Say Ye (2 page)

“Lita, he’s crazy. Don’t listen to him,” Rich said with desperation in his voice, his brow furrowed. Her stomach clenched. Not Rich. She couldn’t be that dumb again. Her faith, her beliefs, had already been nicked, a fine cord now unraveling from the hundreds of small cuts.

“Are you sure? I can’t believe he would…” she whispered to Lorenzo, who nodded.

People stared at them. Still gripping Rich’s arm, Lorenzo said “Let’s go.”

“No,” Lita said. “You must’ve misunderstood.” She moved to Rich and took his hand. It was clammy. She would get him to take her home. She certainly wasn’t going to ask Lorenzo—she needed to forget him, not make him her hero, again. Lorenzo’s furious look only heightened his strong features. Lita forced herself to face Rich.

“Damn right.” Rich shoved past Lorenzo. Lita glanced back at Lorenzo. He tracked them, his arms crossed. Some skinny blonde draped herself behind him, but he shrugged her off.

“You’re with me,” Rich said, pulling Lita along, out of the club. His tone raised the hairs on her arms. Her mind sped through a few scenarios. Before she could decide the best action, Rich’d led her to a darkened alley beside the club. He pressed her against the dank wall. Her limbs tingled in panic.

“He’s that guy you always talk about, huh? You denied you’re into him. I saw the look you gave him. You’re mine,” he muttered.

His breath soured. Lita cringed, darting her eyes for some escape. He had her pinned. His arms hemmed her in, his fingers dug into her biceps.

“You’ve been drinking…you know how you get,” Lita said, trying to buy herself a few minutes to map a plan.

“That’s what my mom says to my dad.” He chuckled.

“No one deserves to be spoken to the way he talks to your mom.”

Rich tightened his grip. Lita’s legs tensed, a cat crouching before she leaps in attack. It wouldn’t be the first time. She’d hoped Rich was different.

“Don’t defend that cheating bitch to me.”

His eyes glazed. Lita rammed her knee up, into his groin. He buckled over with a grunt and she dashed to the side, but not fast enough. He grabbed her arm and tugged her into him. Her heel caught in the buckling concrete and she stumbled into his chest as he righted himself. Twisting, he held her in a sickening deadlock, his right hand squeezing her breast painfully. She writhed, but this only exposed her neck to his exploration.

Shoes scuffed on the pavement. A moment later, she was free. She whirled around. Lorenzo, in one quick move, shoved Rich against the wall and pinned his arm behind his back. Lita gasped a sharp breath at the smack of skin on brick. Her head pounded and her body quavered, both from the adrenaline racing through her and the rancid smells of ammonia and vomit in the dim alley.

“Shut up or I’ll break your arm, you little shit.” Lorenzo made no other sounds, while Rich panted and grunted.

“Listen carefully: leave town and never come within even fifty feet of her again. And don’t think I won’t know, because I have eyes all over the city.”

“Lita,” Rich groaned.

Lorenzo grimaced and studied Lita, who shook without a sound, her body cold. His hesitation gave Rich chance enough to break free. He swung a punch at Lorenzo, who blocked him and followed with a crumpling jab to Rich’s gut. In a swift movement, Lorenzo grabbed him again and whacked him into the wall, this time gripping Rich’s arm with one hand and squashing his face into the bricks with the other. A warm red oozed into the grime of the wall. She squeezed her eyes shut. When she opened them, nothing had changed.

Clutching her throat, she reminded herself to breathe. She fumbled in the pocket of her coat for the cell Lee’d given her. She could call 911…no, she’d been down that path before too. It wasn’t worth the trouble. Lorenzo could handle things. Six years she’d been away from home. She was tired of fighting, of relying only on herself. If her body wasn’t as tense as a brittle tree trunk, she’d have crashed to the filthy concrete in exhaustion.

“You’re pretty slow. I can finish you right here, but I’m being nice for Lita’s sake. Not that I expect you care. I’ll try to make it clearer. Heard of the DeGrazias? Want to be on their bad side?” Rich shook his head in a frantic, mute gesture. “No? Then stay the hell away from Lita and don’t try that crap on anyone else. Understand now?”

