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“Oh, Kip.” His voice holds indignance and disbelief. He’s shocked that his friend would treat his wife like this. Actually, I think he’s shocked that any guy would treat any girl like this. Oh my God, that just melts my heart.
He huffs a sigh. “I’m sorry, I’m mad, and I don’t get mad often.”
“Does she know the woman he’s left her for?”
“Yeah. That’s part of the problem. I told you I was working on a communication device?”
“Yes, like the one Stephen Hawking used?”
“Yeah. I know this sounds arrogant, but the software is miles better than anything on the market at the moment. It’s called MOTHER.”
“Like in Alien?”
“Yeah,” he says softly, and I think he’s smiling. “I’ve been working with my cousin, who runs an AI company.”
“Titus, right? Charlie had read about him.”
“Yeah, that’s right. The predictive text component is especially advanced, and it’s going to make a real difference for people with speech difficulties. In November, we discussed which company we wanted to employ to make the speech synthesizer. Saxon and I wanted one company, and Craig was super-enthusiastic about another. In the end, I went with the company I liked. Then we discovered that he’d talked to a reporter and told them we’d sold to the company he recommended, Sunrise.”
“Shit, really?”
“I confronted him. He said Sunrise had offered double what Genica, the company I wanted, had offered. When I said it didn’t matter, that I wasn’t going to let him bully me into it, he hit the roof. And then his wife told me the woman he’s has been having an affair with is Sunrise’s CEO.”
“Oh wow, so he’s mad because you didn’t sell to his girlfriend? How unprofessional is that?”
“My thoughts exactly.”
“Have you spoken to him about it?”
“No. I was too tired tonight. I’ll go tomorrow. I’m sorry, this must be very dull for you.”
“Kip, come on. We’re friends now, right? I’m glad you’re talking to me about it. I can tell how upset you are.”
He sighs. “Yeah.”
“Are you more upset about the professional or personal side of it?”
He’s quiet for a moment. “The personal. I just felt so sorry for Chloe. She’s a lovely girl. She said it was partly her fault because she’s not been attentive enough to him. That made me see red.”
“Why?”
“She’s just had a baby! What kind of man has an affair when his wife is struggling to recover physically and emotionally from the birth of their first child? Actually, what kind of man has an affair? I don’t get it. Relationships end. People break up. I get that. But there’s no excuse for cheating.” He gives a frustrated sigh.
Smiling, I pull one of the roses out of the cellophane and sniff it, loving its sweet scent. This guy… I’m glad he’s had a few whiskies. It’s like he’s opened up his heart and I’m peering inside.
“Chloe said something odd,” he says.
“Oh?”
“She said Craig was jealous of my relationship with my brothers, Saxon especially, and that he always felt it was us three against him. I can kind of understand that, although I’ve always tried to include him in all decisions. But Chloe also said that it was one reason my ex left.”
My eyebrows rise. “Seriously?”
“Yeah. That shocked me, actually. Apparently she told Chloe she thought she’d never mean as much to me as Saxon.”
“You’re twins,” I say, amused. “You’re going to have a special connection. Anyone who doesn’t accept that is going to have a problem.”
“You think?”
