Page 23 of Perdition
“Dad…what do you mean? What happened?” War asked, uncertainty and fear in his voice.
His son was a mama’s boy. Sure he loved his dad, looked up to him for his time in the service, and for being the provider and protector of the family, but…Warwick Davis Flowers was the one looking after his mom while Frost was deployed or dealing with club business far from home. It was War who took up the role of “Man of the House” when Frost was gone, and he took that role seriously. He loved his mom and twin sister more than anything, and Frost knew that once the truth came out…he was looking down the barrel of estrangement from his own flesh and blood. Understandably, War and Sorsha would take their mom’s side…and he wouldn’t blame them for it.
God, I fucked everything up!
That was a fucking understatement.
Why had he been so fucking arrogant about that shit with Sarah, refusing to listen to Patriot, Locust, and Redtube—men who’d had his back from the very fucking beginning? Those men were loyal, level-headed, brutal in their truth-telling, so why hadhe chosen to ignore their warnings, thinking he knew better, that he had things under control?
Nothing was under his control—not a goddamn thing, and now his wife, his old lady, had severed their souls from one another, leaving him bleeding, like a ragged wound, to fester and die.
Why had he let his immature need for validation, for reliving a little piece of the past, to ruin what was so good in his life? Why had he taken Sarah to the red maple tree, the most sacred place on the earth for him and his wife? How had he thought, for even a goddamn moment, that he could find something he was supposedly missing in a relationship with a woman who was not his everything?
Are you sure you aren’t just butthurt because you think everyone is leaving you behind?
Sucking in a breath, his chest trembling with the effort, he admitted, “Son…I’ve made a mistake…and I don’t think your mom will ever forgive me.”
Fix it!
“But I’ll fucking die trying.”
EIGHT
Emily groaned,her head pounding, her mouth as dry as the Sahara, and her skin feeling so tight she assumed she’d been mummified the night before.
Her cell buzzed from the bedside table near her head.
That’s what had woken her up from her wine stupor.
How many bottles had she and Cheri decimated last night? Four? Five?
Ugh.
Licking her lips, she cringed at the taste of dead raccoon in her mouth—because it was like something had crawled into her mouth and died of leprosy.
She pressed her thumbs against her throbbing temples and attempted to remember what the hell happened last night—aside from all the drinking, that is.
Cheri refilled her wine glass and leaned back into the overstuffed arm of the couch, crossed one leg over the other, and pinned Em with her knowing gaze.
“I know you’re not ready to spill everything just yet. All I want to know right now is why you look like someone kicked your puppy with your favorite pair of shoes,” Cheri said, then took a sip of her wine. Waiting.
Cheri was good at that. When she wasn’t busting balls and breaking in new lovers, she was sipping wine, staring, and waiting. She’d always been like that; the calmandthe storm.
Sighing, Em put her empty wine glass down but didn’t reach to refill it. Yet.
“Do you think I’m too old…too—too fat and worn out?” Em asked, hating how vulnerable and whiny she sounded, like a teenaged girl, desperate for validation.
Cheri’s wine glass stalled just before her mouth as she eyes widened, her eyebrows shooting into her hairline. Her lips thinned, then her eyes narrowed, her nostrils flaring.
Yeah, Em knew that look.
Cheri was pissed.
“What the absolute fuck, Emily Daisy Flowers!” Cheri barked. From Labradoodle to junk yard Rottweiler in a millisecond. “What the hell? Seriously?” She put her wine glass next to Em’s and turned her body until she was completely facing Em. She grabbed Em’s trembling hands, and squeezed.
Suddenly, the tears she’d been holding back for hours burst forth, spilling like a waterfall of anguish down her cheeks.
Apparently, waiting until the morning wasn’t happening, because the dam holding back all that pain, all that humiliation, had reached critical failure…just like her marriage.
