Page 5 of What Broke First (The Cheating A$$hole #1)
Lily paced the apartment barefoot, a glass of wine in one hand, her phone in the other, refreshing Matt’s texts like a gambler hoping the next spin would be different. It wasn’t. No calls. No updates. No lies, yet. She hated silence. It made her suspicious.
When the door finally opened, she turned to find Matt with the most hopeful look on his face.
“You smell like sour grapes,”
she said flatly.
“Hi to you, too,”
Matt replied, tossing his keys on the counter.
“It was a park day. With my kids.”
“Right. Your kids. And your ex-wife. Must’ve been nostalgic.”
He sighed and opened the fridge. Nothing he wanted. Not like his fridge at home. Home.
“It wasn’t like that.”
Lily narrowed her eyes.
“You’re lying already.”
Matt closed the fridge door a little harder than necessary.
“We talked. For the kids. That’s all.”
“Oh, I bet. Did she gaze longingly into your eyes while your children frolicked under a rainbow of second chances?”
“Can we not do this tonight?”
Lily sipped her wine, her lip curled.
“Oh, we’re doing this. You waltzed out of here with a pep in your step and came back looking like you just remembered what real happiness felt like.”
Matt didn’t respond, mostly because she was right. But also because he didn’t know how to stop her when she got like this. Which was often.
“I don’t like that you’re playing house with her,”
she snapped.
“I don’t like that you’re trying to have both worlds.”
“I’m not,”
he said quietly.
“My world is gone. I just want to be a good dad.”
Lily’s expression cracked. Just slightly.
“So, what am I? A layover?”
Matt looked up, eyes tired.
“Honestly? I don’t know what this is anymore.”
That was the wrong answer. Lily threw the wine glass at the wall. It shattered in an expensive splash.
“I left everything for you!”
she screamed.
“I ruined my reputation for you!”
He stood still, glass crunching underfoot.
“And I ruined my family for you. So maybe we’re even.”
The silence after that was thick. Lily turned away, rolling her eyes in an angry huff.
He didn’t sleep in her bed. After the fight fizzled into silence, Matt grabbed a pillow off the couch and made his way to the spare bedroom, the one with the unpacked boxes and mismatched linens. It wasn’t meant for guests, just overflow. Just temporary.
That felt fitting.
He lay on top of the thin blanket, staring at the ceiling fan that clicked with every turn, thinking about all the choices that had led him here. Not home.
The next morning, Matt woke up stiff, the spare room unfamiliar and cold. The fitted sheet was halfway off the mattress, and someone had left a laundry basket full of bras, panties, and socks on the dresser. Definitely not his space.
He got dressed quietly and stepped into the kitchen. Lily was standing by the sink, scrolling through her phone. No eye contact. No morning-after lecture.
She set the phone down.
“You still want to go to the market or not?”
He nodded.
“Yeah. Sure.”
She grabbed her bag and sunglasses.
“Then let’s go.”
No apologies. No unpacking the night before. Just silence filling in for peace.
An hour later, they were walking through the town square, plastic shopping bags in hand, trying but failing to make up for the night before. Then it happened. Sarah.
Matt spotted her before Lily did. She was with the kids. No makeup. Hair tied back. Still radiant. Still real.
The tension arrived like weather.
Lily noticed the shift in his posture and followed his gaze. “Oh,”
she said. Her lips curled. Then she possessively curled her arm around Matt’s and sneered in Sarah’s direction.
Matt felt his stomach turn.
Sarah stood protectively in front of the children, her arms resting gently on their shoulders. She said nothing at first. Just nodded once, calm and steady.
Tommy was oblivious.
“We got ice cream!”
he shouted, holding up his cone.
Matt smiled, trying to match the moment.
“That’s great, buddy.”
Sarah’s voice was even.
“Can I talk to you?”
Matt untangled himself from Lily’s arm and followed Sarah a few feet away. He already knew what this would be.
“I don’t want her around the kids,”
Sarah said, low and sharp.
“It’s confusing.”
He rubbed the back of his neck.
“I get it. But she’s... part of my life now.”
“Well, she shouldn’t be,”
Sarah quipped.
Before Matt could respond, Lily stepped forward, her heels clicking like punctuation, her arm once again sliding possessively through his.
