Chapter 237: Can We Just Stay, In The Here And Now?

[FROLO]

For weeks after the court proceedings, there was literally nothing significant happening in the city.

Many people had expected war, destruction, doom for so many, yet there was nothing. It was almost peaceful for the first month. The people of Frolo were anxious that whole month, really, and they had stayed mindful of their safety.

By the second month, normalcy was slowly resuming.

The Senate building wasn’t rebuilt. In fact, developers insisted the building was too damaged to ever stand again. So, they demolished it, and a new Senate building was chosen, one that was more secure.

One with security crawling across it.

It was easy to feel safe with all that, but only if they didn’t know who Sergei Moskowsky was. The man didn’t give two shits about their security forces ever.

In fact, if he were to bring that building down too, he would do it without so much resistance. Because the Moskowsky Group was that powerful and Sergei was that insane.

Of course, the whispers hadn’t stopped. If anything, they were slowly changing tides, like there was time to breathe, time to speculate.

"Chairman Romanov and Mr. Moskowsky haven’t been seen sharing any more lunches since the court case ended. Do you think we read it wrong?"

"That man flattened a Senate for the Romanov omega. I promise you we didn’t read it wrong."

"The senator looks happy these days. Maybe it’s because Romanov and Moskowsky aren’t being seen in public anymore."

"The senator is a simple man. Anything could make him happy. You guys saw how relaxed he was even when Romanov and Moskowsky were having their insane lunches."

"What of Yaroslav?"

"The beta still insists that his father isn’t in love with his father."

"That’s suspicious. Someone I know told me that Chairman Romanov stepped down from the executive floor to the forty-fifth floor of Moskowsky Holdings."

"That’s a lot of speculation. But even if he did, the court case probably motivated the man to want to step away from anything Moskowsky for a while."

"Besides, sharing the same floor as the man who burned the city for him doesn’t exactly scream comfort."

"Some people say the chairman and Mr. Moskowsky barely see each other."

"That is expected. A lot happened to the chairman. A breather won’t be as bad."

"Is he still the chairman of Moskowsky Group, though?"

"The floor he shifted to is Research and Development. I believe Chairman Romanov is just going back to his roots before he was the chairman of Moskowsky Group."

"The senator refused to comment on his relationship with the chairman. We’ve been following him for seven weeks now since the court hearing, and nothing."

"Maybe he and Chairman Romanov broke up."

The rumors didn’t stop. If anything, they only got worse over the months, and Katya...

He was trying.

He had been trying for the past three months. Trying to make things work between him and Alek. He stayed in more often. He barely had lunch with Sergei in public anymore.

He went home on time.

He was there for the man, but time and fate...

"Another report?" Alek asked by the end of the second month. It was late in the night, and he had woken up to an empty bed.

Unlike the first day he’d woken up like that, this time he didn’t panic. He knew what was happening. He didn’t like it, sure, but he had to respect it. Because this wasn’t even about Sergei anymore.

This was about Katya’s career.

If he sabotaged that, Katya would never forgive him.

"Yeah, the data on the experiments is appalling. We’ve been trying to recalibrate, and it just doesn’t make any sense. If I knew that working on data systems would be this hard;

"... maybe I would have been a school teacher," Katya whined, staring at the computer before him. He had been sitting there for hours since he had come home at seven o’clock in the evening.

He had come in time before dinner, and he had eaten dinner with Alek. It was what his routine looked like now.

He’d send Alek lunches to the Senate occasionally.

On most days, the senator wasn’t even in the Senate building, so there’d be no need for Katya’s lunch. It was not like what Katya had with Sergei. But it was him trying to make the best of it.

But would Alek still feel the same if he knew that while the city no longer saw the chairman and Mr. Moskowsky sharing lunch...

They still never forgot to make sure the other had something to eat.

Would he be fine with it?

"You’ve been working on that database for weeks now. Maybe another approach would be appropriate?" Alek suggested as he looked at his very tired boyfriend.

He had traded one sanity for another.

Katya no longer came home with Sergei, no longer hung out with Sergei publicly unless it was a Moskowsky event.

Even inside the boardroom, Alek saw how the distance was there between the two. It was respectful. The kind of distance that told Alek that Katya had listened to him. That Katya meant it when he said he wanted their relationship to work.

But it didn’t help that even with the distance, the look on Sergei’s face whenever he looked at Katya wasn’t that different. If anything, Sergei had looked at Katya before like someone he was interested in.

Lately, he’d been looking at Katya like Katya was his world. Like Katya was the love of his life. Like Katya was worth every war that could be fought over him along the way. It was unsettling because Katya remained loyal to Alek.

He only smiled at Alek.

Mostly, he was courteous with everyone.

And Alek couldn’t even say that he was encouraging Sergei. Because Alek at this point had long realized that all Katya had to do was exist, and the Devil of Frolo would be ready to give him the entire world. It was unnerving in every way.

"We’ve considered everything. The only other person who could chip in is Yaroslav, but he never comes to work. It’s almost like he shifted careers since the court hearing. No one even knows if he’s alive or dead.

"And the option left is Sergei, which doesn’t make it any better because the man never shows up to work like he used to. It’s a conundrum," Katya said smoothly. You would think he didn’t notice that he called Sergei by his first name instead of Vladimir.

Worse, it wasn’t even easy to tell that he knew Sergei was working from his penthouse instead of his office since Katya shifted to R&D.

Katya knew where Sergei was at all times.

At all times.

But he couldn’t lean into that because he didn’t want Alek to worry. It had taken them a lot to get over the Sergei obsession with him. And he would be damned if he let his boyfriend know that Sergei was always there.

That Sergei had never changed.

But maybe this was the one lie that would save their relationship, right?

"They’re Moskowskys," Alek said with a laugh as he walked over to massage Katya’s shoulders. They had gotten stiff because of too much work, and frankly, it was really something else.

"Unfortunately for all of us," Katya sighed exaggeratedly.

"Little rose... There’s a social event I’d love for you to come to with me," Alek began, and Katya smiled at him.

"Yeah, sure... When is it?" Katya asked like he was so ready for whatever involved him with Alek. He’d been trying lately, and maybe this was one he would be able to join Alek in.

"Seventeenth of December..." Alek began, and Katya froze.

December Seventeenth.

The Vitya memorial that always broke Sergei.

Sergei would need him as a friend on that day... Fuck.

"Three weeks from now," Alek said, and Katya looked at him, his eyes changing suddenly and filling with regret.

"Alek..." Katya trailed, like he knew he was about to disappoint his boyfriend... Again.

"Let me guess, you can’t make it to this one, too?" Alek asked, stepping away from Katya’s shoulder like he had been burned.

"The proje—"

"Of course. Work, again. That’s what you said for the last three. I’m going to bed," Alek sighed before he walked away.

And Katya...

He didn’t follow the alpha’s bitter blueberry scent.

Because he knew nothing, he said would ever make it better.

Sighing, he went back to his reports as if they were the only escape from every reality at the moment.

But how long would he keep running?