Page 71 of The Marriage

“You’re damn right you’re not. You’re going to be under twenty-four-hour surveillance. Do you remember what went down the last time you went on one of your binges?”

Roman glared at his father, meeting his eyes with defiance. If there was ever a time to snort a line—this was it. He’d never had the balls to blatantly do it in front of his father’s face, though.

“And how are you going to manage that?” he asked Demyan.

“You’ve been free to mind your own business for too long. You’re going to be minding mine, now.”

“I’m not a child,” Roman repeated.

“And yet, you act like one.”

Demyan turned to Marky before Roman could respond, snapping with a jerk of his hand toward the door, “Get out of here.”

“What about Masha?” Marky asked.

Roman shook his head. “If she took things to sell, like maybe she needed cash, start there.”

Like the designer bag and expensive, priceless jeweled egg she’d stolen from his mother. Those things were hard to come by, and hot goods were easier to find than some people might think.

“I’ll start putting words in around pawnshops.”

“Yeah—”

“Get the fuck out of here!” Demyan snarled. “Do your job!”

“I’ll hold the fort down and see what I can find on Masha,” Marky said, not blinking an eye at Demyan’s rage before he stepped out of the room again. Out of the line of fire. His father’s bad attitude was nothing new. Sadly, Roman’s friend was used to taking the blame in his story, too.

Once he was gone, Demyan turned to his son once more. His anger was still plain to see, and as much as he hated the way his father presented it ...

Roman knew some of it was justified. He tried to remind himself of that when Demyan asked, “This is the shit you pull as a married man? You didn’t think your wife deserved better than that—that your family deserves more from you?”

“I messed up, I know. I thought I fucked up my marriage, that I lost Karine.”

One of the men stepped into the office with a dustpan and broom to clean the mess. Marky must have mentioned it on his way out, but the presence of the bull was enough to quiet the men again. Not that it really made a difference. They’d undoubtedly heard everything.

Roman was living with his failures, dealing with the consequences of his bad decisions, and toxic lifestyle ... his father just didn’t think it was enough, maybe.

Perhaps it wasn’t.

Demyan was already lighting another cigar by the time the man had swept the floor to find all the little shards. Pointing the cherry-red tip, smoking curling upward in tendrils, at Roman, he said, “What is happening in your relationship has nothing to do with staying in control—that’s where you’re weakest, Roman. And I don’t know how to help you fix that, son. I never did.”

THIRTEEN

Demyan kept good on his threat—Roman hadn’t done much since his father’s outburst. In fact, the first chance he had to leave the Avdonin property, he found himself face to face with a handful of men. Who, in no uncertain terms, made it clear what their orders were.

“You’ve gotten a few knocks to the head this past month—how many more before you’re drinking food from a straw, Roman?”

He had choices—and trying to make good ones.

Roman opted not to test the bull’s theory out, and had returned to the house.

Demyan also let it be known that he didn’t want Roman going anywhere alone. Staying in his own loft was out of the question, and the city apartment was no-go as well.

For the first time in over a decade, Roman found himself sleeping in his childhood bedroom.

Claire was surprised to find him at the breakfast table the next morning. Apparently, Demyan hadn’t filled her in on anything, and she’d gotten home late after visiting a gallery viewing by a friend in the city.

“You’re a sight for sore eyes,” she told him, tightening the belt on her fluffy house robe.