From the Heart (Sweetbriar Hearts #3) - Nora Everly Page 0,2

file for divorce,” he huffed indignantly. “Fine, great. You’re right, they should be with you. I’m taking Bethany up the mountain to ski for the weekend anyway—which I also told you about in the email—so you can pack up your stuff and a few things for the boys while I’m gone.”

“Skiing? I thought you had a real-estate conference in Portland.” My face fell. I am so stupid.

He shook his head. “I really didn’t want you to find out like this . . .” The statement hung in the air as if there were nothing else to say.

“So you sent an email? A freaking email—Gah! You are unbelievable know we were having problems, but to end it this way? After all these years together? Cheating on me? And a fucking email? You couldn’t have just sat down and talked to me and asked for a divorce like a decent person?”

His head dropped. “Vi, I don’t know what to say.”

“Oh, I don’t know—you could try I’m sorry?”

Motherfucker.

Morbid curiosity kept me asking questions I didn’t really want the answers to. “How long has this been going on?” I demanded.

His eyes darted to the bathroom door. “Physically? A little over six months.”

Physically.

“Six months,” I repeated on a breath. It had been almost a year since we had been intimate. Plus, two years of marriage counseling that clearly didn’t take. Too much time and money had been spent on dates and dinners with my husband that, according to our marriage counselor, would put the fire back into our marriage. But I had been wasting my time trying to rekindle what had already been a pile of ash.

I looked to the floor with thoughts of STDs and tiny little Toms running around Sweetbriar darting through my mind. “Are there more? I mean, other than Bethany?” The fact that I hadn’t lost my shit yet was astonishing. Either I was stronger than I thought, or it would all come out later in some kind of epic lady-tantrum. Hopefully, I would be alone whenever it occurred.

Earnest eyes met mine and for a brief second and I recognized the man I used to know. “No! Just her. I swear, Vi. It’s only ever been Bethany.” I studied his face with narrowed eyes. I believed him. But I would make a doctor’s appointment anyway, just in case. I’d obviously been wrong about him before.

I needed to get out of here. After spinning on my heel, I crossed the hallway to the stairs to leave.

Sudden realization halted my progress, and I froze at the top of the stairs with a bitter laugh. All my plans revolved around stupid, freaking February first. My sister Rose had just gotten married on New Year’s Eve and I’d been planning to buy her house and move in with my boys. But not yet, dammit! I needed more time to figure out what to say to them, and she needed to finish moving her stuff out. Crap!

My bed was tainted. I could never sleep in it again. This whole house was dirty with betrayal and filled up with lies. The filth would be impossible to scrub away. There was no way I could stay here even if he had agreed to be the one to leave. Tears clouded my vision as I rushed down the stairs, stopping in the kitchen to grab some Advil and a glass of water. My hands shook with frustrated rage as I filled a glass at the sink.

Had she been in my kitchen?

Drank from my glasses?

Eaten off the plates we’d picked out together?

I slammed the glass down to the countertop, onto the lovely grey granite we’d chosen together five years ago when we’d remodeled the kitchen. We were happy five years ago. Weren’t we?

Was anything real? And why was I so upset when I had planned to leave him anyway?

Oh yeah.

The humiliation.

The younger, blonder, boobier, secretarial cheating situation that had made my life into a cliché.

I was about to be gossiped about so hard.

My heart pounded in my ears as my breath grew shallow. Forget Advil—I needed my migraine prescription and a dark room. But the pills were upstairs in the bathroom currently occupied by my husband’s secretary-slash-mistress.

And my bedroom? Ew.

I had to get out of here. But I had nowhere to go.

I had tolerated the little digs about my coffee shop, my body, myself that he’d dished my way over the last few years. I did it for my boys, to keep our family together. I’d put up with it