Love Him Free: Book One of On The Market

by Lindsey, E. M.

  ‘Rocco,’ he spelled, then offered her his sign name.

  ‘Mary,’ she spelled, and didn’t offer hers which was interesting, but he didn’t much care.

  He knew he looked like hell and the fact that he kept his sunglasses on was twenty shades of rude. But fuck politeness when his ex had confessed to boning a guy he supposedly met at Trader Joe’s and was now going to live with him, or…whatever.

  ‘What agency are you from?’ he couldn’t help but ask, and he braced himself for the answer.

  ‘Sun Valley Interpreting Services,’ she spelled.

  He knew them. They mostly dealt with public events and church services—which really didn’t bode well. He looked past her, then gestured for her to step back before he addressed Xander. ‘Did you hire her?’

  Xander never really did have any tact, even with Eric who had become actual friends with him over the years, and he stared at her over his shoulder as she spoke. “Uh yeah,” he said. “Why?”

  ‘Did you just google interpreting services or something?’ Rocco could tell her inflection didn’t match the rage in his fingers, but he didn’t have the strength to correct her in that moment.

  Xander gave him a bland-faced shrug. “Does it matter what I do now? Eric moved on to greener pastures, right?”

  And really, if there ever had been a glass-shattering moment, that was it. Not because of Xander’s blasé attitude, but the reason why. And maybe it took Xander being an absolute dick for him to connect the dots that had been there the entire time, but now was that moment.

  ‘You fucked him. He left…you’re fucking him, and he left me for you!’

  He watched Mary’s lips form the first half of the word fuck before she stopped. ‘I can’t say that.’

  Fury—a sort of burning, consuming rage—coursed through him and he hit the desk so hard, they both jumped. ‘You say what I sign! I am paying you for this!’

  ‘I can’t say that,’ she repeated.

  Rocco’s lips curled back in a snarl. “Get out,” he voiced, and she took a startled step back. Her hands went up, but he shook his head. “Get the fuck out.”

  Somewhere in the back of his mind, he’d remember to feel bad for making someone that terrified. He knew what he looked like—he knew that his size was intimidating, and that despite his accent, his voice was a deep rumble in his chest. He knew it made people uneasy, and he’d used it against her right then. But it was so hard to care when he was standing in front of the man who had been fucking his partner, and the woman hired to help him communicate refused to do it.

  When the door shut, the slam reverberating through the bottoms of his feet, he slowly turned his gaze back to Xander. “You fucked Eric.”

  His lips were moving too fast for Rocco to read them, but it didn’t matter. The furious blush creeping up his neck said enough. He fucked Eric—he’d been fucking Eric. God only knew how long it had been going on.

  “Stop,” he demanded after Xander said his piece into the silence between them. “You know I can’t understand you, and I don’t care. You’re fired.”

  He turned and started for the door, not anticipating how fast Xander would be, or how bold. His thin fingers wrapped around Rocco and spun him, but the look on Rocco’s face sent him taking a few steps back. “You can’t fire me. The contract.” The words—at least most of them—were easy enough to read.

  Rocco sneered again. “If you think I care about the goddamn contract…” His lips fell silent, and his hands rose to sign the words Xander had never bothered to learn. ‘I’m going to make you sorry. I don’t care what you’re threatening me with, or what Eric promised you. This isn’t over.’

  He slammed the door behind him and didn’t make eye contact with anyone on the way down. It was a blessing when he got to the street and didn’t see Mary anywhere—it wasn’t her fault, but it was just another symptom of a bigger fucking problem, and he was running out of fight.

  By the time Rocco got to his car, he was trembling, his throat tight on the verge of the tears he hadn’t cried in so many years, he couldn’t remember. His phone buzzed in his pocket again, but it was either Eric, Xander, or someone from the agency trying reach him.

  Enough was enough. He wasn’t sure what he was doing next, but all of this was going to come to an end, even if he had to bring it down in flames, crashing around him.

