9. Ember
EMBER
The closer we get to my house, the quieter the car becomes.
I’m a bundle of nerves, and I know Cassidy is too.
Emmett pulls up outside and turns off the engine.
For a few seconds, nobody moves. My eyes lock on the front door.
It’s the same door I have walked in and out of every single day for years, and now … it doesn’t feel so familiar.
Sully twists around from the front seat. "You don't have to do this if you're not ready," he tells us.
I let out a slow breath. "I'm not sure I’ll ever be ready."
Cassidy reaches across and takes my hand. "We've got this."
I nod.
"Together," she says.
"Always." I smile at her.
Emmett looks between us. "We'll stay right here."
"No heroes," I remind them.
Sully smirks. "I'll try."
"We’re serious," Cassidy warns.
"So am I," Sully tells her.
I know that look. If one of us comes running out in tears, Trevor and Kevin are about to have a very bad afternoon.
"Don't make me bail you out," I warn him.
Sully just smirks.
I squeeze Cassidy's hand one last time before we climb out of the SUV. Neither of us says a word as we walk up the path. The closer we get, the harder it becomes to breathe.
Cassidy reaches for the handle.
"No." I stop her. "I'll do it. This was my home. I should be the one to open the door for you.”
My hand shakes as I push it open and let myself in, like I have done a thousand times before. The smell hits me first. Coffee and freshly cut grass drift in through the open windows.
Home.
Or at least, what used to feel like home.
They're already waiting. Kevin is sitting in the living room with Trevor beside him. Neither of them moves to greet us, and we do the same. The silence stretches so long it almost becomes unbearable.
Kevin finally clears his throat. "Thank you for coming."
I stare at him. “It’s my home, of course I had to come back.”
His face falls as if he was waiting for me to say I missed him. He would be wrong. Cassidy quietly hovers beside me, neither one of us moves an inch. Trevor looks exhausted, he has dark circles under his eyes. Same with Kevin. A week ago, I would've cared. Now, I don't know what I feel.
Kevin points to the other sofa. “Please sit.”
"No." The word leaves my mouth before I even think about it. "I think we'll stand."
He nods once, looking awkward. "Okay."
Another silence.
Trevor rubs the back of his neck nervously. "We've had a week to think."
"So have we," Cassidy says.
Kevin looks at me. "I know nothing I say is going to make this better."
"Good." He blinks as if surprised by my bitterness. "Because it won't."
His shoulders slump. "I know."
I fold my arms across my chest. "So ... you wanted to talk."
He nods. "We owe you both the truth."
Cassidy laughs. "You owed us the truth years ago."
Nobody argues with her. Kevin looks at Trevor, then back at me.
"We never meant for you to find out like that."
I feel something inside me snap. "What you mean is you never wanted us to find out. Period.” My voice rises for the first time. “You two were just going to keep sleeping together forever, right? Have your wife, babies, business, and your fucking lover on the side.”
"No … that’s not …” Kevin stumbles over his words.
"Then what?"
Silence.
"Tell me."
Neither of them answers.
I nod slowly. “Fucking cowards.”
Cassidy takes a step forward. "How long have the two of you been sleeping together?”
Trevor closes his eyes and stares at the floor. "A while," he mumbles.
"A while?" She laughs without humor. "That isn’t a unit of time.”
Silence again, I guess they need to get their stories straight.
“Since high school,” Kevin finally confesses.
My knees buckle. They have been hooking up this entire time? Our marriage has been a lie.
“Not consistently, but on and off over the years,” Trevor adds as if that makes it all better.
Cassidy makes a sound beside me, something between a laugh and a sob. “You two have been sleeping together since high school?”
Trevor looks at her, his face crumbling. “Cass …”
“No.” She points at him.
“I’m sorry.” He crumbles as tears fall down his cheeks.
“You’re sorry?” Her voice rises. “You have been fucking your best friend since high school, but you’re sorry?”
Kevin stands quickly. “It wasn’t like that.”
