Page 94 of Perdition
And so he gave her the answer that had been weighing on his heart.
“We’d still be living a half-life, me being listless, pridefully ignorant of your needs, and you’d still be reaching out for me, waiting for me to step the fuck up and be the husband and father you needed me to be.”
“So you’re saying that everything we went through was for our own good?” Emily asked, her expression pensive.
“Come on, you have to admit we were both drifting, living in limbo, waiting for the other one to throw a rope over the divide and brave the gap.”
Em rolled her eyes, huffing.
“So you’re saying that we’d be worse off if Sarah hadn’t stuck her tits in our marriage.”
Grabbing her shoulders, he turned her to face him.
“Even the strongest metals are made even stronger when put to the fire.”
She glared at him, but there was no true anger in her eyes.
“Are you comparing our marriage to rebar, Madsen?”
He chuckled, then planted a quick kiss on her pouty lips.
“Okay, how about…even the healthiest rose bushes need pruning to truly flourish and bloom?”
She hummed, her lips trembling as she fought a smile.
He pulled her closer and cocked his head, waiting.
Finally, she grinned, putting him out of his misery.
“That’s better…and more appropriate for us, Mr.Flowers.”
He nodded sagely. “That’s what I thought, too,Mrs. Flowers.”
Behind them, the clubhouse glowed—warm windows that had watched their laughter, caught their arguments, and held their quiet apologies. It had been built of stubbornness and soft moments, the way their life together had been: plank by plank, brother by brother, good times and bad, mistake by forgiven mistake. They had learned how to be patient with each other’s shadows, to lift when the other faltered, to celebrate the small victories like festivals. Standing there, they could see the shape of everything they had made.
Their family, complete and yet still growing.
His chest could barely contain the pride he felt in that moment, standing beside the woman who’d helped him build it all.
Mads cupped Emily’s face and let his thumb trace the line of her jaw as if committing it to memory all over again. “Thank you, my Bloom, for letting this asshole be your husband again,” he said, not as a triumph but as a contented fact—two people who had chosen one another, day after day, until choosing felt less like an action and more like a state of being.
Emily smiled, quiet and full, and in that smile was all the storms they’d weathered and all the bright mornings still to come.
“Well, I couldn’t let you go—you’re the sexiest piece of biker ass I’ve ever seen. I’d be a real shame to give you up…especially since you own my heart.”
Her voice soft, her eyes warm, her expression filled with joy and adoration, she pressed a kiss to his chin.
Closing his eyes against the surge of emotions bursting forth from his soul, Mads sighed contentedly.
They turned toward the fire pit, their steps easy, a sure-footed rhythm that fit the life they’d chosen: simple, honest, fiercely connected. Laughter mingled with shouting and bickering and off-key singing filled the air, a reminder of the world’s continual unfolding—and that Cluster couldn’t sing to save his life.
Mads pulled Emily close, resting his forehead on hers, and they stood like that until the first star pricked the sky, small and unwavering.
At home, when night finally settled, they went inside not as two halves seeking completion but as companions who had long ceased to measure their worth in solitude. Later, after they made love, and as the house breathed and the world softened outside, they fell asleep in the familiar fold of each other’s arms—no more endings to fear, no more heartache to soothe, only the promise of every coming morning.
For Frost, his time in his own hellish perdition taught him something he would never take for granted: there was nothing he’d rather lose than his pride, and nothing he’d rather have more than his wife, his Emily, blooming beside him.
Mads and Emily forever.