“Same reason you are. Food,” Adonis says as he grabs a plate full.
“It’s like we have food elves. There’s always food around.”
“Did you just call us food elves?” Graínne asks as she walks in with another plate of bacon.
“Um. Yes? But I meant it in the most grateful way.”
“Good save.” Lorenzo laughs as he walks in. “I got a text to come to the clubhouse.”
“Tristan needs some help bringing his parents to Lake Renegade,” Leonardo tells them.
“Sure. I can get the paperwork started now, that way you can take it with you. And then you can either have the cemetery ship their urns to us here or you can bring them back with you,” Lorenzo says.
“Thank you, I think it would be easier for them to ship the ashes. I worry that I will drop them or something could happen if I do it.”
“Not a problem. I’ll have the paperwork state all that and you’ll need to pick a plot before you go. That way we can get it ready for them. If you want, we can head over there now.”
“I appreciate it.”
Lorenzo and I head to the Lake Renegade Cemetery. It takes us a few hours to pick out a spot I think my parents would’ve loved. I can’t help but miss them even more right now.
“Thank you for helping me do this. I don’t think I could’ve done it alone.”
“You’re family, Tristan. I don’t know if you know what happened to Giovanna and me when we were little. But our family is what saved us. Now, I have to say that we were loved growing up. But being back here in Lake Renegade healed us.”
“I know that you were taken. I can’t even imagine what that’s like. The person who took you, are they in jail?”
Lorenzo shakes his head. “Dorian Laurent is part of our family now. It’s a long story, which I’ll gladly tell you one day if you want. What you need to know is that my papà is the best man I know. Somehow, he found a way to forgive Dorian for taking us. All because Gia and I asked him. That’s how much he loves us and I’ll never take that for granted.”
“I wish you could’ve met my parents. Because I know they would’ve loved all of you. One of the things my dad taught me was to be loyal to the ones who deserve it.”
“That’s a good thing. There are definitely people who don’t deserve it. Dorian took us to punish the Mancini family. But in the end, he did love us and raised us to be good people.”
“That’s so different than what you’d think would happen with kidnapping.”
Lorenzo smiles. “Things always seem to work differently in Lake Renegade.”
CHAPTER FOUR
Tristan
It’s quite an adjustment having so many people with me on the drive back to Valor Springs. It’s a straight shot of about twenty-two hours, but we decided to break it up into three days. We’ll go through Missouri and Oklahoma. There are five of us going, that’s all we can fit in the car. There were a few others that wanted to go, but taking two cars seemed a little excessive.
So now I’m stuffed into the car with Eros, Apollo, Keegan and Armando. Levi thought about coming with us, but his wife, Felicity, is eight months pregnant. And he worried that she could go into early labor and didn’t want to take the chance. I’m excited to meet the little nugget.
“Are we stopping soon? I’m hungry,” Apollo says to Keegan.
“We stopped to eat like two hours ago.” Armando laughs from the back.
“Yeah, and? I’m hungry. I’m a growing bear.”
“Yeah, growing rounder.” Eros laughs.
“Feed me!” Apollo growls at Keegan.
After another hour, we finally get to the hotel. Apollo complained the whole time.
“And you said you wished you had siblings,” Eros says to me as he sighs.
