Page 8 of What Broke First (The Cheating A$$hole #1)

Lily hated Thursdays. They always reeked of stale office coffee and low expectations. The office was always too quiet. But today was especially heinous. Matt hadn’t come home the night before. No text. No call. Just a read receipt and a silence loud enough to murder hope in its sleep. She knew he’d stayed with Sarah. A week ago, he’d played doting dad at Career Day, and ever since, he’d been drifting farther out of reach.

As she listened to Vella’s Pull The Trigger in her earbuds, she scrolled through his Instagram. Nothing.

She checked his LinkedIn, which was more pathetic, but... desperate times. Nothing. Her reflection in the mirror looked flawless, with red lips, curled hair, and an outfit designed by Vengeance and Victoria’s Secret. But her expression was cracked porcelain. She was unraveling, and Matt didn’t even care enough to tug the thread himself.

When he finally walked in, it was 10 a.m., and he was holding a latte as if it were a valid excuse for abandoning her.

“Oh look,”

she said, voice honeyed poison.

“The prodigal ghost returns.”

Matt sighed.

“Lily, I was with my family.”

Her mouth curled.

“Oh, so now you want to spend time with your family?”

Don’t pretend like you were out doing something noble.”

“I was with my kids.”

“Oh yes. The kids. The perpetual get-out-of-jail-free card. Did you and Saint Sarah braid each other’s hair and talk about your shared trauma?”

He didn’t answer, but if looks could kill. That was enough of an answer.

Lily crossed her arms.

“Do you want to be here, Matt? Or are you just too cowardly to admit that you don’t?”

He stared at the latte, willing it to offer him a better reality.

“I don’t know what I want.”

“Liar,”

she said flatly.

“You know. You just don’t want to say it because it’ll make you the villain.”

“I already am the villain,”

he muttered.

“To everyone. Including myself.”

She stepped closer, her voice lower.

“You think you’re the villain? You’re not even interesting enough to be the villain. You’re the plot twist everyone saw coming.”

Matt flinched.

Lily softened...sort of.

“I didn’t sign up to be your rebound therapist, Matt. I didn’t sign up to be the consolation prize. I wanted the real thing.”

He looked at her, finally. Really looked.

“And I wanted to be someone who didn’t screw up the best thing he ever had. You think I cheated because you are you. You want to know why I cheated?”

Matt’s voice didn’t rise, but the weight of it filled the room.

“Because it was easy. Because you looked at me like I was something. And I hadn’t felt like something in a long time. Not in the middle of the laundry piles and daycare drop-offs and the nights Sarah went to bed too tired to touch me, or talk to me, or even look at me the same way anymore.”

He swallowed.

“You made me feel young again. Desired. Like, I still had value. And I was weak enough to let that matter more than everything I stood to lose.”

He looked her dead in the eye.

“I didn’t fall in love with you, Lily. I fell in love with the way you made me feel about myself, that version of myself that I saw in your eyes. And that isn’t love. That’s vanity. That’s ego. And now that I’ve finally pulled my head out of my ass, I can see it for what it is. You weren’t the answer. You were the excuse.”

His voice cracked slightly.

“I betrayed the woman who built a life with me. I broke my kids’ sense of safety. I set fire to the one thing I actually got right. And you were the worst mistake I ever made. I’m sorry for leading you on, Lily. But I’m done lying to myself.”

Her jaw clenched. He didn’t want her. He wanted Sarah. She turned away, furious and fragile.

“I'm done.”

Matt didn’t argue. He stepped closer instead. Lowered his voice.“And don’t you ever bring this up again at our place of work,”

he said, his voice low and resolute.

“While we’re here, we act like professionals. We respect each other. That’s not a request, it’s the rule.”

Then he grabbed his keys, left the latte, walked into his office, and shut the door behind him. Lily stared at it for a long time. Then she picked up the latte and threw it into the office sink like it had personally insulted her.

After work, across town, Matt sat in his car outside Sarah’s house. He didn’t get out. He just stared at the ivy-covered bricks and tried to remember what normal felt like. His phone buzzed with a text from Sarah.

Sarah: Tommy says you wer.

“actually kinda cool”

today. Emily says you smell like coffee. So... progress? Matt smiled, for the first time all day.

Matt: I’ll take what I can get. Even if it’s secondhand compliments and eau de Starbucks.

Sarah: Don’t get cocky.

Matt: Wouldn’t dream of it.

He stared at the screen for a while. Then, impulsively, he typed:

Matt: Do you think we’ll ever be okay again?

There was no reply. Not right away.

He didn’t expect one.

Somewhere behind that unread message, Sarah sat at her kitchen table, rereading it.

She didn’t know the answer either. In fact, she didn’t answer. Instead, she picked up her phone and hovered over another name in her contacts.

James. Warm smile. Steady hands. Someone who once made her laugh until she snorted wine out of her nose. They’d met, years ago, one of those introductions that lingered just enough to matter. She hadn’t talked to him in ages.

But tonight, the silence felt heavy. And James had always known how to lighten a room. She didn’t call. Not yet. But she did send a text.

Sarah: Hi.

It wasn’t much. But it was honest.

And sometimes, honesty was enough to crack something open.