Love Him Free (On the Market #1) - E.M. Lindsey Page 0,6
come home to a nice guy.
And that nice guy decided to leave Rocco one Tuesday afternoon during a rainstorm, and publicly announce it before talking to about it Rocco first.
On Twitter.
Thunder crashed— he knew it by the way the table rattled under him. Storms this bad were rare for their little seaside cottage, and he held his breath, but the power indicator on his laptop didn’t blink. It probably would, eventually, not that it mattered. He was nursing the raw, fragmented edges of his shattered relationship and the dark felt appropriate.
His phone buzzed and he saw his brother’s name on the screen. He had half a mind to just turn the damn thing off—too many people wanted the in—not just reporters, but people he’d barely call acquaintances. He was ready to shut down his social media, and his technology, and his brain if this kept up. Having a life that allowed for the public consumption of who he was—it was difficult most days. Today, it felt impossible.
Pietro: Do you want to talk?
He thumbed a reply, then changed his mind and slammed the phone down on the table so he couldn’t see it. He scratched the empty spaces behind his ears—his hearing aids were long dead and he had no intention of changing out the batteries. He didn’t want a single excuse to be able to hear the way people were clawing at him for more, for everything, for every last drop he had to bleed.
He finished his drink, the buzz humming in his veins, then he clicked on the faint letters reading What’s Happening on his Twitter feed, and stared at the blank space he wasn’t sure he had a hundred and forty characters to fill.
@SylentOfficial: The best revenge is living well. That’s the way I try to live my life. Tell me how I can live better.
Asking that question was asking for trouble, but he felt like if he didn’t say something—do something—he was going to explode. He didn’t have the strength to watch the replies yet, but he would. Maybe. When he was drunker, and a little sadder, and steps from sleep.
His Skype alert began to flash, and he nearly ignored it, but when he saw his agent’s name, he knew he wasn’t going to have much of a choice. He clicked the answer button, and immediately Xander’s mouth was flying faster than his fingers on the keyboard.
Rocco had freely and often admitted how much it annoyed him that Xander wouldn’t even learn the basics of ASL, but he had been good at making sure Rocco was earning some of the top money in his field—and he figured trading cash for that peace of mind was enough. But Xander was clearly losing his shit and waiting for the chat bubble to post wasn’t great for his state of agitation.
Meeting tomorrow. Shit hit the fan.
For the sheer amount of time he’d taken to type, and the flow of words from his lips, Rocco was annoyed that’s all he’d managed to type out. He considered typing back, but it was just to annoy Xander, so he didn’t bother. “I don’t have my ears on, and I don’t plan to get them, so I didn’t catch anything you just said.”
Xander scowled at the screen and it was too easy to make out the word, “Great,” on his lips.
“I’m drunk as shit right now and I’m going to be drunker before I fall asleep. Text me the details, but don’t make it too early.”
With that, he signed off, knowing he was leaving his agent swearing up a storm at his blank computer screen. Another call lit up, so Rocco slammed the lid of his laptop down, then sat back in the chair, leaning as far as he could toward the counter where the bourbon was resting at the edge of the polished marble. His fingers scrabbled for it before it fell against his palm, and he didn’t bother with a glass this time.
Who the fuck was he trying to impress now?
He took three more shots into his mouth before turning over his phone, and he swiped away all his text alerts before opening up his Twitter, and hating that there were so many retweets of Eric’s words that flipped his world upside down.
@DaddicusRex: I hate the phrase newly single and ready to mingle but that’s my entire mood. Where’s a broken-hearted guy go to get some rebound dick? Last night wasn’t enough.
There was a text waiting for him too. Three long pages