My head snaps toward him. “What the hell does that even mean?”
“We were confused.”
“You were confused?” I laugh, but there is nothing funny about any of this. “You both seemed pretty fucking sure of yourselves on that blanket.”
Kevin flinches.
Good. I want him to feel every word.
“We were kids when it started,” Trevor says. “We didn’t understand what we were feeling.”
“So, you dated us to what, make you straight?” Cassidy asks. “That was your solution?”
He shakes his head. “I loved you.”
“Don’t say that,” she screams. “You do not get to stand there and tell us you loved us.”
“But we did,” Kevin argues, tears gathering in his eyes. “I still do.”
“But you love him too?” I look over at Trevor.
Kevin hesitates, but he must read my face and see that I’m not messing around. “Yes.”
The word hits harder than I expect. Kevin loves Trevor. Always has and probably always will. I stagger back a step, and Cassidy reaches for me.
“You could have told us,” she says, her voice breaking. “You could have trusted us with your secret all those years ago.”
Trevor shakes his head. “We couldn’t.”
“Why?” Cassidy demands. “Because we would have broken up with you?”
“No.”
“Then why?”
“We grew up here,” Kevin says quietly. “Everyone knows everyone. Our families had expectations, you know how religious they are. We didn’t know anyone like us. We thought our feelings were wrong.”
“So, you used us to look normal,” I say.
“No.” Kevin moves toward me.
I throw my hand up. “Do not come near me.”
He stops immediately. “We didn’t use you,” he says quietly.
“Yes, you did. You married us. You lied to us. You pretended to be someone you weren’t. You cheated on us constantly with each other,” I scream at them.
“Our marriage was wonderful,” Kevin says.
“Until it wasn’t,” I bite back.
“You two are selfish bastards. You could have let us go all those years ago. Let us find someone that truly loved us for us, not for a facade,” Cassidy tells them, and I see that is the arrow that hits them right in the chest. “All those years we wasted on the two of you.”
“You think our marriage was a waste?” Trevor asks her.
“Yes,” she tells him point blank. “It’s great that the two of you found love with each other, but it fucking sucks for us. You took our best years from us. I will never forgive you for taking away what could have been. For forcing me into a life that wasn’t mine.”
“Cass, don’t say that,” Trevor argues.
“Don’t you dare tell me how I’m supposed to feel. You got everything you wanted.”
The two of them look at us, and I honestly think for the first time the magnitude of what they have done hits them.
They think it was all about them not being able to be who they want to be, but they never thought about us.
They never thought that they took away from us alternative lives we could have been living, happily. No, they are two selfish assholes.
“What do you mean?” Trevor asks quietly.
“You got your man, didn’t you?”
Trevor frowns but doesn’t say anything.
“Our marriage was a lie,” she tells him.
Trevor wipes the tears from his face. “I thought if I married you and built a life with you, my feelings for Kevin would go away.”
Cassidy stares at him. “So, you thought I was going to be your cure?”
“Yes. No. It’s hard to explain.”
“It’s not. You’re gay. And you lied to me.
You promised me things that you were never going to give me.
Do you have any idea what this betrayal has done to me?
” Cassidy says, pointing to herself. Trevor shakes his head.
“Exactly, because it was only ever about how you two felt,” she says, pointing at our husbands.
“We never wanted to hurt you,” Trevor mumbles.
“But you did.” Her whole body shakes. “You let me spend years thinking something was wrong with me.”
Trevor looks confused. “What?”
“You stopped touching me.” Tears spill down her face. “You pulled away. You made me feel needy and insecure because I wanted my husband to want me.”
He runs his hand through his hair. “I’m sorry.”
“I thought I wasn’t attractive anymore. I thought I was boring. I thought I was failing you.” Cassidy cries.
“You never failed me. I failed you,” Trevor tells her.
“You did the same thing to me,” I tell Kevin.
“I had no idea.”
“No shit.” I glare at him. “I’m so glad I never got pregnant.” My words seem like a gut punch to him. “Because now we can have a clean break from each other.”
