Chapter 2

The words left me, and Adrienne went silent, as if someone had clapped a hand over her mouth.

I slid the ring off my finger and threw it into the trash, along with the one she'd handed me.

Adrienne felt both familiar and like a stranger. I couldn't make sense of anything she'd done anymore. The whole thing felt absurd, like the entire world had gone insane.

Adrienne had lost her mind. My parents had lost theirs. And so, apparently, had I.

Adrienne opened her mouth, then forced the words out. "I didn't cheat."

I laughed softly. "Adrienne, I'm the fool here. I love you. I can accept everything about you.

"But that doesn't mean I love you enough to ignore the baby in your belly, or that I'm happy you cheated on me. Adrienne, I never forced you into Dylan's bed. I never forced you to get pregnant."

She crossed the room and slapped me, hard. The crack of it twisted the world in front of my eyes, and my cheek burned.

It wasn't the first time Adrienne had hit me. But it was the first time she'd done it with a clear head.

She pressed her lips together, looking a little regretful, but she'd always been strong-willed and stubborn. She never once thought she might be the one in the wrong.

She stepped closer and softened her tone. "Mom and Dad already said you shouldn't hold this against me so much. It was my mistake this time. Next time, whatever comes up, we'll talk it through first, all right? You know my health isn't good. Getting rid of this baby could make it even worse.

"Besides, it was an accident. We'd both had too much to drink..."

Her voice buzzed in my ears. I didn't catch a single word of it. She was standing too close, and I could see the fresh marks on her neck. Her clothes hung loose, and when I looked down, I saw the rest of her, and the fingerprints pressed into her skin.

I could smell perfume on her that wasn't hers.

Something turned in my stomach, and I pushed her away before I could stop myself.

Adrienne and I had been together for years. We were married. But we rarely had any intimacy between us. She'd never wanted it, and she was afraid of it besides, so I'd always held back.

Those marks on her told me otherwise. It wasn't that Adrienne didn't want it. It wasn't that she was afraid. It was that I had never been the one she actually wanted it with.

How laughable. I was her husband, protected by law and everything, and I still wasn't the man Adrienne wanted to sleep with.

I'd respected her. I'd tried to understand her. And now all of it curdled into the cruelest joke, mocking my own uselessness.

Adrienne, standing across from me, seemed to feel exactly what I was going through. Her face twisted with grief and resentment.

"Do you think I'm dirty? You're just like every other man. You say it doesn't matter, but deep down you care more about a woman's purity than anything else.

"Only Dylan... only Dylan never looked down on me!

"Brent, if it weren't for you, do you think I'd have gone through something so disgusting?"

I stared at her and didn't find a trace of guilt on her face. Only righteous accusation.

Whatever anger I had left just drained out of me. Grievance and helplessness swallowed me whole.

I held back my tears and said, calmly, "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have treated you that way. Do whatever you want. I won't stop you."