After the Climb (River Rain #1) - Kristen Ashley Page 0,83
on his own.
His family had had enough.
“We still have mutual friends,” she replied.
“Not friends any longer, they gave you my number.”
“I told them I wanted to call to apologize.”
“Not sure I care to have that.”
“Please hear me out.”
Damn it.
“You got two minutes, Sam, then I’m hanging up,” he stated, glaring at the box of I’m sorrys from Corey that Bettina had tidied that he really wanted to burn, but he couldn’t. That much paper wasted? It cut across the grain.
He was saving it to use as scrap.
He sat behind his desk.
“The world should know what he was like,” she stated.
“I disagree. But I also don’t care about that. I care about you dragging Genny and her ex into it.”
“I guessed and I guess I guessed wrong.”
That caught his attention.
“You guessed?”
“Yes.”
“You guessed what?”
“About Tom. I mean, they were who they were. Nothing could break them up except Tom doing that. And he’s Tom Pierce. Very attractive and successful and men like that do things like that.”
Duncan was breathing deeply.
In and out.
“Dun?” she called. “Are you still there?”
“You guessed? You laid that man out like that on a guess?”
“Yes, that was Hale’s response,” she muttered. “Except louder and with a number of foul words.”
“You know, Sam, I’m not certain what you were hoping to get from this conversation, but I’ll tell you I’m not liking what I’m getting.”
“I don’t want you and Gen mad at me.”’
Was she insane?
He pointed out the obvious.
“You’ve failed in that endeavor.”
“Duncan, we were once friends, and I’m sure that Gen told you she stepped up for my son. I haven’t seen clearly since recently how much she did that, and I’m—”
“It’s my understanding Tom Pierce is the only father he’s really had.”
She shut up.
“And this was exactly what we thought it was,” Duncan said. “You made a play for him, he wasn’t into that, and you struck out at him like you struck out at Corey.”
“Dun, first, there are not many men like you. Or how you used to be. Men run the world, and if you haven’t noticed with all your environmental work, they’re running it into the ground. And not only when it comes to that. And they do it because they’re men. Men like Corey. Who feel the need to prove how big their dick is when, at least with Corey, it wasn’t that much to write home about.”
He felt his lips twist before he said, “I do not need to know this shit and I don’t really care about your philosophy on that other shit.”
“I thought she’d slept with my husband,” she spat.
There it was.
“So you made a play for Tom to get yours back,” Duncan deduced.
Nothing to that.
She’d done it and that was why.
“And then you hung him out to dry when he wouldn’t get with your program,” he concluded.
“Men like him should not be able to get away with all their bullshit.”
“If you’re talking about Tom Pierce, I never met the guy, not yet. But what I know from seeing it with my own eyes is he has the abiding loyalty of two smart, together girls and his ex-wife. And hearing it with my own ears, the same from your own goddamned son. So I’m not sure how a man like that bought your bitter bullshit. Though I will point out something that clearly didn’t cross your mind. Doing what you did to him meant doing what you did to them.”
“As I said, I guessed and I guessed wrong and I’m calling to apologize. I’m calling Tom too.”
“Can’t speak for the man but you might wanna take a minute to think on that because, only a guess, he might be a helluva lot less inclined than I am to listen to you.”
“Well, I need to apologize to Gen, because for years, I was not kind to her. I believed Corey’s shit, I’ll note, the same as you, and she was never anything but Gen to me. Not whenever we had to be around each other for Hale. And definitely not to Hale.”
“I’ll let her know your desires, Sam, but just to warn you, you are far from her favorite person right now so I wouldn’t hold your breath.”
“This was a mistake,” she hissed.
“Recent days, Sam, you been making a lot of them.”
“The first one being falling in love, genuinely head over heels in love with Corey Szabo.”
That was her parting shot.
She disconnected.
And the fuck of it was, her parting shot was a good one.