Page 47 of Waste of Worth

“So be it. Fact is, you still haven’t learned.”

Dino pushed past Ben, the threat hanging over his shoulder as he moved in and out of people. He could feel Ben’s words biting at his back, looking for a chunk to rip out.

Words were nothing.

Words meant nothing.

Except when it was Ben saying them.

Dino was all too aware, given the number of scars he sported under his clothes and the aches in his bones on rainy days, of just how powerful Ben’s words could be.

Ignoring the faces and waving hands trying to draw Dino into conversations, he kept walking, making his way to the front of the mansion where he picked his jacket out of the coat room and pulled his car keys from the pocket. He was just walking out the front door when his shoulder rammed into a solid form.

Dino was stuck too far inside his own head to care.

He needed to get out of there.

He needed to prepare for the hell that was about to come his way.

It was inevitable …

It always came.

“Shit, Dino,” Theo grumbled. “Watch where you’re going.”

It was only the sound of his brother’s annoyance that stopped Dino from going to his car and getting the hell out of there. Ben would never do something in such a public way that attention would be drawn to him. No, he’d wait for when night fell, when Dino was alone, and then he would strike.

Or send someone to do his dirty business for him.

Still, when it came to Theo, he had to stop.

Like his sister, Dino protected his brother.

He tried, anyway. As much as he could. Theo often didn’t know that’s what Dino was doing, but that was fine, too.

Turning to face his brother, Dino schooled his features. He didn’t want Theo picking up on the fact something was wrong, or that anything had happened. He wanted to keep Theo out of his business with Ben as much as possible.

God knew Theo had taken his shit, too.

He’d been through hell, too.

“If Ben asks about Lily, you don’t know a goddamn thing,” Dino said.

Theo’s brow furrowed, and he let the mansion door close, blocking their conversation from being overheard by anyone inside. “I don’t know anything about Lily. I haven’t talked to her in—shit, months, maybe?”

“She’s going to call. Don’t answer. Don’t get information that Ben can use. If you don’t know something, you can’t tell him something.”

“Why—”

“Do as I said.”

Theo’s features hardened, his annoyance back in a blink. “She doesn’t call me anyway. There’s nothing for me to know to tell him. What is your fucking problem?”

“This whole fucking family.”

“What?”

Dino couldn’t be bothered to explain it.