drink in his glass back to his lips.

I shake my head at their banter. The two have a love-hate relationship, but I can see why the girls had so much fun with them at Brynne’s bachelorette party. They’re ridiculous and entertaining.

“What makes you think she’ll come back? Other than my looks,” I ask Lorenzo.

He shrugs. “She’s got it bad for you, Dante. She has to get out of her own way, is all.”

“She’s the child of a nasty divorce. Watched it all happen.”

Lorenzo’s eyes soften with understanding. “That I get completely.”

“How so? A divorce that didn’t happen to her shouldn’t bother her this much all these years later. Not to this extent.” I scowl as Antonio puts more drink in our glasses.

“Man, if she grew up watching her mom be hurt and turn into someone wholly different because of a man who was supposed to be the best there was in the world, that leaves a lasting effect. Why did they get divorced?”

“Cheating, I think,” I toss back.

He sighs. “Yeah, her commitment issues are understandable then. If the one man who’s supposed to keep you safe from harm is causing the harm and pain, I think you’d be a bit more jaded when you looked at the world from there on out, too, wouldn’t you?”

I let out a breath. “I know, and I get it. I guess I just…” I shake my head as I can’t get my thoughts arranged into a proper sentence.

“You just love her, and that’s all well and good, Dante, but she has to go through this process and her feelings in her own time. You can’t rush someone through dealing with their past traumas.”

I laugh. “What are you, the psychologist for the Ricci family?”

He straightens the collar on his button-up. “Maybe I am. Never know, I could get this family whipped into better shape, psychologically speaking.”

I shake my head, still smirking at him.

“Don’t pressure her. Just be there,” Antonio adds.

I bite my lip as I pull out my phone and ignorantly send a message to her.

I miss you.

I hit send before I can overthink it, and it’s off into cyberspace for Alyssa to deal with now. Having told her, though, I feel better.

Once I’m home, changed, and lying on my bed in the silence that not having Alyssa here brings, I open my message to her and stare at it, hoping that the little bubbles will pop up as she gives a reply.

They never do.

Heading to the piano, I sit and run my fingers over the stiff, ivory keys. Music has a doorway into my soul and always has. I haven’t played this particular piano as much in recent years.

My phone lights up on the top of the piano, and I grab it, nearly knocking it to the floor altogether.

“Hello?” I answered without looking at the contact ID.

“Hey.”

Fuck, it’s only Lorenzo.

“What are you still doing awake?” I ask him.

He was hammered when Pauly and I dropped him at his apartment building, and I didn't think I'd see hide nor hair of him for days after the amount of whiskey we’d drunk.

“I wasn’t. I got a call from the docks; we’ve got men sitting on them. They finally caught someone and are holding them at the warehouse for us.”