Page 32 of Broken Vows (Marital Privileges #4)

Emerson

A pounding headache wakes me. My mouth is as dry as a desert, and my stomach is churning. The room spins, and warm bedding falls into my lap when I sit up. I groan while rubbing at the obvious signs of a hangover. My temples are throbbing, and my scaly skin shows signs of dehydration.

As I scan the owner’s suite of Zelenolsk Manor, I prompt my sluggish head for an update on what occurred last night. Portions are a blur, alcohol forever a good cure for painful memories, but a handful are clear enough to recall.

I remember transferring Mikhail’s half of the payment for the photo shoot to his bank account and the other half to my mother, and the paperwork I stumbled onto when attempting to tell Mikhail I had used his computer. But other than that, my night is a haze of short video montages.

The roiling of my stomach worsens when I glance at my phone, hopeful it will clear up some inconsistencies.

Notifications from various shopping apps flood the screen.

I didn’t stick with Temu and Shein this time.

I splurged on goods at high-end department stores, and there’s even a purchase for a top-of-the-range sports vehicle.

The total amount on the screen makes me sick, and not even the remembrance that it is barely ten percent of the amount Mikhail tried to stiff me on eases my guilt.

I feel sick, not just from excessive drinking but from the realization of my actions when more memories flood in.

Last night, I didn’t just throw Mikhail under the bus. I tossed a handful of Zelenolsk staff under the wheels with him.

Needing to make things right, I drag myself out of bed, my body protesting every movement. I need water, something to settle my stomach, and some aspirin before I can even contemplate how to fix my monumental fuckup.

As I make my way downstairs, I recall how my spending began with spoiling the staff at Zelenolsk Manor. With Mikhail’s credit card details at the ready, I ordered a feast fit for kings and enough alcohol to make senseless mistakes seem logical.

I can’t take back the purchases. They disappeared in a matter of hours. But I can ensure that my ill judgment doesn’t affect the people who helped me forget the woes of my life for a couple of hours.

The unease of my stomach settles in my chest as I descend the spiral staircase. The silence is unsettling, and I can’t shake the feeling that something is amiss.

As I cross the marble tiles, my footsteps echo in the quietness of Zelenolsk Manor. The hum of activity from yesterday is absent, and the emptiness of such a large space feels eerie.

As I approach the kitchen, I rake my eyes across the multiple living areas.

As per the worst outcome I thought possible, all the staff are gone—including the maintenance crew, who ensured I vomited on a paved area so the lawns and gardens would maintain their pristine, non-stomach-bile-scorched appearance.

A manor that once housed hundreds of residents on its grounds is silent, and my anxiety grows with each passing second.

I fucked up.

I fucked up bad .

In the kitchen, I find Mikhail. Like yesterday morning, he sits at the breakfast nook, cradling a cup of coffee. His hunched shoulders and the dark circles under his eyes are noticeable. He looks tired, though he is still the most handsome man I have ever laid eyes on.

Worry spreads across my chest, but I try to play it off. “Morning. Where is everyone?”

Mikhail looks up, and that is when I realize he knows everything. The millions I squandered, the liquor I drank with his staff, and the loathsomeness I felt when I tried to flirt, only for it to be politely dismissed.

“Perhaps it is time to call it a night, Mrs. Dokovic?” rang on repeat last night.

“The economy is in a crisis, Mikhail. Your father won’t get close to his competitor if his voters find out you let go of hundreds of employees because you were jealous.

” I hate myself for my last word, but when you’re clutching at straws, you throw more than morals into a burning building.

You take people undeserving into the flames with you.

“You could lose your father the presidency, all because you don’t trust me to let my hair down occasionally. ”

Last night was about more than letting my hair down, but arguments fizzle too fast when you start with the big hitters, and then nothing but lies are told instead of the truth.

Mikhail’s lack of retort stings.

It burns like a thousand bee stings.

I know everything I need to know, but I can’t help but push. “That’s what this is about, isn’t it?” I wave my hand around the empty kitchen, its flap deafening in the silence. “You don’t trust me.”

“It has nothing to do with that,” he lies, breaking my heart.

He didn’t deny that he doesn’t trust me.

He denied that it was the motive of his foolhardiness this time around.

Too angry to think rationally, I roll my eyes before exiting the kitchen with more speed than I entered it. My throbbing temples move toward a blinding migraine, but I keep moving, confident no amount of coin is worth this level of heartache.

Mikhail is on my heels two seconds later. “Don’t walk away from me, Emerson. You don’t get to do that again.”

Hair slaps my face when I whip around to face him, my footing unsteady but resolute. “Again? I didn’t do it the first time, so how could I do it again?”

“Oh, that’s right. You would have had to show up to walk away. I forget not showing up isn’t the same as walking away.” His snarky words are like knives to my chest, so it is only fair I hit him with the same level of aggression.

