Liability (Suncoast Society #33)(56)

Now Freddie’s tone turned shocked, whiny. “Why not?”

“Because friends don’t do that to friends. And they damn sure don’t leave threatening voice mails for them.”

“Why did you lie to me?”

“I didn’t lie to you about anything.”

“You f*cking did lie to me!”

“Lie to you? About what?”

“You didn’t tell me you were seeing anyone!”

“You never asked. Had you asked, I would have said yes. I don’t know what more you want from me. You’re being unreasonable considering I’ve spent the past several months telling you we are nothing more than friends and encouraging you to go out and find someone else. When I moved, I told you it was over, and that we were just friends.”

“But I love you!”

Mason’s creep-meter swung all the way over and pegged out at eleven. “I’m sorry, Freddie. You’re refusing to live in reality. I didn’t want to resort to this, but I’m going to block your number once we finish this call. Do not call me, do not e-mail me, do not come by my place.”

“But—”

He chose the nuclear option he knew would probably firebomb the salted earth he left behind. “Go find someone your own age, Freddie.”

“How dare you! I—”

“Good-bye.” Mason hung up on him and his ranting. Before Mason could maneuver through the contact screen to block him, Freddie called back. Mason ignored it and went back to what he was doing.

The pop-up message asked, Block this number?

With not a little regret, Mason hit the confirmation button.

He hated to do that. Even in previous break-ups he’d managed to stay friends with his exes. Sometimes they’d left, sometimes he’d left. This was the first time he’d ever had to completely sever contact with someone.

It made him sad to do it, although he suspected Freddie would never think that. He’d really hoped maybe Freddie would have picked up some healthy coping skills while they were friends. Learned some relationship skills from someone other than his f*cked-up family.

Matured as a person.

Unfortunately, Freddie had moved himself from friend firmly into the “liability” category. And Mason refused to have someone like that in his life. Especially not when he had Cole and Kim.

Maybe I should rent a car for a few days.

No, that wouldn’t work. If Freddie was going to stalk him, as soon as he showed up in his own car, it’d be a target. Well, at least their complex had security cameras in the parking area and at the entrances. If something happened, he’d file a report.

Meanwhile, he’d probably better have Cole and Kim use the parking lot on the other side of the building. He could let them in through the sliders so they wouldn’t have to walk all the way around his building, but no reason to subject them to that.

He probably doesn’t know where I work.

Freddie wasn’t one to take initiative, usually. It shocked him that the guy had even moved down here, although Mason would never know the details now. It wouldn’t be outside the realm of possibility for Freddie to track him down at work by Googling details or even following him to work.

Thank goodness for campus security. Their complex held three other tech companies and they had a manned gate, a guard on duty twenty-four-seven. For their building, Freddie wouldn’t get past the front security desk without a guest badge.

I’ll have to warn them.

Shit.

This was aggravating to the max.

I’ll have to warn Marcia and Derrick. Again, he’d never given Freddie the name of the club, as far as he remembered. But there was only one BDSM club known in Sarasota, and it was Venture. He couldn’t get the guy banned from Venture unless there was a restraining order or Freddie violated their rules or something. Mason wouldn’t want to subject his friends to someone who appeared to be unbalanced.

Might mean having to keep a low profile there for a couple of months, too.

Dammit.

He took a deep breath. Maybe I’m getting ahead of myself. It wouldn’t be beyond the realm of probability for Freddie to change his phone number and try again. Okay, for the next couple of weeks, he wouldn’t answer any unknown numbers, and if Freddie popped up again, he’d block him. Again.

Or change his own number.

Which would f*cking suck, because he’d had it for over ten years, had kept the same number when he’d moved to Nebraska just so he wouldn’t lose contact with his friends and family here in Florida.

He sat there for a moment, feeling relieved, sad, and more than a little worried.

Maybe over nothing.

Hopefully over nothing.

And at some point tonight, he’d need to have a serious talk with Cole and Kim about Freddie. He’d mentioned the guy in passing, briefly related some of the issues he’d had with him not taking the hint, but hadn’t told them yet about him showing up the other night.

When he hadn’t been working since then, he’d either been sleeping or snuggling with Cole and Kim and definitely not thinking about Freddie.

Maybe instead of getting Kim wound up before the club he’d use their time after dinner to talk about this.

Might be best.

Wanting to have as much time as possible later, he opted to load his toybag into the trunk now. After checking all the windows and doors were locked, he headed down the walk, popping the trunk with the button on his key fob. It was already dark as he rearranged a couple of things to make room for the bag.