As such, I’d given him my virginity and he’d treated accepting it like it was the greatest gift God had ever created.
That was a memory, even with all that had come in between, that I still treasured. Every girl should have that experience. And in all that had happened between Duncan and me, there was no taking away that he’d given it to me.
Then he’d dumped me the day before school started my junior year.
He’d gone then too, but just to move to the city in order to continue his promising career of being a mover.
And right then, as I watched him commandeer a letter opener, raring to get this done, I remembered other things too.
That he wasn’t as confident and cocksure as everyone thought he was. Those good looks. That body. His prowess on the gridiron. Everyone knew Bowie Holloway was the guy. Popular. He could get any girl he wanted (and this was true). He could best any challenge (this was not true).
They all bought into the ideal.
Except Bowie.
I remembered, too, that there was a reason he and Corey got along so well.
Because under that hot guy exterior was a nature nerd, but the relationship Bowie had with his father meant he had to keep that buried way down deep.
I also remembered that the first time his father made him kill a deer, and gut it, earning the nickname “Bowie,” he’d come to my house that night. He’d climbed through my window and cried in my ten-year-old arms his twelve-year-old tears, declaring he was never going to do that again, “Even if Dad hates me.”
He didn’t do it again.
And his father grew to hate him.
I had wondered, and as I ended up being his girl, twice, but I was his friend what seemed like forever, so I did not hesitate to ask why he’d kept the name Bowie.
“To remember…never again,” was his answer.
It was implacable.
He could be an intensely stubborn kid.
And I’d lived the nightmare of him being that same kind of man.
But there was more to him that I had not allowed myself to remember, until now, as I watched him standing behind his large, handsome, masculine desk, slitting open that box that he’d set smack in the center.
This was what sent me to stand opposite it, and say, “You look well.”
His head came up. His hazel eyes locked on me.
And his mouth moved.
“Let’s not.”
Well then.
“Of course,” I murmured.
“I don’t know what Corey was thinking,” Duncan stated. “And as usual, I have no goddamned clue what’s goin’ on in your fuckin’ head,” he continued. “But for the kid I knew who was my brother, I’m doing this. With you.”
He would obviously not know what was going on in my head because he didn’t ask, and if I spoke anyway, he wouldn’t listen.
I did not get into that.
I was right then just as keen to get this done. See what was in that box. And get the hell out of there.
I nodded.
Duncan slit open the box.
I took a step closer to the desk.
He folded open the flaps.
I leaned, peering in.
And I did not understand what I was seeing.
It looked to be filled with reems of paper, computer printed, and there was one lone #10 envelope on top, sealed, with something handwritten on the front.
Though as my eyes processed what I was seeing, I could make out what the papers said.
And my blood ran cold.
Over and over…
And over and over…
I’m sorry.
Three tall stacks, side by side, the box filled, the top pages all covered in the same thing.
I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.
Duncan’s large, veined hand reached in, nabbed the envelope and then shifted some papers aside, exposing the same underneath.
If it was all like that, it was thousands and thousands of I’m sorry.
“This says…”
My eyes darted up to Duncan, who was reading from the envelope.
His voice was quieter.
And I was very aware that I was incredibly disturbed by the literal thousands of apologies when I had no idea what Corey would need to apologize for—to Duncan and me—and I did not think that was a joke.
I still saw that Duncan had lost some of the color under his healthy outdoors-man tan.
“…I’m supposed to read this out loud with you here,” he carried on. He looked to me. “I’m not allowed to read it myself. He says he wants us to hear it first at the same time.”
“Duncan—” I could not hide the disquiet in my voice.
“Let me just read it, Genny,” he whispered.
There he was.
There was my Duncan.
My Bowie.
Mine.
Mineminemineminemine.
I couldn’t stop my head ticking, which made his eyes narrow in concern he didn’t hide, before I again nodded.
He didn’t hesitate to slit the envelope open. Pull out the tri-folded letter that was on such fine-quality stock, I could see it without feeling it.
Duncan unfolded it, and through a dead man’s hand, delivered a blow neither of us was prepared to absorb and neither of us would recover from.
Ever.
“Dun and Genny, I can’t say it enough. I’m sorry. It was me. And it was me because I loved you, Genny. God, you never figured it out. I thought I was so obvious. But you never figured it out. And you picked him.”
“What?” I asked softly.
Duncan didn’t even look at me.
“So I told him. I told you, Dun. I told you Genny and I slept together. And I told you because I knew you’d believe me. And I loved Genny so much, I was willing to sacrifice you to have her. So I lied and told you we’d had sex.”
The chill of shock slid over my skin, forcing me to take a wooden step away from the desk.
“And I was married. God, what a fuckup. I did it to myself, giving up on Genny and marrying Samantha. Of course, both of you would come to my wedding. Of course, both of you would remember how into each other you were. And of course, you would hook up and be inseparable again. I couldn’t even get either of you on the phone because, if you weren’t working or sleeping, you were fucking. And every day it kept going on, turning to weeks, months, an entire year. It was torture. It made me crazy. I had to make it stop.”
I was trembling.
Duncan stopped reading, I knew he did when he said gently, “While I finish this, why don’t you come over here?”
I tore my eyes from the letter in his hand and looked to him.
I should have kept them on that despicable, foul, hideous letter.
Because Duncan looked ravaged.
Not pale.
Not stunned.
Not angry.