  * * *

  Rocco squinted off into the distance, staring at the rows of still ripening grapes. His sister-in-law’s pet project that turned into a little something more with the cash he’d supplied them over the years. He didn’t mind it. Her wine wasn’t half bad—hair of the dog more than anything he’d serve at dinner, but at this point the burn of any alcohol was welcome.

  It was nice to take sanctuary away from Malibu where the city was huge but the circles he ran in were small and impossible to avoid. It was likely Eric and Xander were holed up in his apartment fucking and scheming because there was no way he fired Xander without consequence.

  He was prepared to pay it, of course. His accountant and lawyer were both on stand-by to issue whatever check they had to in order to terminate his contract and get Xander off his stage name and out of his business for good. It had been radio silence though, and it was making Rocco uneasy.

  And Pietro was also being a little too attentive which was also getting under his skin. For the first time in his life, the temperate spring weather of southern California was not a balm. It felt suffocating, like the wind was made of invisible walls pinning him in one place. He ached to get away, but he had no idea where—and frankly he knew he couldn’t go until Xander made a move.

  Rocco dipped his shades down his nose when a shadow fell over his face, and a thick-fingered hand plucked both bottle and glass away from him.

  “Hey,” he voiced with a scowl, annoyed, barely into his first pour.

  Pietro dropped into a chair and clasped his hands on the table. He was the eldest brother, and the most fussy over all his siblings. He was almost sixty and wore his salt and pepper grey with charm. He would have been great in the industry too—built just like Rocco, though he looked far more like their mother than their father with his sharp black hair and narrow blue eyes.

  Pietro was a lawyer though, not one that represented Rocco, but his firm did. And it was of some comfort to know that his brother could help sort shit out so he didn’t have to leave this little fake piece of heaven until he was good and ready.

  ‘You okay?’

  Of all the siblings, Pietro had been the most resistant to sign, and only gave in when his years of pushing Rocco to voice and read lips yielded very little. His kids and wife were both better at signing than he was, but since Rocco showed up on his door step a drunk mess with two Louis Vuitton suitcases and an annoyed Pomeranian in a cloth carrier, he’d been trying.

  ‘Been better,’ Rocco replied. He reached for his glass, but Pietro held it further away and ignored his irritated grunt. ‘I’m not five.’

  Pietro lifted a brow and signed more in English than ASL, ‘Stop acting like it.’

  “Bah!” Pursing his lips, Rocco waved him off, turning his attention to the vineyard until Pietro’s hand waved in his periphery. He turned to look as his brother hooked a finger over his ear, asking about his hearing aids for the hundredth time since he got there.

  Rocco scoffed again. ‘Why bother.’

  Pietro, like so many others, wanted to think his hearing aids made a damn difference beyond making babies crying in planes a little sharper, and the occasional ability to pick up some of the harder consonants. Mostly, he knew, Pietro wanted this to be easier on him, and Rocco was in no fucking mood to hold his hand through communication.

  ‘What are you going to do after this?’

  At that, Rocco felt a little bit of the blood drain from his face, because he didn’t know. He’d just wrapped up a three week shoot that was set to come out of post in June, and he knew there were two other films on the books he’d given a verbal promise, but no
thing signed.

  Mostly, Xander had been up his ass about branching out. “People want new content, and you’re stagnating. Do something unexpected.”

  At the time, Rocco had almost considered it for the hungry look on Eric’s face as he interpreted.

  “Bottom, fuck a virgin, play boy to Daddy. Do you know how fucking much money any of those would earn you?”

  Rocco didn’t need to worry about money. He wasn’t just rich, he was smart. He had expensive designer taste, but he also had an eye for numbers, and it was easy to start investing when he realized he was raking in the cash because he was commodity. He could sell both houses, buy something new, and live off his interest if he really wanted to. He’d never have to work again, and wouldn’t that be a slap in the face to the people who had been profiting off his work?

  But he wasn’t quite ready to retire. Yes, he was ready to shake things up, but to walk away from his life entirely?

