After the Climb (River Rain #1) - Kristen Ashley Page 0,89
he didn’t move for a while after.
He had bi-monthly poker games at his house with his buds.
She’d sat in the last two, which were the only two since he’d had her mother back in his life, and Sasha in his life at all.
In that time, they’d been down to the condo on three occasions for short visits in order for Gen to show him her home, so Chloe could show off her shop, and for Duncan to attend his first event at Genny’s side, a fundraiser for the Arizona Humane Society.
Which meant he now owned a suit.
And Chloe had not only selected it, she’d bossed the tailor at the shop to have it fit to perfection (or what she considered perfection) while he was trying it on.
Needless to say, there were a number more pictures of he and Genny together out there.
And without them making a statement, they were now “official.”
And through this time, in her pale-yellow convertible Beetle, Sasha tended to wander back and forth between the cabin and the condo.
Though, she made a point to be at the cabin on poker night.
Duncan headed to where her mother made a point to be on poker night.
The bathtub.
When he got there, he felt the humidity in the air, and you could still smell the scent of the candles she burned, but she wasn’t there.
So he turned around and retraced his steps.
He then went to her third favorite place in his home, outside his bathroom and his bed.
The den.
She hadn’t had an army of designers come in and fill it with chintz and florals, or what he’d discovered was her aesthetic when he first saw her condo: glamour and wealth.
Genny liked it just as it was.
Big stone fireplace with an arch fashioned in the rocks and a deep hearth. Comfortable, deep-seated leather chairs, throws over the back. Several thin but colorful rugs overlaid on each other on the wood floors. Small, unobtrusive standing lamps that didn’t give off light so much as warm glows. And rough-hewn tables close at hand to put down drinks.
Gen loved that room and had claimed it. She said it was small and cozy and it didn’t have a TV, which was something he’d found she wasn’t big on. A surprise, considering her profession. But she definitely preferred to read.
Or what he was seeing her doing now when he entered the room and saw her curled up in a chair with Cookie in her lap, the dogs around her chair jumping up to come greet him, and Tuck snoozing on a folded blanket on the hearth.
She was playing that game on her phone.
She glanced up at him, looking guilty.
“I need to clear the cursed forest,” she told him.
He chuckled as he made his way to her with the dogs accompanying him.
She was not a morning person.
He was. Up early to face the day at least an hour before she cracked open her eyes. It would be an hour after that before she got out of bed.
Which meant she was a night person.
Duncan tended to hit the sack at around ten.
Gen hit it at around midnight.
They made this work sexually, because she woke him up when she got in bed, and with her there, he was all in to have a quick, or not so quick, fuck before passing out again.
And in the mornings, if she was going to be in bed for an hour anyway, he figured he might as well return to it and keep her busy.
So he did.
This meant he was usually in the office an hour later than his norm.
But he’d worked hard all his life.
He deserved this.
They deserved this.
So he was taking it.
And giving it to her.
“They’ve left,” she said as he sat on the hearth by her knee and reached out to give Tuck some love.
“Yeah.”
“Did you all let Sasha win again?” she asked.
He grinned. “Yeah.”
She shook her head but did it also grinning.
She stopped doing that and asked worriedly, “They don’t think it’s rude I don’t say goodbye?”
“Babe, you came in, said hi. Came back, checked in, refreshed the food. And came back again to say goodnight. Now, it’s after midnight. It’d be rude for them to expect you to be at the door, waving at them as they drove away. I don’t even do that shit.”
This made her relax. “You have good friends, Bowie.”
“Yeah.”
“Harvey especially. I adore him.”
“Adoration wouldn’t be how I’d describe it, but he’s the best friend I’ve ever had.”