Page 3 of Perdition (Unchained Hearts #4)

TWO

Frost groaned, throwing his head back, his throat working, his eyes closed tight, his body vibrating with unspent tension.

Fuuuuuck….

Ten days. It had been ten fucking days since he’d been home, since he’d seen his wife. It had been three days since he’d spoken with his wife, and that was three fucking days too long.

He ached with the absence of her.

And whose fucking fault is that?

Scrubbing his hand down his face, he heaved a sigh and leaned back in his desk chair, the aged leather creaking and the metal base squeaking with the movement. He could buy a new one, but this one was worn in, comfortable, fitting him perfectly.

Just like his marriage. Best friends for twenty-three years.

A couple for twenty years. Married for nineteen years, two kids, six deployments from Fort Drum, two moves—from their tiny apartment to the house they currently lived in, and years of stress, drama, and other ups and downs with the Unchained MC…

. Their relationship was older than some of the prospects looking to patch into the club, but that was one of the best things about it.

Right?

That his marriage was strong, uncomplicated…and…well, he was content .

At least he had been before the kids left for college, creating a vacuum where all-consuming chaos and noise once reigned.

Now…there was silence, there was peace, there was…

an emptiness he couldn’t quite fill, especially now that Em wasn’t there as often as she’d once been.

Now…he had no idea what the fuck was going on.

Em, his Em, was his rock, his home, his reason.

Em, his Em, his Bloom , had been with him from the very beginning, through all of his deployments in the Army, then all his long weeks away during road trips or long nights dealing with club business.

His Em was used to long absences, some without contact for days or weeks at a time.

But not once since he’d been discharged from the US Army had he and his wife gone so long without at least texting.

Yeah, he should have noticed on day one that she hadn’t texted, called, or had one of the brothers check in on him—she was a good wife like that.

Truth was, he could have reached out to her too, checked in on her, told her he missed her and wished he could be home with her, wished he could lay next to her in their bed, make love to her.

But…well…he didn’t have an excuse. He’d been letting the bullshit with the Bone Dogz patch over, drama with the brothers and their women, and the upcoming Cool Hands costume party and fundraiser keep his head occupied.

He was jerked from his thoughts when his cell chimed with a text from his desk, where a pile of invoices still sat untouched. Shit, he was never going to be out from under that pile of bullshit.

Maybe I should just let Patriot handle it…then maybe I can see my fucking wife again….

His phone chimed again, and he checked it.

Sarah: Thank you for lunch on Tuesday and yesterday. I can’t believe how beautiful that place is.

Sarah: Do you think we can go there again tomorrow? Weather is supposed to be perfect.

A hot poker covered in acid impaled him.

Fuck….

He scrubbed a hand down his face and pinched his eyes shut.

The moment he’d first set foot beneath that red maple tree with a woman who was not his wife, he’d known he’d done something irreparable.

But…that day, he’d needed a moment, and Sarah had been vocally upset about something with her family back in New York, and he’d stupidly thought she could come with him, find peace and solace in the beauty and quiet of the back mountain property he and Em had owned for decades.

He'd taken the truck, and Sarah had sat beside him, chatting about her issues with her mother, her hand reaching for his when she needed his strength, and once they’d parked at the fence line and gotten out of the truck, a weight had settled over him.

An oppressive sense of wrongness that only added to his agitation over all the other bullshit he was dealing with.

Rather than give in to it, to allow the stress of duty and obligation conquer him, he’d pushed forward, taking Sarah’s hand to help her over the old log fence, and then leading her to the spot overlooking the small lake at the back of the property.

He hadn't even noticed he was still holding her hand until she curled into him, sighing, at the sight of “the spot.” The spot beneath the red maple tree he and Em had planted so long ago; a symbol of them, their growth, their relationship.

For fuck’s sake, he carved their names into the bark of that tree the same night they’d taken each other’s virginities.

Her voice soft, warm, filled with that sweetness he loved, she asked, “What’re you doin’, Mads?”

He turned his head to look over his shoulder at her where she was laying, naked, her skin glowing in the moonlight, beneath a thin blanket on top of a sleeping bag he’d spread out to keep the chill of the ground away.

He couldn’t stop the unrepentant and ravenous grin that lifted the corners of his mouth at the sight of her, his woman, his everything.

“I’m making a record of us, claiming this spot, this moment…for us,” he replied, a feeling unlike anything he’d ever felt before filling him from his toes to this scalp.

With one last deep groove, Mads stepped back, the knife now loose in his aching fingers.

He felt her move, not needing to see her to know she was there, now standing behind him, the blanket wrapped around her beautiful body, a body he’d worshipped for hours that night.

Her breath against the back of his neck, he groaned when she pressed herself against his back, then wrapped her arms around his waist, holding him there, as though she were his anchor, and him her pillar.

“Wow, Mads…,” she whispered, awe in her soft voice, “it’s amazing.”

He nodded silently, unable to tear his gaze from the permanent mark he’d left in the tree they’d planted three years ago.

Red maples were fast growing, but they’d had no idea, when they’d planted it during Arbor Day when she was twelve and he was sixteen, that the tree would become a symbol of them.

Em and Mads. And now it always would be.

“Mads loves Em 4-Ever,” Em read, sighing.

His gaze, still riveted to the heart he’d etched deeply into the rough, gray bark of the tree, he barely heard her next words.

“Do you mean it?”

His heart slammed against his ribs as a warmth so like the heat of the sun overflowed from it.

Turning, finally tearing his gaze from the tree, he looked down at the girl who’d owned that very same heart for as long as he could remember.

