Page 31 of Perdition (Unchained Hearts #4)

NINETEEN

If she wasn’t already dealing with 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’t shared 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….”

Limerence. Em knew that word because she’d read a few Wattpad stories where the dumbass heroes had fallen for the cute, sweet, manipulative, love bombing other woman.

Never had she thought she’d be living fiction.

“You’re addicted to the feelings she gives you,” Em supplied flatly.

“You like that she’s young, feeds your ego, and doesn’t come with all the wifey responsibilities.

You can have your fun without having to worry about if you threw your towel in the hamper, or if she’s happy or sad or raging or insecure.

You don’t have that weight of worrying if you’re meeting her physical and emotional needs—even though you care enough to make sure you respond to her texts, brush away her tears when she cries, and you hate to see her sad so you give her what she wants, even if it means taking her somewhere you know she doesn’t belong.

” Like our spot , was left unsaid, but still echoed through the room.

Frost heard the unspoken, growling, “And yet, you cut down the red maple like it meant fucking nothing to you—then you burned it, right where I could see it, right where my brothers could see it. They asked questions, you know. They asked why you’d deliver wood for a random bonfire, and why I had to be there before they lit it.

They asked and what the hell was I supposed to tell them? ”

Lord, he sounded like the wounded party.

Victim this dude was not.

“Tell them that you’re trading up, got yourself a new old lady, and the old one is burning her bridges,” she replied, shrugging, even though she didn’t feel, at all, as carefree as that implied.

Frost let go of her like she was on fire and not their tree, hissing.

“I am not replacing you with Sarah—goddammit! I would never do that! I love you, Emily!” he practically bellowed.

Climbing to his feet, he began pacing between her and the reclaimed wood coffee table she’d bought from an architectural salvage place in Scranton. She’d been so proud, thinking Mads would love it, because it was made from old barn wood and old Harley parts.

Frost had taken one look at it and hadn’t said a word about it.

That was three months ago.

Just another thing he ignored—her gift to him, in their home.

Focus, woman!

Dragging her thoughts back to her pacing husband, Em opened her mouth to respond, but Frost’s next words left her utterly speechless…and enraged.

“What’s the real problem here, Em? I can tell you I’ll never see Sarah again, that I’ll send her to another club somewhere in Timbuktu, but that wouldn’t be enough for you, right?

I could apologize until my face turns blue and my throat is sore, but that still wouldn’t be enough, right?

I could cut off my dick, shave my head, and become a monk, but that wouldn’t be enough for you, right?

I could leave the club and become the doting, domestic house husband, but that wouldn’t be enough, would it, Emily? ”

Word after word after word slammed into her, each one a match to the fumes bubbling from her deepest, darkest parts.

He was right—God, he was right. Even if he spent the next fifty years apologizing, living like a monk, and being at her beckon call, she’d still resent him, she’d still hold his mistakes against him, she’d still burn with embers of unquenchable anger—and she knew why.

She was humiliated, betrayed, cut open and hollowed out. The whole of her, every part that made her what she was, the woman she was, the mom she was, the wife and lover she was, had been poisoned—rotted out like a disease in her blood.

And she had no idea how to recover from that.

If she ever could.

It wasn’t because she’d somehow lost her womanhood, it was more like it was stolen from her—not the physiological bits and pieces that made her a woman, it was the spirit, the soul of her.

How was the possible?

Because the one man who’d made her feel the most feminine, the most cherished and adored and capable as a woman had betrayed her.

He said he hadn’t actually touched Sarah, but then Em remembered how Sarah had known things about Frost that only she and Frost knew.

How was that possible!

She had no idea, and it was killing her.

Frost hadn’t just cheated; he’d ripped out the pieces of their love story that had made her unshakably confident and secure in her marriage.

Mads loved her and only her, had only ever wanted her, had never looked at or lusted after another woman because he was only attracted to her.

Mads never felt drawn to another woman, never wanted to ease another woman’s pain, never wanted to make another woman laugh when she was sad, or heal when they were unwell.

Mads never cared about the opinions or thoughts of another woman; he never asked another woman for advice or insight.

He never talked with another woman for hours, completely absorbed in her, so much so that he forgot everything else.

Her Mads had never prioritized another woman over her, neglecting her, forgetting her, carelessly brushing her aside… but Frost had.

He'd done all of that.

With Sarah.

The foundations of what made Em who she was were laid in the bedrock of her relationship with Madsen Flowers. Without him, she wouldn’t be the Emily she was—they were intertwined, their souls and lives woven together like a quilt made of starlight and heart’s blood.

And he’d taken that quilt, tore it to pieces, and tossed the scraps into the wind.

“Sarah is everything I’m not!” she screamed, her throat closing around the words, her heart beating so hard she could feel it in her neck.

Frost jerked, his whole body locking in place as a look of horror claimed his face.

His voice a haunted rasp, he croaked, “Em…baby….”

She pinched her eyes shut, the tears sliding down her cheeks dropping onto her chest.

“Not once, in all the years we’ve been married , had I felt as ugly and unlovable as I did that morning when I stood there listening to Sarah basically tell you you could do better…

that you had options. Why would she say that unless she was right at the top of that list?

And then she came to my place of business, Frost!

She came to my safe place, my sanctuary, my pride and joy, and she tainted it!

She told me I was fat, worn out, not good enough to stand beside you as your old lady.

She told me—to my face —that she was better than me, that she should be with you, that I should back off and leave you two to be the golden couple of the MC. ”