“You wrote Bellini a big goddamned check, and we both know it wasn’t because you wanted a goddamned Gordon Kendrick.” She wrapped her arms around herself because that way, it was easier not to throttle him.
“Well.” He rubbed at the back of his neck. “Who told you about that?”
“Katya.” She spit out the name as though it tasted bad. Which it did.
“Look. Gen.” He made a patting gesture in the air in front of him, which she supposed was intended to be calming. It wasn’t. “Let’s just … Can we just sit down someplace and talk about this?”
“Talk about what?” she demanded. “About how you thought you could buy off Bellini to get him to offer me cheap gallery space? So you could make poor, inept Gen think she was achieving something on her own? God. It makes me sick to think of you and Bellini scheming behind my back. Do you understand how humiliating this is? How demeaning?”
“I didn’t mean it like that. I didn’t …”
“Then how did you mean it, Ryan? How else could you possibly have intended it?”
He turned and walked a few steps away. He hung his head and put his hands on his hips, then turned back to face her again.
“He—Bellini—said he ‘wouldn’t be in a position’ to offer you the space without a big purchase from me. And I … You had already gone with Katya to look at it. You were so excited about it. Told me how it was perfect for you. I didn’t want to be that guy who was too tight with his checkbook to get you what you wanted.”
“What I wanted was to prove myself. To make something of myself in that world, on my own, without anyone’s help. And now …” She shook her head, her lips pursed tight.
“I thought you didn’t want that anymore,” he said. “I thought you’d decided it wasn’t for you.”
“That’s not the point.”
“Then what is the point? What’s the point, Gen?” His voice was raised to a level that was upsetting to the cow, who tossed her head and made a grunting noise.
“The point is that you didn’t trust me to stand on my own. You didn’t think I could do it without you. And if you’re here, standing behind me with your … your Delaney money and your giant almighty checkbook, then I’ll never have the chance to try.” Tears were spilling down her cheeks, and she swiped at them with her fingertips.
“Ah, Gen …”
“I think I need to go.” She turned and walked out of the barn.
“Gen, wait.” He started to follow her, and she turned on him, her eyes bright with anger.
“Don’t. Just … don’t.”
She walked out, and he let her go.
Sandra was waiting for Ryan when he got back to the house all dirty and dispirited. He’d barely gotten in the door when she confronted him, her arms crossed over her chest, that Sandra Delaney scowl on her face.
“What had Gen so upset earlier today?” she demanded.
Ryan sighed deeply and rubbed at his eyes. “Not now, Mom.”
“Don’t you tell me ‘not now.’ I’m still your mother, and I still expect an answer when I ask you a damned question.” Her graying ponytail bobbed with vehemence.
“Mom … Please.” He couldn’t look at her, and he felt like shit. It wasn’t enough, apparently, to have one woman he loved yell at him. Now another one appeared ready to tear his head off and throw it at him.
“Ry.” Her voice was softer now, and the softness ate at him even more than the anger had. “What happened? Come on. Sit down and tell me.”
They went into the kitchen, and he sat at the kitchen table, staring miserably at the tabletop. He told her what he’d done, and what Gen had said. His voice sounded pathetic, and he knew it, but he couldn’t seem to change it. When he was done, Sandra sat across from him and shook her head.
“God, men can be idiots sometimes,” she said. Despite the harshness of her words, her voice was gentle. “You misread that situation, boy.”
“Yeah. I’m starting to get that.”
“A girl like Genevieve doesn’t give two shits from a rat’s ass about your money. She wants your emotional support, not your financial support. I’d have thought you’d have figured that out about her by now.”
“Well, I guess I should have, but I didn’t. I can’t undo what’s done. So how do I fix this?”
She leaned back in her chair and gave him a hard look. “If I were you, I’d give her a little time. Then I’d go find her and grovel.”
He nodded slowly. “Yeah.”
“But I wouldn’t be surprised if it doesn’t work.”
The idea that it might not, the thought that he might not be able to set this right, made his chest hurt. “Why not?”
“You didn’t just lie to her. You didn’t just scheme behind her back. You hurt her feelings. And a woman’s feelings can be slow to heal.”
“Ah … shit.”
“Wait. And then grovel.” Sandra went to the refrigerator, got out a bottle of beer, and set it in front of Ryan. “I figure you need this right about now.” She patted his shoulder—a quick and businesslike pat-pat—let out a grunt, and walked out of the room, leaving him alone with his beer and his regret.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Gen was crying, and Rose was holding a carton of Ben & Jerry’s Chunky Monkey and a spoon.
“Here.” She held the ice cream and the spoon out to Gen. “It’s not happiness, but it’s pretty damned close.”
Gen grabbed at the carton as though it were a life raft and she were at sea in the middle of a hurricane.
“Why?” she moaned. “Why would he do something like that?” She tore the top off the ice cream carton and began shoveling with the spoon.
They, along with Kate and Lacy, were gathered at Kate’s house on an emergency mission to nurse Gen through the crisis. It was dark out, and Jackson was at the restaurant working the dinner service. Gen’s eyes were red, her skin was blotchy, and a flurry of crumpled Kleenex surrounded her like little shipwreck victims.
“Oh, honey.” Kate put her hand on Gen’s forearm. “Men like to fix things. He saw a problem—you wanted the gallery space—and he tried to fix it.”
“But I didn’t even want the gallery space! I’d decided that I wasn’t even going! He was fixing a problem that didn’t exist!” She waved the spoon and the ice cream carton around for emphasis.
“But he didn’t know that,” Lacy said.
“He would have if he’d talked to me! And why are you all on his side?!”
“We’re on your side,” Rose said. “It’s just …”
“It’s just what?” Gen demanded. She spooned more ice cream into her mouth.
“Well … it’s just that he thought he was helping. He was trying to help.”
“But he was ‘helping’ by being patronizing and demeaning,” Lacy said.
“Exactly!” Gen pointed the spoon at her. “That’s … That’s exactly right.” She looked down at the ice cream. “Why am I eating this? I don’t eat junk food.”
“You do today,” Rose said.
Gen put the ice cream and the spoon down on the coffee table in front of her and slumped back onto Kate’s sofa. She put her hands over her face and scrubbed at it.
“He doesn’t even get it. I was yelling at him, and he was just … He asked me what my point was.”
“Oh, God,” Lacy said. “I hate that. That’s the worst.”
“Right?” Gen said. “If he doesn’t even understand why I’m upset, then how … how …”