Pulling her into his arms, he embraced her…

and the bright, beautiful future they were going to have together.

Pressing a kiss to her head, he drew in a deep breath, and vowed, “Until the day I die.”

That moment, twenty years ago, was still as fresh a memory as any he’d made that morning, and it was why he always returned to that tree, that spot, every time life became too fucking much.

Sarah had oohed and awwed at the sight, her issues with her family seemingly gone in an instant, and he was left with more internal upheaval than he’d had before he’d gotten in the truck.

He knew he shouldn’t have taken Sarah there the first time, but she when she’d asked again yesterday, he’d been…

preoccupied, his mind a mine field of information, data, missed calls, missed texts, a cold, lonely bed, a cold, lonely heart, and when Sarah started talking about Em, like she seemed to do every time they were together…

every mine in that mental mine field exploded at once.

So, when she’d asked to go back, he didn’t say no—she’d already been there before, what was the harm in taking her again?

And, fuck, did he need at least that much, that moment under the tree where he’d once been happy with Em.

She wasn’t talking to him, wasn’t checking in on him, wasn’t being the wife and best friend he needed, so he’d take whatever the fuck he could from just sitting beneath the tree that meant something to the both of them.

And Sarah came along. They’d stopped for Chik-Fil-A, and sat beneath the branches of the tree. He ate, Sarah talked as he leaned against the bark of the tree, trying to absorb whatever energy he could from something Em touched, loved, cherished.

Like she’d once did him.

And whose fault is it that she doesn’t give you the fucking time of day?

A ding of a text pulled him from his thoughts.

Sarah: I’m going to WNS. You want anything? I know you’re out of Jack. You want the apple kind?

He almost smiled at that last question, because she knew damn well he thought apples belonged in pies not booze. He’d made a big deal about it at the last club BBQ when Cilla brought hard apple cider and tried to get him to try one. He’d been less than impressed.

Now, Sarah was going to the state-owned Wine thoughtful.

She was sweet as pie, always checking in on him, offering to get him things, showing she cared in a lot of little ways…

like Em used to, back before she got busy being the boss lady.

Now, it felt like he was an afterthought, something Em remembered when it suited her, and he was left puttering around in the periphery of her new life, one she obviously had no problem living without him.

When had they become like this; two separate people, living two separate lives?

When you became the asshole who put more effort into the Bone Dogz than he did his own marriage?

Fuck! That voice didn’t know what the fuck it was talking about. His marriage had always been his priority, it was Em who started pulling away once the kids left for college.

Right?

Feeling his face pinch in a grimace, he reread Sarah’s text, his thumbs hovering over the screen.

But he didn’t message her back; he couldn’t, not with the way he was feeling.

Confused. Charmed. Captivated. Contorted—like he was being twisted and pulled and bent in too many directions. How much longer before he gave out and simply…broke?

Sarah Yates. Twenty-two, high school dropout, child of a broken marriage, beautiful, and still sunny and hopeful despite all that life had thrown at her.

She was new to his club, a club whore that had moved to Unchained MC from the Bone Dogz previous clubhouse.

When Frost had offered a home for the members and those under their protection, he knew the club would bring a few of their girls with them.

Sarah was the only club whore who’d made the move, though, stating that there was nothing keeping her in New York, and that she wasn’t close with her family any longer, because they’d pretty much abandoned her when she’d moved in with the club.

So, she’d moved from New York to Wilkes-Barre, and she’d quickly become a favorite among the single members of the Unchained.

But it wasn’t until she’d slunk over to sit next to him at the bar one night, months ago, that he’d actually talked to her.

She was intelligent, charming, witty, caring, and sensual.

She’d used every trick in the club whore manual to try and get into his bed that night, but he’d turned her down, reminding her that club whores kept their hands off the brothers with old ladies.

She’d blushed, seemed contrite, then asked if they could be friends.

That was the problem, though, being friends with a club whore was all kinds of awkward, but…

she hadn’t done anything wrong, and she was a breath of fresh air, and talking to her had stirred things in him that he hadn’t felt in a long, long time.

Since that first night, he’d found himself seeking her out, talking with her for long hours, sitting beside her, laying his head on her shoulder when the weight of his responsibilities became too heavy.

Yes, he knew he was using Sarah for what he should be giving to Em, but Em, well…

she was busy being the badass boss bitch at her business, a business she’d been dreaming about since she was thirteen.

She was building success, and now that the kids were in college, she had more time to devote to her dream of being a professional florist. But where did that leave him?

Ignored. Forgotten. Pissed. Discontent. Out of sorts. Aching like a phantom limb.

It didn’t help that she found out about you sending Locust on that fucked up mission to seduce an innocent woman.

Yeah, that had been one of the worst things he’d done in his life—he freely admitted that—and he could blame all the stress of the Bone Dogz patch over, but there was more to it…he just couldn’t put his finger on it.

A knock on the doorjamb made him raise his head, and his gaze slammed into the hard, wary eyes of his VP.

“Need you in the conference room,” Patriot said, his voice giving nothing away.

Heaving a sigh, Frost leaned back in his desk chair, and crossed his arms. “Can’t it wait? I’ve got shit to do.” Like figure out how to get out of taking Sarah to “the spot” again. Twice was already too many times, and if Em found out….

He couldn’t stop the full body shudder even if he were made of stone.

Patriot’s lips thinned, his eyes narrowing, he answered, “No.”

That was it, that single word, and yet it carried a whole other meaning, one that made the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end.

Fuck.

Standing, his bones like jelly, his heart like cement, he followed his VP from the room, knowing that he wouldn’t return to his office the same man who’d left.