“Oh, cut the crap. We’ve both been miserable ever since we got married, and you know it. You’re not that stupid.”
He threw the papers onto the floor at my feet. “I’m not signing them.”
“Do I even want to ask why not? Because you’re clearly not happy in this marriage if you’re already fucking other women. So, why would you want to stay chained to a woman that’s not giving you everything you need? Don’t we both deserve partners we get everything from?”
He cupped my cheeks, and for the smallest moment I saw the Blake that I had fallen hopelessly in love with when I was twenty years old.
“I love you, Rose. I love you with everything that I am. Ever since I first laid eyes on you, I knew you were my wife. I knew you were the one I wanted to spend the rest of my days with. People aren’t perfect. People fuck up. It’s just a fact of life. But that doesn’t mean you throw away a marriage over it.”
The smallest part of me wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt. “I’ll tank this entire divorce right now if you do one thing for me.”
His hands slid down my body until he gripped my own. “Anything, Rose. I’ll do anything.”
I looked him square in his eyes. “Tell me that you fucked up. Apologize, and tell me that you were in the wrong for cheating on me.”
His gaze searched mine. “Rose, it’s so much more complicated than that.”
I pulled away from him. “I’m leaving, and the next thing you’ll get from me is a subpoena for court.”
“God damn it, Rose! Cut this shit out!”
I practically flew through the front door, making my way for my car. “Goodbye, Blake.”
“Just stop this, okay!? I love you! I want to make things work! I’m sorry that I messed up. I’m sorry that I fucked that woman. Okay!? Will you just come back inside?”
I slammed my way behind the steering wheel and dug out my keys. I blocked out his enraged voice as it filtered through the metal door that I had already locked, just in case. As I slid the keys into the ignition, I wondered why he couldn’t simply say it. Why did I have to be walking away from him, anteing up on my double-down, before he finally broke down and admitted his mistake?
Six months of nothing, and it took me turning my back and showing him that I was serious before he placated me with a bunch of words.
“No more,” I said as I turned the engine over.
“Rose!” Blake shouted.
As I backed down the driveway, my tires squealed as I charged into the road. I stepped on the gas, peeling away from a place that no longer felt like home. In some ways, it never had. In some ways, I had convinced myself that it was home because I had set up my office there. My home office. I slept with my husband there, in our home-based bedroom.
Yet, as I pulled out my cell phone and scrolled through my contacts, I realized something.
Nothing about that house had ever felt like home.
“Come on, please,” I whimpered.
I had no idea who in the hell I could call to talk about this. Most of my friends had either ditched me because they didn’t like Blake or Blake didn’t like them, so I ditched them first. A dutiful wife always took her husband’s side. That was what my mother taught me growing up. And that train of thought left me with seven contacts in my phone that were okay for me to call.
To be honest, I hadn’t had anyone in my life that I considered a friend since Caleb.
And as my finger hovered over his number in my phone—hidden under the name Isabel P.—I wondered if he’d even pick up the phone. I wondered if his number was even the same. We hadn’t spoken in years. Not since Blake made it loud and clear that he didn’t like my best friend being a man.
I had no clue if he’d answer.
But as I came to a screeching halt five miles away from my former prison, I pressed that name in my contacts.
Before I held the ringing phone up to my ear.
3
REAPER
“Reaper?” Fangs asked.
