After a short time fruitlessly trying to memorize terms, she picked up her phone from where she’d left it on the table, upside down, ignoring everyone. Gabriela had texted again, but not Duke. Of course not. I just told him to leave me the hell alone.

He’d claimed the sex tape was made last year. When he was with Regina. If that was true, he wasn’t cheating on anybody. He wasn’t hurting the woman. Obviously, it had been quite the opposite. Angel swallowed down bile. She wasn’t sure how to feel about the fact that they were willing to tape themselves, but who was she to judge? He hadn’t done anything wrong, and, if she could believe Duke, it was long before she’d met him.

She sighed, hesitated, and then called him.

“Yo, it’s me, you know what to do,” said his voicemail, followed by a beep.

Angel hung up. She tried twice more over the next half hour, but he didn’t answer. She’d started to leave a message once but couldn’t get out the words. I’m sorry, she wanted to say. It was me who was not being fair to you. You deserve better. However, what she’d said at the table, while hurtful, was true. She could not risk Duke getting in her way when she was so close to the finish line. A relationship with so much baggage was out of the question right now.

But he was still a human being. She couldn’t leave it this way. He’d been good to Jose. He’d chased her down and apologized when he’d been an ass the night before. He’d been a friend to her. And Angel was just another person who pushed him aside when things got hard. She had to return the favor, swallow her pride, and apologize. She tried calling one last time. No answer.

With a sigh, she gathered up her things and messaged for an Uber.

Chapter Seventeen

There was one car in the drive, a Lexus.

Angel knocked on the front door, praying it was Duke who answered.

It wasn’t. The door swung open to reveal a gray-haired gentleman in a sweater vest, with a small gut. A sour, bent version of Duke.

“Hi, I’m sorry to bother you. Is Duke here?” She felt like a child, asking for a friend to come out and play.

The man removed his reading glasses and propped them on his head. “And who are you, miss?”

Here’s a guy who doesn’t watch the news.

“Um, I met Duke a few days ago…”

“Are you the one who spent the night here last night?”

She didn’t want to answer. “Yes,” she said slowly.