Page 66 of Perdition

“What if they can’t be fixed?” she asked, stepping out of his embrace to peer up into his pale face. “What if I don’t want to fix it?”

NINETEEN

If she wasn’t already dealingwith a flood of her own emotions, she’d have sobbed in heartbroken empathy at the look that imprinted itself on Frost’s face.

Devastation.

Hopelessness

Terror.

Anguish.

His blue eyes widened in a now deathly pale face.

Never, not once in their twenty years together, had she seen him so scared—not even when she was in labor with their twins.

Frost jumped from his seat, stumbled forward, and fell to his knees at her feet.

He looked like a man who’d been gutted.

He cupped her face in his hands, the movements jerky and rushed and desperate, and held her gaze as he rasped, “No! No! I refuse to believe that, Em!”

“Why?” she whispered, her throat raw.

“Because, despite all the bullshit and the mistakes and the words said and unsaid, we still love each other.”

“Sometimes love isn’t enough—it certainly wasn’t enough for you, otherwise Sarah never would have become an issue.”

“Shit!” he cursed, his mouth twisting in self-derision. “I will not let the mistakes I made with Sarah be the reason our marriage falls apart.”

She snorted. “Your mistakes with Sarah were the last straw on the already dying camel’s back, Frost! The issue isn’t that you cheated with her, the issue is that things between us had degraded so much that she was able to slither her way in in the first place. How did that happen, Frost? What crack in our marriage allowed that snake to slide in and pour her venom into our relationship?”

His lips thinned, his nostrils flaring in anger and frustration. And the flicker of one specific emotion in his eyes told her everything she needed to know.

Yeah, that was a look she recognized. He was without words, without answers, and wholly guilty.

Heaving a sigh, Frost admitted, “I let her in.”

Em knew that, but to hear it from his lips was like a dagger to the chest.

He dropped his hands to her shoulders, squeezing them.

“After that night, when you kicked me out, I talked to War about what was going on,” Frost said, shocking Em.

“You talked to War? About our marriage?” Her voice was sharp, and Frost flinched.

“Not about intimate or private things, Em. I talked about what I’d done, about pulling away and spending too much time with another woman….”

Hell, Warwick was the perfect blend of his father and mother—all of Mads’s protectiveness and strength, and all of Emily’s compassion and insightfulness. He would make an amazing therapist…or bartender.

“And what did our son say, Frost?” she inquired, curious as hell, and a little apprehensive—no mother wanted her kids involved in their marital strife. Matter of fact, she hadn’tshared anything about what was going on between her and their father…until Sorsha had demanded answers that morning at Cheri’s house. By then, though, Em had been so freaking exhausted, keeping up the lie that their family was perfect and whole.

That was the day Em realized she hadn’t been as great at hiding the truth as she thought she had.

And, apparently, Warwick was just as shrewd as his sister. Her act hadn’t fooled either of her brilliant kids.

“War talked about something called limerence, and how what was going on with Sarah was….”