Title: Ruefully Rude
Author: Harper Kingsley
Pairing: Charity Reese/Kurt Carpenter
Genre: contemporary romance, mf
Rating: teen+
Summary: Kurt Carpenter finds himself in a sticky situation when the guys he’s working with are rude to the wrong group of women.
Getting in to see the illustrious Nadine DelMacchiano involved making an appointment two days in advance and waiting on a couch for twenty minutes before he was called into her office. Kurt felt like he was walking straight into the lion’s den, but there wasn’t much choice, not if he wanted to get his life back.
“What do you want?” she asked bluntly. She was lounging behind the big glass and chrome monstrosity that pretended to be a desk. Her dark hair framed her pretty face in soft curls that did nothing to lighten her confrontational expression or the disdain in her cold brown eyes as she looked him up and down.
Kurt fought not to shift uncomfortably. There was something about her that made him feel stripped bare and he didn’t like it. He felt out of place in her fancy office, his jeans and charcoal sweater suddenly shabby and maybe a bit shameful.
“You recently posted a video to your blog called ‘Hooter Monkeys’ and I was informed that I’m in it.”
She smirked. “That’s right. Front and center.”
“Look, I was coming out of the office trailer. I didn’t know they were yelling abuse at people on the street, otherwise I would have told them to cut it out. That kind of thing is disgraceful and disrespectful and our company doesn’t condone that kind of behavior. I didn’t know it was happening and I had no part in it, yet the way your video was recorded … It looks like I was one of them.”
DelMacchiano folded her hands on the desk and leaned toward him. “You are one of them. You work with them everyday and you have to know how they are. The only thing that stopped you from yelling at us and whistling too was the fact that you weren’t there. You’re just as bad as they are.”
He shook his head in disbelief. “You don’t even know me. I was transferred here three months ago. I only started working with these guys last week. I don’t … I wasn’t yelling and whistling and denigrating women, but you labeled me as a misogynist on your website.”
“I did no such thing,” she said. “I let the video speak for itself.”
“Yeah, and you named the video ‘Hooter Monkeys’ and it looks like I’m one of them.”
She arched a brow, a smirk tugging at her lips. “You are one of them. You work with them everyday. You were there when they were grabbing their crotches and yelling disgusting sexual things at me and my friends. I only had to post the video. I didn’t even say anything, and everyone knows what you are.”
“But I’m not. I was there picking up some paperwork on my day off, and now everyone’s looking at me like I’m some kind of pervert.”
She shrugged. “I suppose a picture speaks a thousand words, doesn’t it?”
“Can you please remove the video?” he asked.
“Don’t be hilarious. This is the Internet. You’re famous forever,” DelMacchiano said.
Kurt raked a hand through his hair. “Look, I have a kid. I wasn’t one of the so-called ‘hooter monkeys’ as you labeled them. I just got caught on your video because of bad timing.”
DelMacchiano snorted. “Bad timing or the predestined fate of an asshole. Seems kind of the same to me.”
Looking at her face, Kurt realized that she wasn’t going to back down. There was a confrontational jut to her chin and she was giving him this look like she thought he was barely one step up from a rapist. There was no talking her around, and being here would just make things worse.
“I’m sorry those guys were so rude to you and your friends,” he said, and that was it. He didn’t try to make excuses, because he could see her itching to call him a mansplainer. He just gave her a nod of his head. “Thank you for your time. I have to go pick my daughter up from school. You have a good day.”
He kept his back straight as he left her office and headed toward the elevator. There was a heavy feeling in his chest as he thought about the disgusted looks he was going to receive from the moms at Katie’s school.
A bit of bad timing, and his life had become a morass of accusation and suspicion. It seemed like the good feelings of last Tuesday were going to remain nothing more than a memory.
/EXCERPT
