I pull away and stumble two steps before falling face-first through the door of the owner’s suite.
Emerson chokes back a sob when I hit the floor with a thud. It makes her voice crackly when she pleads, “Please let me help you.”
“No,” I reply, shaking my head enough to rattle my brain. “You are only here because you’re worried about losing your mother’s placement in the trial program. You’re not here for me.”
“That isn’t true.”
I continue as if she didn’t speak. “You have no reason to fret. I will continue with our agreement as per the terms cited in our contract. Kolya drafted a media release that announces you had to return to Lidny to take care of your mother. I will take Emmy up a handful of times over the next twelve months to make it seem as if I traveled to visit you. Then, once our first-year wedding anniversary slips by unnoticed, we will announce our separation. We don’t even need to be in the same room to pull this ruse off.”
Her voice is a croak. “That isn’t what I want, Mikhail.”
“Then what do you want, Emerson?” Even though I am asking a question, I continue talking, stealing her ability to reply. “Because we sure as fuck know you don’t want me.”
I see her anger glaring up, but she refuses to nibble at the bait I’m throwing out—goddammit!
We fight, then make up.
That is how we operate.
Or should I say, thatwashow we operated.
“Emerson…”
Her eyes are brimming with tears, but her voice is surprisingly firm. “Let’s get your foot cleaned up first. Then we will talk.”
“No,” I shout. “You broke my heart, remember?” I spit out, my words slurred. “That’s more important than this.” I thrust my hand at my throbbing foot at the end of my sentence before ripping out the shard against her silent pleas for me not to. “It is more important than anything.”
“It is?—”
I grip the glass fragment, and it digs into my palm when I interrupt. “Then come clean! Tell the truth. Admit thatyoubroke my heart!”
Her wet eyes drink in the droplets of crimson dripping from my palm before she shouts, “Yes! Okay! I will admit it. I broke your heart.” Her chest rises and falls as she takes a deep breath, her expression unreadable. “I hurt you, and I’m sorry for that. But doing this…”—she jerks her hand at the shard of glass—“and acting this way won’t fix anything. It won’t take back what I did or how I hurt you. It will only hurt you more.”
Her confession adds more sways to my steps than the alcohol coursing through my veins. I stumble toward the bed and sit on the edge, where I stare at her, unable to comprehend what I’m hearing but grateful she has finally admitted her part in our downfall.
After a beat, I try to mask the vulnerability her words stirred in me. “Saying you’re sorry won’t make everything right.”
“No, it won’t,” Emerson agrees, her eyes never leaving mine. “But hopefully it is a step in the right direction, and it will prove to you that I’m here for the long haul.”
I don’t know how to respond to the last half of her reply. The hope in her tone has me speechless. I never expected her to take the blame, to admit that she was the one who broke my heart. But this, an admittance that she wants to stay, is shocking.
I honestly don’t know how to respond.
As I stare at the woman I promised to love until eternity, the wall hours of drinking built around me feels like it is already cracking.
I don’t like it.
I don’t want to let her in. I can’t. I won’t survive a third round of heartache. But as she stands before me, vulnerable and raw, my guard drops.
“Why?” I ask, my voice barely a whisper, needing closure. “Why didn’t you show up?”
Emerson looks down, her shoulders slumping as a handful of tears escape her drenched eyes. She is quiet for so long that I think she will never answer me.
When she does, it goes differently than the numerous scenarios I’ve run through my head over the past ten years. “I was scared. Scared of what I was feeling. Scared of getting hurt.” Her eyes lift and lock with mine. “Scared that your family was right.” She sees me shake my head, but she acts as if she didn’t. “We were young, Mikhail?—”
“And what we had was fucking perfect.”
Her lips shift upward as she nods. “It was. It was perfect.”
