After the Climb (River Rain #1) - Kristen Ashley Page 0,6
what Corey didn’t know was that Duncan already wasn’t ever going to forget it.
Or perhaps he knew that all too well.
“And you were. You were so sure of him,” Duncan continued. “So proud of him. ‘Corey’s gonna rule the world someday, wait and see.’”
My words of yore coming back to me in this instant made me feel nauseous.
“He was remorseful,” Duncan informed me. “He told me he’d understand if I never forgave him. It was a moment of weakness. You were beautiful and he thought the world of you and admitted he had a crush on you and the booze made him stupid. He’d take that hit, of losing me. But I had to forgive you.”
Which, of course, would lead a man to think, Yeah, he was drunk, it’s a guy thing. I get losing control. But her? She’s a slut out for the best thing she can get.
Not to mention the reverse psychology.
Boy, Corey had this down.
At age twenty-six.
However, this water was so far under the bridge, it had evaporated, rained down, flowed back under that bridge, and repeat.
Therefore, it was no matter.
“There’s no point going over this,” I declared. “What’s done is done. Corey’s dying gift was a one final fuck-you. However, I’m taking it as finally having the understanding he was who he was and the relief that my grief at losing a lifelong friend will not last as long as I thought.”
“No point?” Duncan asked.
“Sorry?”
“No point going over this?”
“Well…no.”
“You were the love of my life.”
My stomach folded in on itself so powerfully, I thought I would vomit.
“And you were that from the minute I met you when you were eight,” he carried on. “I knew it when I threw that frog at you and you marched up to me, shoved me and said, ‘Gentlemen don’t throw frogs. You’ll hurt the frog.’”
God, I remembered that.
And I also remembered how disappointed I was he threw that frog, because he was so cute, but he was also clearly a jerk.
It didn’t take him long to reverse that opinion.
“It was little kid love, but it never died,” he finished.
“Yes, it did,” I pointed out.
He flinched.
My heart hurt.
Time to go.
“I’m sorry I pressed this. I should have just opened the box without subjecting you to—”
My preamble to my departure was interrupted by Duncan.
“You wouldn’t want me to know? You wouldn’t want me to know that you didn’t cheat on me with my best friend?”
“It hardly matters now. You haven’t seen Corey or me in over two decades.”
“It hardly matters?”
“Yes.”
“You ride around in that Rolls everywhere, Genny?”
Damn.
I forgot.
I knew Duncan.
And Duncan knew me.
Duncan didn’t let up.
“Hollywood’s down-to-earth female Tom Hanks throws on some heels and folds into a Rolls to take a two-hour trip up to a mountain house in the middle of nowhere?”
His tone was dripping disbelief.
“I think we’re done here. Goodbye again, Duncan.”
And with that, I turned on my Prada kitten heel (when normally, for the most part, I went barefoot, and if I needed to put on shoes, they were slides or T-strap flat sandals, and yes, the slides were Valentino and the T-straps were Chanel, but neither were Prada slingbacked kitten heels), and I started to the door.
I stopped when Duncan cut around me and barred it with his big body.
“We’re not done,” he declared.
“We’re very much done,” I stated.
“Genny, we need to talk this out.”
“What is there to talk out?”
His head jerked, violently, and angry lines formed between his brows.
And his answer was, “Everything.”
“Everything what, Duncan? Seriously, what? There is nothing to salvage from this. You’ve been out of my life more than half the time I’ve been living it. And if Corey has not just demonstrated to you that he is not worthy of your time or emotion, he has to me.”
“I fucked up.”
“Yes, you did, twenty-eight years ago.”
“And we need to talk that out.”
“I disagree.”
“Gen, you’re single. And I’m single.”
He had to be joking.
I felt my eyes grow wide. “Are you mad?”
“If you mean angry, fuck yes. Blind with it at Corey and me for fucking up so colossally.”
“I didn’t mean angry, I meant crazy,” I explained.
“Then I’m not that. I’m very sane and I’m very serious.” He took a step toward me. “And you know it.”
“I actually think you’re crazy,” I contradicted.
“You couldn’t get enough of me,” he declared suddenly.
It took all my talent, of which many were convinced I had a great deal, to force nonchalance.
I waved my hand between us. “I was twenty-four years old and—”