  The vibration on the table under his hand made him look up, and he saw Pietro’s frown as he pointed to Rocco’s phone. The screen was lit up with messages, but he’d forgotten he’d turned the vibrate off just to get a little peace from people still trying to drag the real story out of him.

  Anthony: Need you to come to my office. Please bring someone to interpret. This is an emergency.

  Anthony: I’m going to be here until two, and then I’m coming to find you.

  Anthony: I just got the call from Blaylock Inc’s representation.

  Rocco’s hands shook as he tapped out a quick message about being on his way. He wasn’t quite sure why people like his lawyer thought he kept trained interpreters in his back fucking pocket, but he’d make do.

  ‘Is Lorenzo in the city?’

  Lorenzo was the second to youngest—the last planned baby before the whoops that was Rocco—and he was more free spirited than any of the other siblings. He had a small condo near the beach, but he was rarely there when the weather was nice.

  ‘I’ll call him,’ Pietro said. He stood when Rocco did, then laid a hand on his arm. ‘What’s wrong?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ was the only answer Rocco could give. Whatever it was—it wasn’t good. The stress and fury bled through Anthony’s simple words on the screen. ‘Anthony needs me, and I need a better interpreter than you.’

  Pietro had the grace not to look offended, but at least a little ashamed as he put his phone to his ear. Rocco didn’t stick around for the conversation. He’d use notepad and pen if he had to, which he’d done before. It took ten times longer, but it was better than nothing, and nothing was just shy of worse than a bad interpreter.

  He hurried into the house, giving his niece a small pat on the head before he rushed to his room. James was at his heels, likely yipping for attention, but he ignored the dog as he grabbed a fresh shirt and then moved to wash his face.

  He was sweaty from his morning in the sun, but he spritzed cologne and changed into new jeans, doing up the button as he moved for his loafers tucked in the corner of the closet. The room was in total disarray—as it often was when he had to live out of suitcases. Most of his things were still in Malibu but they all felt so fucking unimportant now that they were tainted with what Eric and Xander had done.

  With a sigh, he looked at himself in the mirror and tried not to grimace. He was the same man as before, just haggard and exhausted. He hated that Eric had this much power over him. True, it was becoming obvious he hadn’t loved the other man in years, but he still had a hold over Rocco’s life and that was starting to weigh on him.

  He just wanted this over.

  James followed close at his heels, and he reached down to pick up the yapping pup before snatching his hearing aids from the dresser and using one had to push them in. It had been a while, and the molds made his ears instantly start to ache, but he gave himself a reprieve by not turning them on.

  He buried his face in James’ soft, pampered fur before moving to the living room where Pietro was waiting, pacing in front of the sofa. ‘L will be at Anthony’s office waiting for you.’

  Rocco breathed a small sigh of relief and nuzzled his dog once more before setting him down and grabbing his keys off the side table. ‘Thank you,’ he signed with genuine affection.

  Pietro wasted no time in pulling Rocco into a hug, and Rocco was profoundly aware he was still the baby. Even nearing forty, he felt young and vulnerable in his big brother’s embrace, and he let himself sink into his own weakness just for a moment.

  When he pulled back, he felt better, and gave his brother a nod.

  ‘Let me know when it’s over,’ Pietro insisted.

  For the first time that morning, Rocco felt somewhat comforted, and he nodded. ‘I will. Don’t wait up.’ He didn’t think his brother caught that meaning, but it didn’t matter. He slipped out the door and headed to his car, bracing himself for what was about to come next.

  Chapter Three

  Simon swiped a mixture of sweat and flour off his brow, then glanced up at the time. The bakery was closed, but morning came too quickly, and it was obvious after hiring an extra set of hands, Kyle wasn’t going to be much good at anything except keeping track of the register and flirting with the customers—and he didn’t think that second part was winning the Chametz any favors.

