Chapter 102: Shadows Shifting In The Rain
[FROLO]
Sergei seemed to actually be thinking, and for a moment, Anya had hope. Because finally, the barbarian would shut up and leave. Granted, she knew it was too long a shit, but a woman could hope, couldn’t she?
"Maybe I should give more donations because Solnyshka is happy today. He even agreed to go to dinner with me. He let me touch his arm. He breathed with me... Well, breathing exercises, but he breathed so close to me...
"Should I buy a shrine and name it after him? Or maybe I should build a school... What about the city itself?" Sergei rambled like he was considering his options.
This would have been easy if Sergei were just naming things that he couldn’t possibly do.
But there was no saying no to Sergei’s ideas when it came to Katya Romanov. Or at least what Sergei believed would make Katya happy.
And his listing all that was the reminder Anya needed to know that even when she thought the man was sensible, he still wasn’t.
She couldn’t put it past Sergei to already have the procedures ready, because that was who he was.
What the fuck would the omega need all that for, though?
"You want to buy the Omega a city?" Anya asked like she didn’t already know that Sergei always meant whatever he said.
This man was terrifying and annoying in the morning. And to Anya, he was just someone she needed to smack some sense into. Because this was infuriating.
"Is that too small? Maybe it’s small... Should I buy a state for him?" The alpha rambled on, desperate for approval or anything from Anya that could tell him that this was a good idea. Was it, though?
"Sergei..." Anya sighed tiredly.
"I’d say hospital, but I don’t want him to end up in hospital again. Maybe I should rename Knox to Katya Tech?"
Anya just stared.
What else could she do when the only functional brain cell this barbarian had right now was focused on a whole other world that didn’t even make sense?
"Sergei..."
"Should I make him president?" he asked, like it was so casual.
And the worst part about this all was that he had the right pull, the right strings to make Katya president of their darn country.
Oh, how Sergei Moskowsky was gone.
But Anya...
She suddenly smiled at the idea, almost like she was endorsing it. And Sergei listened, waited for what she would say to that.
Then...
"Then he’ll have dinner with Senator Aleksandr daily," Anya said, a smirk on her face as she had finally found the one thing that could make the barbarian as miserable as he was determined to make her morning.
"What?" Sergei asked, as if he had finally entered buffer mode.
Oh, how Anya loved this.
Hell, she even got up for her seat, rounded her table just to be close to Sergei, and see what his face would be like when his buffering brain finally caught up.
"The senator? The one he told he prefers coffee? Are you daft or just plain stupid today?" Anya asked, amusedly, with her focus on Sergei’s face.
And the laughter that came when Sergei connected the dots?
It was like a humiliation ritual for Sergei Moskowsky.
"Wait... The senator," Sergei said, pulling the blanket off of him like he really needed to focus for real this time.
Would there be any changes to his absurdity, though?
After all, it was like there was not much he could say or do right now to make it all better, no?
"You gave him freedom to leave," Anya reminded, hands folded on her chest, while Sergei seemed to be stuck in some sort of loop because he didn’t respond until a minute later.
"He’ll come home every night, though," Sergei said, like that was definitely more than enough for him.
But was it?
Would it be enough?
"After hanging out with Senator Aleksandr," Anya said casually as she grabbed her tin of nuts and began popping them while enjoying the misery that was about to hit the man who was making her miserable in the morning.
Perhaps it was true that misery loved company.
"Don’t..." Sergei breathed hoarsely.
But Anya, she just smiled wickedly at him.
"He’s kind. The senator... He knows how to talk without constipating himself. Did you hear him in the meeting room? He’s definitely the kind of person I see the omega going for.
"...Especially after everything with Yaroslav," Anya said, a smug look on her face as the horror settled bitterly on Sergei’s face.
It was a sight that Anya hadn’t expected, but two could play the game, right?
"Anya," Sergei said in warning.
But Anya wasn’t even bothered.
"Want some?" she asked, casually handing Sergei the nuts like this was a normal day for them and the alpha wasn’t about to shit his pants from jealousy.
When Sergei didn’t take the nuts, Anya pulled her hand back.
"More for me then," she said, popping the nuts in her mouth, her smirk never once leaving her face.
Sergei stayed still, like he was trying to process what he had just heard. Like his denial was seeping through the cracks of the future he had initiated unwillingly earlier.
But was it unwilling when it had been his suggestion at first?
When Katya didn’t ask for it, but Sergei had given it nonetheless?
"What if the good senator starts wooing him? You heard the drunk challenge over the weekend?" Anya asked so casually, like she didn’t already know that she was stepping on a landmine.
But this barbarian needed to leave her office, and if a reality check was what he needed, she would give it to him.
"I’ll kill him," Sergei said possessively, his obsession a sight that wasn’t new to Anya anymore.
She wasn’t even fazed at this point.
The alpha spiraling about the thought of Katya looking at someone else was expected, because Anya had long learned that Sergei never conformed to the rules of normal.
That was why the alpha never once considered the possibility that maybe, just maybe, Katya would be interested in someone else after Yaroslav.
"Then your omega will hate you for lying to him about freedom," Anya remembered, and Sergei groaned.
He could live with himself if Katya hated him.
That shit would kill him.
Fear was one thing. But hate?
Sergei wasn’t strong enough to live in a world where his Solnyshka hated him. He would lose his mind. His will to live. He would just be. Whole other vegetable waiting for his days to end.
Only that he would never be able to survive it because Katya was his lifeline.
His everything.
He couldn’t lose someone he cared about.
Not a second time.
"He’s a free man... Just..." Sergei said, tripping over his words.
And Anya loved every minute of it.
"Just what, boy genius?" the woman asked, before handing him the nuts a second time.
She was definitely enjoying every minute of his misery while the alpha was trying to function on whatever he had left. The very idea haunted him. And Anya knew it so damn well.
But then the truth was not something to be run away from.
Because eventually it would catch up. Whether it was pretty.
Or ugly.
"You sure you don’t want the nuts? You look like you could use some," Anya laughed.
But Sergei didn’t find it funny.
He was horrified by the very idea of Katya abandoning his ass in the open. It was ruining him.
"You can’t seriously think he would go for the senator, right?" the alpha asked desperately, even though he was trying to be reasonable.
But there was nothing reasonable about Sergei from the moment Yaroslav had brought Katya home seven years ago.
The alpha had been a mess through and through; it was even a miracle that he survived to this point.
"Why wouldn’t he? The man is perfect. Loved by everyone in the city... You’re feared by everyone," Anya stated the obvious, and Sergei’s heart clenched at the sound of her choice.
Her words...he knew she wasn’t trying to be cruel to him
She would never be.
But it didn’t make the sting any lighter or easier.
Because she was right.
He was feared by everyone.
And everyone loved the senator.
There was nothing wrong with Katya naturally leaning towards the perfect senator Aleksandr.
Only that Sergei would die first before he let it happen.
"But I gave him everything?" Sergei asked weakly.
"Did you?"