“Maybe you should move on,”
she said, her voice thick with condescension.
“You’ve had time. Pack up your kids and let go. That’s his house, anyway.”
Lily took another step forward, chin high.
“He chose me.”
Sarah nodded once, slow and sharp.
“He did. He chose you over his children’s bedtime stories, over Sunday pancakes, over growing old with someone, over the woman who knew every monster under every bed. You aren’t his future. You are his escape hatch.”
Matt opened his mouth. Closed it again.
“You’re not the villain, Lily,”
she continued, her tone calm and cutting.
“You’re just the symptom. Of his weakness. Of your insecurity. And of a culture that teaches women that you find your validation under a taken man.”
Matt stepped between them, but Lily ignored him.
“You’re pushing forty and clinging to a man who chose better.”
Sarah didn’t flinch.
Her eyes locked on Lily with a stare so steady it felt surgical.
“I’d rather be a 39-year-old me…”
A pause.
A breath.
“…than a 27-year-old you.”
She let the words settle. Let Lily feel them.
“At least I have integrity.”
She didn’t raise her voice. She didn’t need to. The certainty in her tone was louder than any scream. And somehow, that was worse because Sarah wasn’t fighting.
She was done.
Lily stiffened.
“You think you’re better than me?”
Sarah tilted her head.
“I don’t need to be better. I just need to never be you.”
Lily’s eyes widened in outrage, but Matt quickly intervened, pulling her back.
“We’re leaving,”
he said firmly, steering Lily away from the scene. He could feel the eyes of passersby on them, the weight of judgment heavy in the air.
As they walked away, Matt’s mind was a whirlwind of emotions. He wanted to disappear into the pavement, but fury clawed at him too. And under it all, a sharp, undeniable truth — this wasn’t the life he wanted. He realized that the person he was with, this younger, wilder woman, was not who he truly wanted by his side. He had always intended to grow old with Sarah, her sharp wit and verbal intelligence. She exuded class and an emotional maturity that Lily lacked.
They reached the car, and Lily yanked her arm away, her green eyes blazing with fury.
“Why did you pull me away like that?”
she demanded.
“She deserved to hear the truth.”
Matt ran a hand through his hair, feeling the tension building in his temples.
“That wasn’t the truth, Lily,”
he said sharply.
“That was you being petty and cruel. And I won’t have you speaking to her like that, especially in front of the kids.”
Lily’s eyes narrowed, her lips curling into a smirk.
“You’re just scared to admit you’re still hung up on her,”
she shot back.
“That’s what this is really about, isn’t it?”
Matt felt a surge of anger and guilt.
“This isn’t about me,”
he snapped.
“This is about you disrespecting the mother of my children.”
Lily crossed her arms, turning to get into the car.
“Whatever! Were you respecting the mother of your children yesterday when you were balls deep inside of ME?”
“Jesus, Lily.”
Once they were both seated in the car, he stared at her like she had grown a second head.
“Do you hear yourself? Do you even care who’s watching? Who’s listening?”
Lily rolled her eyes.
“Just take me home.”
Matt clenched his jaw, his hands gripping the steering wheel tightly as he started the car. The ride back to her apartment was tense and silent, each of them stewing in their own thoughts.
As they pulled up to her building, Lily turned to him, her expression softening slightly.
“Look, I’m sorry, okay?”
she said, her voice quieter.
“I just... I don’t like seeing her. It makes me feel... threatened.”
Matt sighed.
“Lily, I left my family for you,”
he said, his voice tired.
“But that doesn’t mean I’m going to let you treat Sarah like that. She’s still the mother of my kids. And that’s never going to change.”
Lily nodded, but Matt could see the frustration in her eyes. “Fine,”
she muttered.
“But you need to make up your mind, Matt. You can’t live in two houses at once.”
Matt watched her slip out of the car and disappear into the building, the door clicking shut like punctuation on a sentence he didn’t want to end.
He stayed there, hands on the wheel, the silence closing in. Then, almost on instinct, he thumbed through his phone and queued up Still Loving You by The Scorpions.
The guitar bled through the speakers, aching and slow.
He had made his bed; that much was clear. But as the song ended and he stepped out of the car, something twisted in his gut. He knew this was the biggest mistake of his life.