Infinite Us(74)

"You are fucking with my patience and you're threatening everything I … "

"You?" I said it because it occurred to me that Duncan, no matter how upset he was, didn't have any real claim on the work I did. He made phone calls. He took rich assholes out for rounds of golf or for fancy meals I couldn't pronounce at restaurants I'd likely never be able to get a table at. But the work? The idea? The plan for it all? That had been me, not Duncan. "You, man? Your work?"

"Don't start with that again. I've pulled my weight."

It took me a minute, but I stood, slowly, hands resting on my desk because I wanted to give him time to calm, to restate what he'd said. But Duncan didn't apologize or backtrack. In fact, he only got redder in the face and his eyes grew glassier. "Maybe you wanna try that again?"

I wasn't a jock. Despite my size, it wasn't in my nature. I was fit and large but that was Nation genetics. I looked like my dad and my granddaddy-big and brawny with not a lot of neck and too much lip. If I needed to, and sometimes you just damn well needed to, I could move my shoulders a certain way or pop my neck at just the right time and look intimidating as hell. But I rarely needed to use it.

Just then, I need to strut a little because Duncan looked a lot like he might lose his entire shit.

He ignored my question, mouth quirking like he wasn't sure how intimidating he could look if he curled his lip and bared his teeth. We weren't dogs and I had a good four inches on the guy-I also knew that without me Duncan had no deal. He had zero leverage. That asshole didn't scare me.

"You need to check yourself," he said, voice high and cracking, but he didn't seem to notice and leaned forward, copying my stance as he glared at me. "I can make your life fucking miserable." 

I stood up, flexing my arms a little when I crossed them. "That right?"

"You better fucking believe it." He straightened then, but kept his hands at his side. The red splotches over his cheeks and across his forehead lightened just a little. "I can call in favors, of which I have a shit-ton. I can pull your business license and make it impossible for you to get rental space or staff. Trust me, Nash, without my help you're just a code monkey with no way to get your product to the public."

"And you're just a rich prick scratching your ass until someone smarter than you, more creative than you, comes along so you can ride their coat tails."

"Fuck you … "

"I don't think so." My laptop shook when I slammed the lid closed and I came around the desk to glare down at Duncan. "You can't fucking intimidate me, man. I might not have your connections, but I have a product that a lot of people want and you have zero legal claim to any of it. You pull my license and I'll go somewhere else to get another one. You block me from renting and I call a few favors of my own. You think I went to MIT and didn't network? Man, please. Code monkeys stick together."

I knew I'd flaked out on Duncan. My life, my distractions, my damn dreams had split apart the work I'd done with him like a sledgehammer, each blow fracturing another split, each dream cracking apart what I knew as normal. It was my fault, I knew that, but something had always been unsettling about Duncan. Something had always told me that with him, I'd always have to watch my back. And now it was time to cut some ties.

When he went on glaring, unable, maybe unwilling to answer back from my insults, I decided right then he wasn't worth the drama. There might not be a Nations with Duncan, but I knew for damn certain there would still be a Nations on my own.

"You know what? I don't need this." I stepped back, grabbing my laptop and a few notebooks I kept in the top desk drawer.

He watched me as I moved around the office, picking up chargers and books, a few Post-Its with shorthand notes I'd made to myself before stuffing them all in my backpack and loosening my tie.

Duncan watched me in silence until I had grabbed the doorknob and opened the door. It was only when I'd stepped over the threshold that he decided to speak.

"You walk out of this building, Nash and I'll sue your ass. You're in breach. I don't like people who walk away from me."

I laughed then, pulling up my backpack on my shoulder. Outside in the lobby Daisy and the contracted programmers we had hired to pound the code paused their conversations and hung up their calls to listen to us.

"Sue me for what Duncan? I got nothing to my name. I don't have a damn thing to lose."

I left him standing in my office, that face still angry and red. A nod to a few of the staff that had been with me from the beginning, a couple who followed me into the elevator, and I left Duncan's building, leaning against the wall wondering why I didn't feel worse. Wondering why I'd been able to lie so easily. Duncan may not realize it, but I did have something to lose. Something I thought could never be mine again. But it had nothing to do with investors, or programming, or even my precious code. It was something a lot more personal.