I storm up to him and bang my fists on his pecs while shouting, “You’re the one who failed to show up!” I huff in his face. “And for what? The makeup sex was good, but it wasn’t good enough to take it that far.”

“Good?” He laughs a tormented chuckle that exposes he didn’t sleep a wink last night. “The sex wasn’t good, Emerson. It was so fucking unbelievable that it ruined every other sexual experience I’ve had.”

Excitement blisters for half a second before it’s stripped for jealousy.

“I’m so sorry to have ruined your ability to stuff your dick into any trollop you meet without having a conscious thought.

How dare I crave fireworks so blistering that I couldn’t imagine doing it with anyone else, let alone being upset it could ruin future endeavors. ”

“Oh no, because you’d much rather pretend it didn’t fucking happen at all. Wouldn’t you? That and running seem to be your go-to coping mechanisms these days.”

I go to slap him, but he catches my hand before I can, and then he uses the same hand to pull me into his body.

Every muscle in my body tenses when I smell my scent on his skin. Our combined smells expose why the minuscule hours I got last night were so restful, and it makes my insides feel like liquid instead of solid masses.

We slept in the same bed, and one whiff of his heated skin last night had me wanting to forget my anger as swiftly as it does now.

I’d like to blame alcohol for the actions that occurred shortly after I told him he smelled like home, but that isn’t true. By the time Mikhail joined me in bed, I was already halfway sober.

Mikhail’s heated words bound off my cheek when he snarls, “You got off on my leg but didn’t have the decency to look at me after it…

again !” His angry eyes bounce between mine.

“Spent over a million dollars in under an hour and didn’t buy me a single damn thing.

But that is nothing compared to when you walked out of my life without so much as a goodbye after three fucking years, Emerson.

Three. Years!” I’m not granted the chance to display my shock, much less articulate it.

“What did I ever do to you to deserve that level of disrespect?”

I cringe at the morbid bitterness in his tone.

He can’t be serious, can he? He broke my heart.

That deserves far more than a snippet of disrespect.

I trusted him and believed in him, and when he left, he shattered our dreams and broke all the promises he’d made.

He drowned our memories with turmoil and made them warp in my mind like a cruel joke.

He hurt me badly, and the fury of that cracks my tone when I say, “I’m not the bad guy in this situation, and I refuse to let you make out I am.”

“And I am?”

“Yes!” I scream, the hurt of his betrayal too painful not to react. “You’re to blame for everything!”

I thrash against him again, desperate to get free.

The memories are too painful, the hurt still real.

To my absolute horror, I whimper out a moan when my fight to get free of his hold has my leg brushing past his crotch—his extended crotch.

It flashes up memories of last night and exposes how he didn’t just watch over me after I stumbled into the owner’s suite.

He was in every frame, close enough to catch me if I were to fall but not close enough to intervene in my rebellious streak.

I try to remember my anger and the pain that hasn’t subsided in over a decade while saying, “Let me go. Please. ”

“No,” Mikhail says sternly, his voice steady. “I’m not letting you walk away from this. From me. I shouldn’t have let you do it ten years ago, and I won’t let you do it now.”

His shunting of the blame again fuels my anger. I continue to fight, to place necessary distance between us, but he holds on tight.

“You can’t just decide to fight now,” I snap out, my voice rising. “It’s too late. Years too late.”

Even as the words leave my mouth, a part of me is grateful, pleased that he’s finally showing some fight and not letting me go without protest this time.

The memory of Mikhail leaving me at the altar is still fresh, a wound that refuses to heal, but his silence for the past ten years hurts more.

I honestly don’t know if I can go through that again.

“It’s not too late,” Mikhail argues, his tone softer now but still resolute. “We can move past this. We can get over it. Fuck.” His eyes are full of emotions and on me, hot and heavy. “I can’t lose you again, Emmy. It will kill me.”

A twisted mix of emotions hits me at once. Anger and gratitude are most prominent. But hope is there too, and it leaves me feeling conflicted. “It’s too late. You should have fought for us sooner.”

“I know,” he admits, his voice cracking with emotions as his grip on my arm loosens.

“I should have demanded answers a long time ago, but I...” His eyes bounce between mine.

“I didn’t want to know the truth. I didn’t want to face the fact that we were over.

I couldn’t bear the thought of hearing that from you. ”

I stare into his eyes, fighting back the moisture looming in mine. As much as I hate to admit this, the hurt in his tired gaze suffocates some of my worry, replacing it with a glimmer of hope.

Maybe, just maybe, there’s something still worth fighting for. We just need to heal the wounds we’re both carrying and rebuild what we’ve lost, and my hungover head is confident it knows the perfect way for us to commence that.