The Marriage (Darkest Lies Trilogy Book 3), Bethany-Kris [books for 8th graders txt] 📗

reliable connection to home. Since he was the only one who knew the name and location of where Karine was admitted—other than Demyan—he took on the responsibility of tracking the phone number to the facility down.

He must have managed to get the right motherfucker on the phone.

“You need to get back here. There’s been an incident,” Marky said.

“What incident? What do you mean—I’ve only been gone a day and a half?”

Roman called him back after he switched on the burner phone he’d picked up as he left town. They were a dime a dozen in airports. Available at every turn. Karine still stood in the garden where he could see her in the distance, walking along the path and reaching out to feel the bushes as she passed.

Her momentary happiness calmed him. It amazed him how such simple things about her made him smile.

“Masha, she’s gone.”

For a second, Roman’s thoughts cut off.

And then he asked sharply, “What do you mean she’s gone?”

“She’s disappeared.”

“From the house?”

“Nobody thought she was a flight risk. Like, what is she running from? Who is she running to? It isn’t like the woman’s got anybody here, Roman.”

Marky had a point.

But this was just another thing.

Something else to handle.

Fuck.

Roman resisted the urge to kick the decoration at his foot next to the path. It might soothe his irritation for a brief time, but it also wouldn’t last. Masha’s recent behavior had certainly been a red flag, and while he thought he’d dealt with it, he clearly had not.

Or not well enough.

“Do we have any leads?” he asked.

“She’s taken some things. One of your mother’s Fabergé eggs, probably to hock, and a bag—”

“Anything else?”

Roman eyed Karine who was laughing with a staff member now. The woman had come walking up the path from the opposite direction, but Karine didn’t appear to mind the conversation. Her hair fell back over her shoulders while she squinted against the sun. He couldn’t help but fantasize about her on a beach somewhere. She would look beautiful against the backdrop of a roaring sea. Far away from here and the uncertainty he found looking at the future.

Was it so bad that he wanted this to end?

That he wanted time to love her?

“Marky,” Roman asked again, “is there anything else?”

The man sighed, making the speakers crackle from the breath. “Some personal items of Karine’s that Claire brought from the Vermont Lodge. A coat. There could be more, your parents live in a big fucking house, okay?”

Yeah, yeah.

“So if she’s taken the time to gather things to take with her, this was a deliberate escape. It’s not like someone kidnapped her,” Roman added.

“No. But we’re not sure where she could have gone. Is there a chance she’s working with Dima?”

Roman considered that.

Had she fed information to Dima before—was that how he stumbled upon Roman the first time and caused the car accident? Nobody had thought to keep a close eye on the lodge phones; everyone had their own devices, and Masha was always so concerned with Karine day in and day out.

It was possible.

Anything was.

“Shit. If she is, I wouldn’t have guessed it, though,” Roman admitted, hating that he even uttered the words. “She seemed dedicated to Karine. She has to know what he’s capable of doing to her.”

What he did to her, he added silently.

Marky stayed quiet, and Roman wondered if that was the right time to apologize. Or even, say something to make up for the shit he kept putting his best friend through. Nobody had his back quite like Marky.

He didn’t because his friend spoke first, reminding him what was most important at the moment.

“I think you should get back here, Roman.”

“Yeah, I think I should.”

The call ended abruptly, and Roman could still hear the lingering bitterness in his friend’s final words. He didn’t fault him for still being sour.

Roman tried to put it out of his mind for now. Separating from Karine was going to be difficult—no matter how many times he had to do it; it hit him like a punch to the gut to say goodbye.

Not that it changed anything.

Every time, he still had to go.

*

They returned to her room together holding hands, and he didn’t let her wander more than an inch or two from his side the whole time. He wanted to keep Karine as close as possible for as long as he could.

“I’m sorry I just got here only to go again,” he said.

Karine had taken it surprisingly well when he told her he was returning to New York. He decided to tell her the truth about Masha’s disappearance, as well, refusing to keep anything more from her. He wasn’t going to treat her the way she had been treated all her life—fragile, and easy overlooked.

She wasn’t a sensitive flower who couldn’t handle the breeze. Perhaps the way she dealt with her fears wasn’t the way someone else might want her to, but she was stronger than anyone knew. She’d been doing this for years.

He couldn’t forget that.

“I want to say there’s a good reason for her leaving—she’s probably freaking out because she doesn’t know where I am. You should have told her. Maybe she thinks she can come and find me. I don’t want to think she has bad intentions, Roman.”

“Then, don’t. I will.”

“But—”

No buts.

He’d do what she couldn’t.

Roman interrupted any argument from Karine by pulling her in for a kiss that left his chest aching with the need for breath. He kissed her long and hard, pinching her chin between his forefinger and thumb to keep her right where he wanted her while he licked the taste of his last breath off her lips.

She didn’t shy away from him, and he adored that. Her tongue moved over his, firm and sure in what she wanted. Despite the relationships she had with the men in her life—Karine always kissed him boldly.

Like she was showing the world ... he’s mine.

From the moment they first met, she had decided to take him. Even if he hadn’t known