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Me:Why so?
Kip:I went to see that colleague I told you about.
Me:You went to his house?
Kip:Yeah. He wasn’t there. Turns out he’s walked out on his wife. She has a four-month old baby. Fucking bastard.
The curse surprises me. He swore during sex a few times, but this sounds positively vitriolic. He’s upset.
I study my phone, fighting with myself. I promised I’d cut myself off from him when I came home. It was tough to leave Wellington knowing I’d never see him again, and I was convinced that keeping in touch with him would only draw out the disappointment of losing him.
But he sent me flowers. He asked how my mum was. He’s upset. And I miss him.
Me:Would you like to talk? Properly, I mean? It’s okay if you’d rather not.
I wait a few seconds for him to message. Then my phone starts ringing. Smiling, I answer it. “Hello?”
“Hey, Alice.”
A shiver runs all the way down my back at the sound of his voice. “Hey, you. How are you doing?”
“Ah, I’m okay.” He sounds tired.
“Where are you, at work?”
“No, at home. I’m on my second whisky, rather a large one, I have to say. It tends to loosen my tongue, so I apologize in advance if I say anything untoward. I wasn’t expecting to talk to you.”
I smile. “I’m glad you’re at home. Where do you live?”
“Out in Brooklyn.”
“Is it a mansion?”
He chuckles. “Not quite.”
I toy with the ribbon on the flowers. “Kip, I want you to know that I’m not talking to you now because I know you have money.”
“Well, if my fortune can’t talk you into seeing me again, there’s no hope for me.”
I frown. “I’m serious. My situation hasn’t changed. But…” I hesitate. I don’t know how to tell him that I’m sad I can’t see him again without giving him mixed messages.
“I miss you,” he says.
I look at the flowers on the table, my lips curving up. “I miss you, too. So what happened today?”
“I’ve been trying to call Craig but it just goes to voicemail, so I went around his house. His wife, Chloe, was there, with their four-month-old baby. She told me he left her two weeks ago for another woman.”
I close my eyes for a moment. I can only imagine how that must have shocked him. “Ah, jeez. That sucks.”
“I didn’t know what to say to her. He’s my best mate. I’ve known him since university. He’s a member of our senior leadership team at the company. He’s a smart guy, the smartest I know, after Saxon and Damon. I’ve always admired him, looked up to him. And he treats his wife like this. They’ve been together since his last year at uni, so I’ve known her just as long. I’m just… speechless.”
“I’m so sorry. Was she terribly upset?”
“She cried.”
“Aw.”
“She said he’d been seeing this other woman since Christmas. The same time they were trying to get pregnant.”
