Chapter 234: The Promise Keeper From The Riverside

[FROLO]

The noise in the courtroom was not enough to quiet the sound of Katya’s heart beating in his chest. He had tried to shut everything out.

To make peace with what was here for everyone.

He had tried to assume that at the end of the day, he had grieved enough. But gods, hearing the confessions and how everything had been planned, messed with him. He wanted to cry one last time, but even his tear glands had gone dry already.

It was like the universe was reminding him of the sacrifices he had made. The ones that had been so involuntary and constant.

The way the surgeon always smiled at him before every surgery. The way the professor recommended different medicines. The way the nurses had him chug down herbs like he was a herbivore.

It was all too much, and Katya stared ahead at the empty stand, the sound of journalists shouting around him fading in the distance.

He wondered how people could be so cruel, how someone could look at him and decide his fate without giving him a chance to breathe. How people had turned his trust into a game of life.

And Milan...

Katya wasn’t even angry at the woman.

If anything, he was amazed at the lengths she had gone just to get Yaroslav. The lives she had snuffed just so things could be easier for her.

Maybe life was about people who tried.

About people who held on, but what would it be worth in the end when now she was going to be separated from her child? Not to mention, the man she loved had looked at her with so much spite.

Thinking of Yaroslav, Katya looked at his ex-husband, pity on his face for the man who had been battling a ghost while sleeping with the demon herself. It was not even karma at this point.

Yaroslav was just pitiful.

"Boss called us for prisoner transport. I suppose we’ll see each other at work," Volkov said excitedly, and Rahim got up with the same enthusiasm.

It was crazy how they had become really, how their trusts had been restructured, and fuck if it wasn’t the most unhinged of things at the moment. But they were fine with it.

After all, this was their life, no?

"Everything will be okay, boss," Rahim said before she nodded toward the Romanovs and excused herself.

Katya looked at them as they made their way through the crowd of reporters who were clamoring to get out of the courthouse. And even he knew the dice had been cast.

"Do you want us to leave now?" Svet asked.

Katya shook his head.

The reporters out there would have questions that he didn’t exactly feel like answering.

Not right now and not ever.

Besides, it would all be the same through and through. The same questions that had him at the center of a scandal no one had been ready for back then.

Katya was tired.

"We’ll wait them out then," Andre said softly as the courthouse emptied.

Then Yaroslav got up.

He didn’t make any noise, didn’t even try to get anyone’s attention.

Instead, he just walked to the row that was in front of Katya’s row and sat there. Then he turned to look at the omega, like a man who was memorizing his only tether to humanity.

Katya didn’t say a word. Just stared at him.

They had already talked the previous evening, and nothing they said today would be any different... Right?

"I’m sorry," Yaroslav began quietly, ignoring the fact that the Romanovs had moved to sit next to their son when the court started emptying. Even ignoring the two crazed friends beside Katya.

Maybe this was one he didn’t need to say to Katya when the omega was alone, right?

"I... I know you’ll see me all over the news segments and in situations that you’d never be proud of. So allow me to apologize in advance one last time, Katya. For the man I am going to be when I step out of this courtroom.

"I know it won’t change what happened, but someone has to pay the price for what they did to you. For how they robbed you of happiness. I have to atone too, but that’s alright;

"...because at the end of the day, the only thing that matters more than my life is your happiness, even if it isn’t with me," Yaroslav said calmly, like he was fine being angry too.

Then again, there was only so much rage he could show in front of his ex-husband before it started to look like he was doing it all for some twisted sense of attention and madness.

But it was alright either way.

"What will you do?" Svet asked even though a part of her knew better than to ask.

But this man was here apologizing for what he was going to become right after his father walked into a courtroom and made sure things were finalized. It didn’t sound like this was the beginning of peace anyway.

"Whatever it takes to keep Katya happy. To bring back his smile even if he won’t be smiling at me," Yaroslav said in earnest.

Katya let out a scoff.

"You don’t owe me anything," Katya said, looking at the man like he needed to do better with his own life instead of thinking of a way out that probably wouldn’t mean much at this point.

"You’re wrong, my soul. I owe you everything they took from you," Yaroslav laughed lightly before adding:

"Remember the first day you agreed to go out with me?" Yaroslav said, and Katya just sighed.

"You said... You said no one was allowed to hurt me and... and keep their lives," Katya sighed like he was not even going to try to talk sense into this man. If he wanted to ruin his life, there was no point in stopping him, right?

"I am going to keep that promise. I know... I know we agreed I’d be good. That I’d be a stand-up citizen. But they took advantage of that. They hurt you because I was too much of a coward.

"Don’t worry, though, my soul. By the time I’ll be done with all four of them, no one will ever breathe your name the wrong way," Yaroslav said, like he was talking about the weather.

Like, there weren’t a few court officials hovering around.

Like, there weren’t a few people still in the courthouse that could hear him.

But then the gloves were off.

And there was no talking this maniac out of it.

"Do you need help? We burn our bodies inside Romanov Steel. They won’t ever be found," Andre suggested, like this was what Christmas looked like for them. Like this was their chance to make sure no one was left behind.

But would it matter at this point?

The storm was here.

"I know," Yaroslav said, and Svet raised a brow at him.

"What do you mean you know?"

"I’m a Moskowsky, Vasilieva. My father taught me to sniff the stench of death from the moment I stepped into high school," Yaroslav laughed, and the woman just glared at him.

"Yet you still cheated on Romanov?" Svet asked disbelievingly, as if she were about to commit an actual murder right now.

This man couldn’t be serious.

"I thought it was the only way to give him a child. I was going to kill Milan after. Looks like that part is going to come true.

"As for my cheating, I know you want to strangle me, but can you postpone that to after I’m done with my current kill list?" Yaroslav bargained, as if that was supposed to make it any better.

It was a twisted sense of reality, one that Yaroslav finally understood after what he had just learned from the court, but he wasn’t a time traveler. He couldn’t turn back time.

And he would pay for what he had done.

He knew it too.

Katya, on the other hand...

He just facepalmed.

The people in his life were going more insane by the day.

"If you let anyone kill you before I do, I’ll follow you to the afterlife just to finish the job," Svet warned, and Yaro snickered knowingly.

Then the beta turned to Katya...

"I have to go now, my soul. I hope you are happy through and through. No one hurts you and lives," Yaroslav said before he got up and walked out.

Never once looking back.

"Let’s go home, kids," Mr. Romanov said, and no one protested.

Until...

"Actually, I... I have to pick up some things from the office. I’ll stay with Alek after, so you guys don’t need to worry."

And for the first time since the proceedings had begun...

Masha Romanova smiled knowingly.