  His eyes strayed to the photo he’d hung on the wall—a copy of the one he’d given to Levi of his younger brother baking with Bubbe. They both looked blissfully happy with dough under their nails and smears of chocolate on their matching aprons. Levi was barely using full sentences, but his passion was already obvious. Simon had never had that—never really felt passion for anyone or anything before.

  Even when he was in school, he chose writing because he was good at it. Writing had been a way he could express himself when his own tongue twisted into knots and made him sound like a fool. Writing allowed him no mockery as he tried to put his thoughts together and make sense of his raging emotions.

  Not that it helped—in the end.

  He was here, at Chametz, alone as he ever was. Levi was living with his boyfriend, James, at the Lodge, and while Simon was happy for him, a small piece of him felt like Levi’s absence was nothing more than a mark of the inevitable ending to the bakery. And Simon had known it, the day he conceded that part of his life and passed a set of keys to a food truck over to his brother—a gift, but also a promise. When this all falls apart, I’ll still have done my best by you.

  Levi had insisted he wasn’t going to give up his time at Chametz, but getting his food truck ready proved a bigger monopoly on his time than he’d anticipated. Simon had assured him it was fine, that he’d make do—and he would. He had to. He had a personal loan for the food truck with sharp teeth breathing down the back of his neck. The Chametz was a few missed payments away from folding, and he didn’t see a solution. They had been near, if not in the red for over a year, and he knew as well as any accountant that there was no coming back from that.

  Nothing short of a miracle, and he’d stopped believing in those the day he set his first stones on Bubbe’s grave and realized any covenant he made with Hashem would probably be ignored. He was in too deep now to give up his beliefs, of course, and Levi was too important to take the risk. But sometimes he wondered if it was habit, not real faith.

  With a sigh, Simon set the dough into the walk-in for the slow rise, then hung his apron up and moved to the sink to wash up. He looked a mess, but Levi was having his official food truck grand opening over at the fire station where Spencer, Max, and Collin had set up a little makeshift petting zoo for the kids in order to raise money for Spencer’s cat shelter.

  It was going to be cute, and Simon would have enjoyed the idea more if it wasn’t crushing him with social anxiety. But he was trying more—for Levi, for the things his brother was doing and the steps he was taking to bridge the gap between them. Simon felt worse about it for the secrets he was keeping. The fact that Bubbe hadn’t left the bakery to them both—that Simon alone shouldered the burden of
ownership and finances. That sales had been sluggish since Simon was dragged back from college and forced to take her place—to play parent to an angry twelve-year-old who had just lost the last parental figure he’d ever had.

  He managed to keep them afloat for a while, and Levi’s refusal to do anything with his culinary schooling besides work at Chametz had helped, but not enough. The loan was a stop-gap, it was a way for Simon to provide for Levi before it all came crashing down.

  The foundation was already ruined, and the walls were starting to tremble.

  He knew that disaster too well.

  He could only pray at this point, Levi would forgive him when all was said and done.

  As summer crept closer, the nights were easier to bear, and he enjoyed the breeze on his skin after being trapped in the kitchen all day. As much as Cherry Creek felt like a prison some days, he did love it there. He loved that he could spin in a full circle and never get tired of looking at the mountains—he loved that the summer air was fragrant with blossoms, and the winter was crisp with fresh snow and rich with smoke from fireplaces. As much as this place held grief, it also held joy.

  It held Levi’s first steps and his first words. It held Bubbe’s smiles and off-key Shabbat blessings and the smells of home. He knew that the bakery wasn’t long for the world, but he wasn’t ready to roll over and give it all up. Not yet.

  The walk to the fire station wasn’t far, and he heard the soft murmur of voices as he got closer. Someone was playing music on a loudspeaker that didn’t carry far, and he could already smell fresh baked goods on the breeze.

  Crossing over the grass courtyard, Simon stepped onto the pavement and rounded the corner to the massive parking lot at the fire station. The bay doors were wide open, kids hanging on and around the front of each truck, and off to the side was the makeshift paddock that held goats, a duck, and a handful of cats who didn’t seem at all interested in escaping the eager hands, giving them all love.