Page 19 of Redemption

“Do you see why I needed to pull away from the club? You all back him! Heisthe club, but you don’t know the entire story. You don’t know everything that’s been going on for the past year. The club bunny issue is just the icing on the shitstorm cake he’s baked.”

Shep moves towards her and pulls her tightly against him, ignoring her protests until she gives in and looks at him. “Talk to me, babe. Tell me what’s going on.”

Colt hates how relieved she appears with someone other than him, but he feels a punch to the gut when he hears the tremble in her voice.

“It’s so much more than Diane taunting me. It’s everything else that he’s done to put him in the position for me to doubt him. And then there’s the fucking sonogram and naked picture of him she sent me. She knew things he never should’ve told anyone. And yet, I gave him a chance to stop me, and he ignored me. And my texts. He just did nothing.”

“I never fucked her!” he shouts. “Goddammit, Lex, I was in Black Valley for club business. You of all people should understand this!”

His anger quickly disappears as her legs give out, and if it weren’t for Shep holding her, she’d have collapsed right there on the ground.

“Lex?” Shep asks, his voice alarmed.

“I can’t do this,” she whispers. “The club is the excuse for everything. The club brought us together, but now it’s broken us. I can’t do this, and I can’t do this here. Not now. Please, I need to go. Let me go.”

Melanie and Felicity rush to her. Colt moves to check on her, but Heidi and Shep create a two person barrier to stop him.

“Baby, go get your kids from Lane’s house,” Melanie says. “Cuddle those babies.”

“I can’t,” she says as she tries to collect herself. “I can’t let them see me like this. They’ve seen too much, and Noah will ask more questions I can’t answer. He can stay with his cousin tonight.”

Felicity turns around and stares hard at Ky. “You knew, didn’t you? You knew about all this?”

“Babe, their marriage doesn’t affect ours.”

“Are you fucking kidding? The club has gotten in the way of every one of the relationships in this room. But it’s usually Lex who pulls us all back together. She’s broken. Can’t you see that? And it’s Colt’s fault. By not beating the shit out of him for being this big of an asshole, you’re siding with him. You know what? It’s probably best if you stay here tonight.”

“He’s fucking lucky she still has enough love for the club to stay married to protect them,” Melanie says. “She could really fuck everyone over.”

Colt feels the trigger of her words and shakes his head. “I’m not living with a marriage like my parents. It’s all or nothing, Lex. Together or not. No in-between.”

Sniffling, she nods and still avoids contact.

Lily slams her drink on the bar. “I’ll get everything drawn up and serve his ass. I told you the other night, Colt. I side with her. Oh, and fuck you.”

Turning, she leaves and walks out the front door with her small posse behind her. He runs after her in a mixture of anger and shock. She’s divorcing him? How did they get so far away from what he planned for tonight? “So that’s it? You’re just giving up and walking away?”

She turns and faces him in the parking lot. “When what we had turned me into someone I hate, someone I never thought I’d be in a million years, what am I fighting for? What’s the point? I fought enough alone, and I honestly don’t know if I want what I’d be fighting for anymore, Colt. You win.”

Chapter 8

Griffin’s Beach

Colt

Colt stares at Lex in utter shock. “What are you talking about?”

“You don’t have to talk to him,” Melanie says.

She is really starting to piss him off. “Melanie, stop it,” he says, his voice much calmer than he feels. “What do you mean by that, Lex?”

Felicity avoids looking at him and focuses on his wife. “Are you okay? Do you want us to stay?”

Lex shakes her head, a few blonde curls falling from her bun and resting on the sides of her face, sticking to her wet cheeks. “I’ll be okay. I don’t know what else could possibly go wrong tonight. The train went off the track the moment I stepped foot in there like I knew it would.”

The two women walk back towards the clubhouse but don’t go inside, and he looks at his wife. For the first time, she looks into his eyes, and he sees the pain in a sea of dim blue that used to sparkle. “Lex, talk to me.”

It hits him why the look scares him. It’s the same look she had after she was kidnapped by her ex, Vincent. She gave up on him, and she wanted him to let her go. That she wished he’d physically beaten her because the emotional beating she was taking was too much. In this moment, he knows he screwed up. He screwed up, and she may be too broken to be fixed.

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