“Emmy …” he cries out.
“No.” I hold my hand up at him. “I mean it. I want nothing to do with you ever again.” My words hit him. “I want a divorce.”
“Me too,” Cassidy says.
The room falls silent, the two of them stunned. What did they expect?
“What about the business?” Kevin asks.
“Fuck the business,” I tell him.
“We went and saw a lawyer this morning,” Cassidy advises them, which shocks them. “Wisconsin is a fifty-fifty state. I’m happy to do that regarding our personal assets,” she tells Trevor.
“I’m the same,” I add.
“Regarding the business, we want you to buy us out,” Cassidy explains.
We haven’t had time to discuss this, but it was one of the options the lawyer gave us, and I’m okay with it.
“Buy you out?” Trevor asks.
“Yes. We can get an independent person to value the business, and with the houses we have purchased together, once flipped, we can take our cut, or you can pay us out now.”
The guys seem confused.
“Did you think we would still be business partners?” I ask, folding my arms.
“I didn’t think that far ahead,” Kevin tells me.
“Of course, you didn’t. You haven’t thought that far ever. Don’t fight us on this, give us the clean slate we deserve. You owe us that.”
“Don’t you think we need to discuss this?” Kevin states.
“Not like you discussed anything with us.” I raise a brow at my husband. “Cassidy and I have, and this is what we want.”
“Also, if you want the house, you have to buy me out or we are selling it,” Cassidy tells Trevor.
“You don’t have to move out,” Trevor tells her.
“I know. But I am. Emmy and I are moving to New York. We want to start fresh there. There’s nothing left for us here.”
The guys are surprised.
“New York?” Kevin repeats.
“Yes. It’s the dream Cass and I had before we met the two of you.”
“Oh,” Kevin says.
“We can’t turn back time and get all the years you wasted of ours back, but we can try to control our futures,” I tell them.
“We’re not bad guys,” Kevin argues.
“Really?”
“We hurt you, we get that, but we aren’t the devil,” Kevin argues.
Is he serious right now? He wants to play the victim.
“You had years to tell us, years!” I scream at him.
“We couldn’t,” he yells back.
“Because you were selfish.”
“This isn’t how I wanted things to go,” Kevin says.
“Well, you should have thought about that when you cheated on your wife,” I throw back at him.
“I was faithful more years than I wasn’t,” he says as if that makes up for it all.
“Lucky me.”
“Ember,” he says my name sternly, as if he is losing patience with me.
“Don’t Ember me. I want my name back. I want my life back. I want every single part of me that I handed over to you, back.”
“I think it’s better if we start talking through lawyers, don’t you?” Cassidy adds as she watches Kevin and me glare at each other.
“Think that might be a good idea,” Kevin says.
Fuck him.
“Don’t make this difficult,” I warn him.
“Same goes for you,” Kevin throws back.
My eyes narrow on him. “We will be back tomorrow to pack up our things.”
“Fine,” Kevin says.
There’s nothing else to say, it’s done, over. I turn toward the door and Cassidy follows. Neither man tries to stop us. I guess we’ve said everything we needed to say to each other.
When I open the front door, Emmett and Sully are already getting out of the SUV. They take one look at our faces and hurry toward us. Sully reaches Cassidy first, pulling her into his arms, and Emmett wraps me up against his chest.
“What happened?” he asks.
I bury my face against him. “They’ve been together since high school.”
My brother goes completely still.
Behind us, the front door opens. I feel Emmett turn.
“No,” I whisper, gripping his shirt. “You promised.”
His entire body is rigid beneath my hands. “I won’t,” he grumbles.
“We’re done,” Cassidy tells her brother.
Sully looks down at her. “You’re sure?”
“Yes.”
Emmett looks at me, and I nod. He holds me tighter. “Okay. Let’s go.”
No judgment. No questions. Just loyalty, something neither of our husbands understand. We climb back into the SUV, leaving the house and the men we married behind us.
This time, I don’t look back.