Clamping his eyes shut, Rich tried nodding and grunting yes before Lorenzo shoved him one last time into the wall and let go. Maybe all those rumors of the DeGrazia family, Lorenzo’s maternal relatives, being corrupt were true. She didn’t care anymore. Safety mattered more than morality sometimes.

“Get out of here. I’ll be watching you.” Lorenzo scowled at Rich, who staggered down the alley.

If Lita didn’t sit down, she might fall over. The buildings seemed off center. She shivered and hugged her arms to herself. Lorenzo draped his jacket, a warm embrace, around her shoulders. With one hand hovering over her waist, he led her out to the street. Lita took a deep breath and tried to clear every horrible sight and smell from her senses. The groups of people and numerous cars driving by now seemed sinister and loud though all had been cheerful and vibrant when she’d arrived earlier.

“I’m parked over there, in that lot.” Lorenzo’s low, intent tone wrapped around her. “I’ll take you home.”

Lita nodded and walked to Lorenzo’s black Mercedes coupe. Lorenzo watched her as she slid into the deep leather seat. He shut the door. The loud thump startled Lita, but she leaned back and her breathing steadied. She could rely on Lorenzo. He’d been a loyal friend to her and her brother for fourteen years and, from what Lee told her, rivaled Lee in his protectiveness of his female relatives. Her throat tightened dangerously. She wouldn’t cry. Lee and Lorenzo had protected her and when they hadn’t, she’d made herself safe. Lorenzo drove across town, the multi-colored lights flashing past her window.

“Jane home?” His fingers dug into the steering wheel. Anger rippled from his rigid form and his tense tone.

Lita tried to fathom what he was thinking, but her thoughts pushed each other, an uncontrolled mosh pit. “No, and she might be out all night. I don’t want to be alone. He knows where I live.” Why hadn’t she listened to Lorenzo in the club? Maybe Lee was right, maybe she was too trusting, too ready to believe the best in people. But she didn’t know how else to get by in life, how else to keep the possibility of the life she wanted open.

“I’ll keep you safe. Want me to call Lee or Emma for you?”

His words warmed her. “No, it’s almost midnight and I don’t want anyone to know what happened. I shouldn’t have trusted him.” When would she learn? But she didn’t want to learn not to trust anyone. She wanted to have hope, believe in goodness.

“It’s not your fault. He’s a creep, maybe a rapist. Don’t blame yourself.”

“If you hadn’t been there…” Lita faltered and pulled down the hem of her dress.

“You would’ve been okay. Don’t think about it.”

“You don’t understand. To have my first time be…” Lita said. She exhaled a shaky breath. Why had she said that? Lorenzo didn’t need to know she was still a virgin. “I feel sick.” She leaned her cheek against the cold window and closed her eyes against the harsh lights.

“Stop thinking about it. Everything’ll be okay. Look, here we are. Give me your keys.” He followed her up the front steps and opened the door for her. So many times she’d fantasized about Lorenzo taking her home, but this was all wrong. She hurried inside.

Her tension oozed out with each wobbly step down the hall, as if she’d just gotten off a roller coaster. She went to get a drink of water in the kitchen. Lorenzo followed her; she felt his eyes on her. Smoothing the back of her dress, she glanced around the old kitchen, clean once again after her daily ministrations. The answering machine blinked red and she pressed play. It was her mother, Jane, saying she was spending the night at a friend’s and would be back by lunch tomorrow. Lita deleted the message, for once wishing her mother was home, though she quickly thought better of it. No doubt Jane would somehow blame Lorenzo. Her mother never liked him or his family. The only thing Jane had been strict about was not letting Lita anywhere near Lorenzo’s family, or him, unless he was visiting Lee. Their traditional Italian American Catholic patriarchal lifestyle offended Jane’s feminist atheist progressive sentiments.

“Sure you don’t want me to call Lee or Emma?”

