Page 20 of Cusp: A Renzo + Lucia Companion

TEN

Diego

The email Diego found waiting for him on the last day he would spend in Vegas was short and to the point. Like maybe Marty Lorde had shot it off last minute because he didn’t have time to do much else. Considering the man’s job and the client list he toted, it was a very real possibility that he did only have time for the three sentences he emailed Diego.

Not that it mattered.

The three sentences were more than enough.

Diego,

Attached is a plane ticket—thought you might want to fly out to LA to see the project my team is working on with Nexit Entertainment in Hidden Hills. I showed them some of your stuff, and they’re interested in putting you in a campaign or maybe doing a sponsorship if you’re up for it. I’ll be in and out for the next week while I finish up things so any replies will go to my assistant.

Regards,

Marty Lorde, Manager

Los Angeles

Diego took in a breath and read the name of the company again. Nexit Entertainment. Known across the world for their festivals, the organization’s events typically sold out in minutes. Getting any kind of brand deal or sponsorship from Nexit would be … beyond his wildest dreams. Undoubtedly a five-figure check, not that the money was the most important thing. It was still a big deal to him, though.

Resting back on the small sofa in his brother’s hotel room, Diego kept reading over the email again and again as though the words might change. Of course, they didn’t. It just … all seemed a bit surreal to him. There was an actual A-list manager that wanted to sign Diego on as one of his clients. It was a little scary. Completely fucking amazing, too.

Diego checked the flight details on the tickets. If he took Marty up on his offer, it meant he would have to fly to LA only four days after he got back to New York. He could already imagine how that would go over with his sister and her husband.

Rose would say no; she thought LA and all the possibilities waiting in the Land of Dreams was nothing more than bullshit at the end of the day. Certainly not the guarantee that college and a nine-to-five promised. Although, those things had never been something that interested him in any meaningful way. And wasn’t that the thing? Shouldn’t Diego be able to do something that he was passionate about? Something that would make him the happiest to do?

Trevor would back Rose up because that’s just what he did.

Already, he had a pretty good idea about how the LA conversation would end when he brought it up to Rose. Diego hated arguing but that was the thing. He knew now that if he really wanted to chase these dreams, then he couldn’t let anyone stand in his way. Even if that person was his sister.

Right?

The click of a latch had Diego glancing up from the laptop he had left on the coffee table with the email still open, waiting for his reply. The person who entered the hotel room was not at all who he expected, if only because Luv had called the room the night before to say his brother wouldn’t get back until the day he was supposed to leave.

Except …

There Renzo was.

Diego couldn’t help but smile at his brother’s entrance. “I thought you weren’t getting back until tomorrow?”

“Pulled some strings. They owed me at least one day with you after the week I had.” Renzo grinned and slammed the hotel door shut behind him. “And hey to you too, kid.”

“Not a kid, bro.”

His brother only shrugged. “You will always be a kid to me, even if we both know different.”

Diego barely had time to react to Renzo’s approach. He stood from the couch only to be engulfed in a warm, tight hug that reminded him of safety and home. Even in the spread of years that Renzo had disappeared from his life, those hugs remained the one thing that never changed when his brother came back.

They still grounded him.

It gave him love.

A long time ago, Diego stopped being pissed off about the fact that his mother cared more about drugs than them. He didn’t even know who his dad was except that he didn’t have the same father Ren and Rose did, but that asshole had never been around, either.

And none of it mattered.

He had a family.