Chapter 390: The Forsaken Who Sank His Teeth Into the Bone

* Happy New Month of Septemberrr!!

[FROLO]

Katya had no expectations that night.

Not when he went to bed.

Not when he struggled to sleep.

And certainly not when he listened to a call that was clearly not meant for his ears.

For years, his father had trained him to walk on air, light footsteps that wouldn’t give his position away. But Katya had never thought that he’d be using his Romanov omega training to listen in on a call that he wasn’t meant to.

But then the contents of the call...

Gods...

That was three months ago, right after the breakup with Alek.

Katya had told himself that there was a better reason for everything he’d heard that night. That maybe he had heard wrong because there was just no way it was possible.

He had gone through endless denial phases. Connecting dots that he shouldn’t have been focused on.

Still, he dared to believe there was a better reason. After all, the Sergei he knew would never hurt him. He always did things with reason, and Katya’s tears had never been a goal for him.

That was the only reason Katya hadn’t said shit to his friends.

Katya needed to think. And for months he willed himself to reason better.

Watched Sergei love him openly and shamelessly. Tried to see any signs of triumph on the man. Like a score Sergei had settled or a trophy he had managed to get, especially after so long.

But Sergei...

He was just the Vladimir Katya knew.

The man who slept late while watching Katya sleep.

Made him tea before bed and breakfast before work.

Who sometimes read Katya books at night like it was their little routine.

Katya had waited.

For inconsistencies. Slip-ups.

Anything that told him that Sergei was playing him. Because honestly, when he learned about the decade-long surveillance, Katya had freaked out bad.

He’d wanted to run away. Cry himself to sleep. Leave Sergei’s side because the man probably had ulterior motives.

But months later, Katya still hadn’t gotten any inconsistencies.

Instead, he had a man who wasn’t ashamed of him. A man who still kissed him like it was the first time they were kissing. A man who worshipped him like the deities had been spectators to their love.

And it made it hard to be angry.

Because eleven years was a long time.

Katya didn’t even want to rationalize for Sergei. Even he knew that there would never be a proper reason for it all.

And when Katya told Masha...

When he explained to his mother what he’d found out and how confused he was, his mother only had one statement to say.

"You’re confused because deep down you know he didn’t mean to harm you and thought he was protecting you in his twisted way," Masha had told Katya.

That right there gave Katya a different perspective.

Because he knew his mother.

He knew Masha was as protective as his father was. He knew if his mother sensed danger, she would be the first to make him leave.

Yet she’d forced him into thinking rationally.

And Katya...

He ended up annoyed rather than pissed.

Because for some reason, Sergei’s madness over the past decade and his tendencies that should have scared Katya had him feeling differently.

Even if he still didn’t like the fact that the man had stalked him for so long.

Now, Katya was inside the Moskowsky group lobby.

He’d waited for Sergei to call back when the call ended, but the alpha hadn’t. Katya had even tried to ask Anya what had happened to Sergei, but all Anya told him was that the alpha was busy. That he had other company-related things to deal with.

Katya didn’t insist.

Instead, he came to the company after work.

Because if Sergei wasn’t going to call back, Katya was going to get his answers before he let himself think too much about it and make his own conclusions.

Or maybe he just wanted to see Sergei’s face when he told the man that he knew about the surveillance.

Would he budge, though?

"I’ll wait for him to finish his meetings," Katya had insisted when Anya tried to explain that there was a really high chance Sergei would not be coming home today.

And for two hours, Katya Romanov waited.

Watched as people clocked out of work. Still, it wasn’t suspicious to him. Even when the construction workers passed him and went to the basement floors with a very tired Anya.

He waited.

Didn’t ask questions when Anya came back from the basement and handed him Sergei’s phones and pagers. After all, what could he say?

Sergei really had to be busy, no?

Or avoiding him?

He wasn’t quite certain.

Still, Katya waited.

Then the elevators dinged a third time, and through them came the man he’d been waiting for. He looked like shit. Worse than he had seen him earlier in the afternoon.

But Katya needed answers.

And he wouldn’t smile and be glad to see him even if he was. Because a part of him had suspected Anya was lying to him with the work excuses.

That was why he’d come over and waited that long.

He needed to see for himself that Sergei was okay.

So, when their eyes met and Sergei looked back at the elevators, scanning the lobby for any other potential exit, Katya knew.

His alpha was avoiding him.

Still, he waited.

Not once moving from where he’d been standing since the construction crew came in and walked out.

Meanwhile, Sergei contemplated.

He’d never been that scared of being in the same space as Katya. Ever.

Accountability was something he’d preached to himself over and over, so why the fuck was he terrified of one tiny omega who was not even moving?

Defeatedly, Sergei walked toward Katya.

He fixed his hair, straightened up, like he wanted to appear as proper as possible. He knew he couldn’t use any excuse because, judging by the look on Katya’s face, the omega had been here for a little longer than he could comprehend.

"I... My phone died," Sergei said nervously when he reached Katya.

He put some distance between them, maybe because he needed to make a run for the door if this was too much. But how much longer would he run?

How far before he didn’t find himself pulled back by the citrus scent he always starved for on a normal day?

Katya didn’t say a word.

Simply extended his hand for Sergei to take his phones and pagers.

"I wasn’t avoiding you," he lied, and Katya raised a brow at him, the first reaction from his omega since the damn elevator had betrayed him.

"I... I was going to come home... I promise. I just..." Sergei sighed, tripping over his words as he stared at the extended hand.

His smartphone was still dead.

His flip phone, on the other hand?

That traitorous device stared right at them both, power at eighty percent.

"The video call... The phone... I mean video... phone... It died. I didn’t turn it off," Sergei tripped over his words.

Shit, he’d murdered people faster than they blinked, and now he was standing before his omega like a constipated alpha without coherence?

"I’m going to bed," Katya said, walking past Sergei to the private elevator.

"What?" Sergei asked, surprised that Katya was going to the penthouse at Moskowsky Holdings instead of his penthouse across the city,

"Are you coming?"

Katya pressed the penthouse button, and Sergei knew he was a dead man.

So, he checked the exits again.

"You can’t run from me, Sergei," Katya reminded.

Fuck.

A bullet to the head suddenly didn’t sound as bad as following his omega home.