“Yes. I don’t want to bother Emma this late. She’s been working so hard at her internship. Maybe Lee… No, he took Amy to Tahoe for the weekend. I’ll be all right. You were there with someone. I’ve already ruined your night.”

“You didn’t. If you want, I can sleep in Lee’s old room or on the couch.”

“I can’t ask you to do that. You’ve done enough already, thank you,” Lita said. She’d imagined spending the night with Lorenzo and this wasn’t it.

“You’re not asking. I’m offering. Do you want to go up and get ready for bed?”

“I…” Lita hesitated.

“Should I go up and turn on the lights for you?”

“Yes, please,” Lita whispered. Her body relaxed, the warm mellowing from being near him gave her a deep, almost queasy sensation.

Lita followed him upstairs then watched him return downstairs after he checked everything for her. From his calm, gentle manner, Lita knew he must care for her, but, as she showered and changed, she believed it was only as if she was his own sister. Lee would have done the same things for her. The slow burn of shame began when she imagined Lorenzo staying with her in her room, or getting in the shower with her, or--no, she stopped herself, she couldn’t think about him that way or she wouldn’t be able to face him. She needed him right now, so she took some deep breaths and put on her black pajama pants and a soft pink cotton sweater and padded downstairs.

“Feel better?” he said as he set a picture of her and Lee back on the fireplace mantel.

“Yes, thanks. You don’t have to stay, really.” She clasped her hands together.

“I can’t…” His cell phone rang. “Excuse me,” he said before he walked into the hall to answer.

Lita’s stomach lurched when he said something about Rich. He hung up, turned to Lita, told her he’d be outside for a few minutes, and to lock the door behind him. Through the small window in the door, she watched him stride down the front stairs. Rich’s car peeled out before Lorenzo even got all the way to the sidewalk. The old Victorians lining her street seemed to close in on her. Usually their closeness comforted her, but her throat constricted in panic like the time her classmates had locked her in a closet.

Lorenzo jogged up the stairs. Lita let him in right away, trembling again. He stepped in, turned, and locked up. She threw herself at him, pressed her face into his chest, gripped his shirt tightly, and sobbed.

His masculinity, from his scent to his solidity, made her blink back her tears and heave a sniffling sigh into his damp shirt. He softly stroked her hair and her breathing calmed, her sobs stopped. Then, clearing his throat, he led Lita into the living room and sat with her on the couch, where she snuggled herself into his embrace. Nothing bad could happen to her now.

“I’ll stay with you. I’ve got someone following him. He can’t do anything to you.” She leaned into him more closely. “Want to watch a movie? Or I could make you a cup of tea?” Lorenzo asked.

Lita wiped away the last of her tears without moving off his chest. She could stay like that forever, like Sleeping Beauty, with Lorenzo as her human bed.

“No thanks.” She sat up to look at him. He wouldn’t meet her eyes. “I shouldn’t have doubted you.”

Lorenzo shrugged. “Most people do.”

“You’ve always been honest with me and Lee.” Though she couldn’t be sure, especially since most of her experience of him was when she was younger. Probably her judgment had been even worse than it was now. Lita frowned, thinking of all she’d heard of Lorenzo’s player ways, different women every week. He had a reputation to live up to, working at his father’s strip clubs. She scrunched her eyes shut.

“You sure you don’t want me to call Lee?”

Lita nodded, relaxed her head back into his chest, and curled up next to Lorenzo, her arms on his waist. She smiled. He draped one arm around her. His heart beat an unsteady rhythm in her ear. She knew she should go up to bed, but she couldn’t. Her eyes closed as she breathed in Lorenzo’s scent, her cheek rested on his solid pecs, his arm snug about her waist. A dream made real. Why ruin it by over-thinking? It was just one night, probably the only one they’d ever share.

Her body grew limp and heavy, like when she snuggled in a blanket still warm from the dryer, the steam from a cup of earl grey tea soothing her. Lorenzo’s scent held a spicy hint of bergamot. She had a few fleeting thoughts of how many bad choices she’d made, but these were soon overridden by her sleepy imaginings of Lorenzo wanting to be with her, of this being one night of many they would spend together.