Chapter 9: Between Fathers And Sons
[SERGEI]
Sergei didn’t think.
Didn’t let himself consider anything.
All he saw was a man who had forced himself on his husband. And anyone who touched what was his... deserved to die. There was no negotiation about that.
Not even when his son’s father-in-law walked in on them.
"No one touches him... and lives," Sergei said before he began punching Yaroslav’s face against the wall. He pulled his gun out and began hitting Yaroslav with the handle, as if that would make this any easier.
It didn’t.
The fact that Yaroslav tried to fight back was just pitiful. His father was an alpha. Yaroslav was a beta.
Alphas were stronger.
More powerful. Dangerous.
And Yaroslav had managed to piss off one who had been irritated and unsettled all day.
"F... Father ... Wait," Yaroslav pleaded, but Sergei wasn’t listening.
He was irrational. Too fueled by rage to even think.
He beat Yaroslav up like a man who had caught his worst enemy. It was a personal fight for him, even though he was after his son.
The brutality of the alpha had the nurses faltering. The doctors stilled, their hands on the tools that they were using to revive Katya. It was a tense situation.
They had never seen such levels of brutality.
A father fucking up his son in the kind of way that made no sense whatsoever. None of them understood the extent of this, but they all knew one thing.
Mr. Moskowsky wasn’t someone to be messed with.
And the new husband...
He was the lifeline of the medics in there.
"Hey. Hey, look at me," Sergei growled as he snapped his son’s head, gripping his jaw tightly and forcefully turning Yaroslav’s face to him.
Yaroslav winced in so much pain. He had been beaten black and blue by someone he called father, and yet that didn’t seem enough for Sergei.
And when Yaroslav fell unconscious, unable to keep up with his father’s relentless punches, his body slumping on the floor, Sergei wasn’t pleased. It was as if another part of him was awakened.
Because he shot Yaroslav awake.
The gunshot tore through the room as Sergei fired into his son’s thigh. It was a flesh wound, but the shot didn’t stay quiet.
It was loud.
Too loud.
Everyone heard it. Everyone who was in the room saw it.
And they willed themselves to keep going.
Because they didn’t need to have it spelled out for them.
If anything happened to Katya, they would all die.
All of them.
"Wake the fuck up and listen to me, Yaroslav," Sergei said cruelly, pressing his thumb into the bullet wound.
"What... What the fuck, father!!" Yaroslav cried out in pain. It was too much for him to bear. Too much for anyone to even bear watching.
Hospitals were not places for such brutality, and yet no one in their right mind would ever be able to stop Sergei anywhere. Much less here when he was still raging like a beast.
"You’re awake. Good. Now, I need you to listen very carefully to me, Yaroslav," Sergei said, and Yaroslav forced himself to look at his father.
It was a sight that no one had anticipated at all.
Yaroslav, all bloody.
Sergei, all bloody.
Nothing made sense. At least for most in the room.
"You fucking shot me!" Yaroslav groaned angrily.
"Yes," Sergei said coldly, unapologetically.
"The fuck for?!" Yaroslav screeched.
Sergei just stared. Like this was the first time he was seeing his stepson clearly.
Relationships had always been complicated.
Anya had warned him more than once. Told him it was risky.
But Sergei had insisted.
Said that it was alright. That he would just watch from a distance. That he wouldn’t get close. Hell, earlier, Anya had told him not to kill anyone.
Funny how here he was, trying to kill his own son for something that society would forever frown upon.
"You’re never to touch or see him again. Or I’ll put a bullet in you for every hour he’s been in here," Sergei warned calmly, his knuckles bleeding from punching his son one too many times.
He knew what this looked like.
How this was insane.
He loved Yaroslav.
Fuck, he loved his son so much.
He just happened to care for his Solnyshka differently. The kind that would have Sergei giving up everything willingly.
Sergei would burn the world for Katya.
And if he had to start with his son...
He would do it without question.
"He’s my husband," Yaroslav tried to argue, but he was too weak.
Too beat up.
He looked like he had been run over, like someone had mugged him, and yet it had been his own father.
The man who was sworn to love and protect him.
"Don’t test my patience, kid. Here’s a preview of what you’ll deal with if you see him again," Sergei warned one last time, before he shot Yaroslav’s ear, tearing the skin crisply.
He didn’t even wait for anyone to register what happened.
The sound of the second gunshot rang throughout the hospital, but the immediate effects in the room were obvious.
Mr. Romanov stiffened, watching as the father and son fought here in his son’s hospital room.
They were both dangerous men, but one was clearly a thousand times insane.
Hell, one of them belonged in a mental lockup.
"Fuckk!!" Yaroslav cried out, holding his ear desperately while his father still pressed on the wound on his thigh.
"I won’t say it again, Yaro. Stay away from him, or I will riddle you with bullets myself," Sergei added.
"Consider this a warning," Sergei said before he took out his knife and cut the ear clean. Then, he handed the ear to his son, pressing it in the beta’s palm.
Before Yaroslav could get over his shock, Sergei slammed the beta’s head one more time against the wall, knocking him unconscious and leaving him bleeding.
The silence that followed was deafening. Too loud.
But footsteps could be heard in the distance, headed in their direction.
Security personnel who had come to see what was happening, and doctors who were rushing to see if their colleagues had been hurt. But right out the door were obstacles.
Sergei’s men.
Sergei stood up and tucked his knife back, as well as his gun. Then he walked into the washroom to clean himself up.
He didn’t care that the medics were in so much shock.
Or even that Mr. Romanov had been in the room the entire time.
All he wanted was to see Katya. His Katya.
And he couldn’t do it with blood on his hands.
Not even when the blood was his son’s.
When Sergei stepped out of the washroom, he straightened up and walked to the bed beside Katya.
The omega was still sleeping. Still out of touch with what had happened around him. It was surreal, how two gunshots were fired in this very room, and Katya hadn’t once woken up.
"H... How is he, doctor?" Sergei asked the doctor.
His voice was respectful, his tone calmer than he had been with Yaroslav. It was as if they were seeing a different side of the man, and fuck was it confusing.
"Sir?" the doctor spoke, still terrified of the answers the alpha needed.
"Will he be alright? Can... Can he be moved? A different room? This one’s already tainted. Can I take him home? Will he be okay? He looks..." Sergei rambled desperately.
"... Fuck. Say something, doctor, please," Sergei begged, and the room stilled save for the monitor that was beeping steadily.
Even now, Katya’s father has not spoken a word.
He just stood there. Still frozen in time.
Like all of this was the most confusing of things. Perhaps if Sergei had been a regular person, Mr. Romanov would have intervened. Asked for respect. Demanded it.
But Sergei was not a man to be challenged.
And a man who could shoot his son and cut off his son’s ear was certainly not past killing anyone he didn’t care about.
"He lost a lot of blood, sir. He still needs a transfusion, and he has undergone too much stress. He needs to rest. Moving him will put him in danger.
"I believe he will survive. We can clean up the room, but he needs to stay put," the doctor said, his voice shaky, his hands trembling, and sweat trickling down his face and temple.
"Okay. Get the cleaners. Just... I can’t lose him," Sergei said quietly, staring at Katya like the omega was his whole world.
"Wh... What happened to my son?" Mr. Romanov asked, finally getting the courage and reminding Sergei that he, too, was in the room.
"Yaroslav Gamov," Sergei spat.
And that confused Mr. Romanov even more.
