“You didn’t used to be a mother.” His words hang between us, taunting me. My face scrunches up in detest. How dare he. The only thing I can do is glare at him, but it does nothing to work him up. His eyes are trained on mine, and he’s so earnest it pisses me off.
“I’m a mother—to your kids, might I add—but I’m also your old lady. I didn’t just stop being a woman when I had kids, so don’t you dare treat me like I’m fragile and can’t handle my shit.”
“That’s not what I meant!” He’s shouting now.
“Tell me what’s going on. You know as well as I do that keeping shit from your old lady is dangerous. I can’t help you or the club if you keep me in the dark.”
Something I’ve said makes his jaw lock in place, his hands ball into fists at his sides, and his eyes turn dark. He’s getting angry, which is about the only thing that will get me what I want.
“Are you my old lady? Doesn’t seem like it—you won’t even let me fucking touch you.”
I flinch. I’m not that woman who mouths off and can’t take it when shit’s thrown back at her, but this hurts. It hurts because I want to let him touch me. I want to touch him. I want to fall back into that crazy, passionate couple we used to be. I want to walk into a room by his side and have every single goddamn person there know we’re a packaged deal. He is mine and I am his, and there isn’t a single thing on this earth that can change that. But he’s right. That girl who walked into a room, knowing she owns her man, wasn’t a mother. She didn’t have two kids who depend on her to make the best choices for them. Her old man was her entire world, but now he’s not. He can’t be. Not until my kids are adults and their worlds won’t fucking end because Daddy’s on a bender. I need to keep things straight with us, calm even, so that I can make sure he stays sober.
Wyatt takes a step closer and cages me in with an arm on each side of me. A slow, devious smile breaks out on his face, and he’s got a flicker in his eyes that tells me he’s gearing up to be a real asshole. He used to get his way by out-bitching me, but that was before I went pro by having a teenager. I steel myself for the verbal assault I just know is coming.
“You are fucking punishing me, and it’s going to stop. I fucked up, okay? I snorted shit, popped pills, lost time, lost you, our son, and everything else that fucking matters to me except for my cut. But let’s get this straight—I’m clean. Have been since I knocked you up for the second time, babe.
“I can see that fear in your eyes, thinking I’m gonna go back to that shit once we hit a road bump, but I’m not. Don’t believe me? Ask Pops or Grady. Fuck, ask my own goddamn mother, who I’m guessing doesn’t know shit about her grandkids either. Go ahead and ask any motherfucker that’s been in my life day to day for the past three years. I. Am. Clean.”
“I just need time, okay?” Everything he’s saying sounds so perfect, so right. I love the idea of a clean Wyatt. I love the fact that despite how much he was fucking up personally, he handled his shit with the club and made it to VP and—now that he’s clean—president. But that doesn’t mean I feel it in my heart. How the hell am I supposed to just jump back into everything we were when I’m not the same woman?
“You’re either my old lady or you’re the mother of my children. You don’t get to pull away or run from me every time I try to touch you but then turn around and demand more from me when I’m already trying to give you everything I fucking have.”
And there’s nothing else to say. Because as much as I want to be that woman he can fuck and then tell all his dirty secrets to, I’m terrified that she’s the reason he never stayed clean. I can’t do that to him or to my kids, and I really can’t do that to myself. I’ve lost him once already. I can’t fall into us only to lose him again.
CHAPTER 14
September 2015
7 months to Mancuso’s downfall
It’s been two weeks. Two weeks of family breakfasts and family dinners. Someone throws a fit, and someone throws food, and it’s an exhausting physical and emotional mess. On the good days, Piper’s the guilty party. On the bad days, it’s Zander. At least his fits are getting fewer and far between. I try to tell him as much as I can that Wyatt’s not going anywhere, but he gets tired of hearing it. Or maybe it’s that he’s tired of needing to hear it. Either way, it makes him bitchy. So I keep finding new ways to let him know that his dad’s here and he’s not leaving.