Roman: Book 1 (23 page)

To say I spend most of my time in solitude is an understatement. An understatement, I refuse to voice.

I haven’t seen my husband in over two months. Aside from when I stepped into our master bedroom on our wedding night, not once have I seen him.

My emotions are running amok. My once compartmentalized thoughts surge and crash against my confused yet deep rooted emotions. I don’t know who I am, but I do know, whoever I am needs Roman.

I am weak.

I am a disgrace to all women.

Do you know how many times in my silent tomb of solitude I have planned my escape? The saddest part is, with every passing day my perfect plans fold and buckle beneath the day before. They weaken, and I fucking hate it. His absence is doing nothing…nothing but tearing my resolve to shreds and I don’t know how much longer I’ll be able to keep the threads that remain from snapping.

My thoughts are clearly seen in the mirrors reflection looking back at a woman I don’t recognize when a knock on the door pulls me from my thoughts.

I stand from my vanity, spray Coco Chanel Mademoiselle and step into the mist of perfume before setting the bottle onto the vanity top and walking towards the door.

When I open the door I smile, greeting my OB specialist, Dr. Carol before closing the door and following her lead. “Mrs. Payne, you’re now 28 weeks, or 7 months along in your pregnancy making it time for your third and last ultrasound. Now, Mr. Payne has had a 4D Ultrasound machine brought in so you’re able to see your baby more clearly. It’s an astonishing machine that will literally allow us to see your baby as if it were outside the womb, technology at it’s greatest, I assure you.”

She smiles before opening a door to a darkened room, “Go on inside, remember, gown open to the front, sit on top of the exam table, and lay the sheet across your lap.”

“Yes, ma’am.” I mutter as the door closes behind me. I make quick work of removing my clothes, slipping the gown on and grabbing the sheet before I turn to make my way to the exam table.

Roman fucking Payne, in ALL of his glory, brings me to an abrupt halt and I gasp, cupping my hands over my mouth. “Ro—“

Satan personified slips beneath the skin of the man I married as his devious grin smirks, raising the right side of his mouth and unveiling his hidden dimple.

“Mouse.” Without showing an ounce of emotion he sits up, bringing his right ankle to rest on top of his left knee before steepling his fingers under his full bottom lip and continuing, “My, my. You look…well rested.”

“Roma—“

His hand flies into the air causing me to snap my mouth shut and bite my tongue from any verbal accusations trying to push their way out. “Mouse, you didn’t really think I was willing to stay absent for this, did you?” He pats the exam table beside him and smiles at me. “Please, sit. Let’s see our baby girl.”

Without hesitation I make my way to the exam table and sit, after I lay back I hear the nurse come in and speak, “Heather, the gel is going to feel a little sticky, I warmed it up, so it won’t be cold.”

I nod as the nurse spreads warm gel across my lower abdomen before my daughter’s beautiful face flashes across the screen.

Any woman, who has ever truly loved a man, knows in life, you will only ever precisely hold a handful of memory’s that are important. One of those is falling in love. Our hearts are so self destructive and foolish, like sheep, they lead us to our own slaughter. And after we’ve shattered…we keep on begging, pleading for more, because the sweet is every woman’s drug. And even though it’s known he will wreak you, decimate you, and leave you in the dark nothingness, we still chase the sweet just like the good little addicts we are. 

I’ve been running towards him from the minute I tossed my duffle bag into the trunk of my car and raced after a life I wasn’t ready to live.

And I hate myself as much as Roman for it.

“There she is,” The nurse pulls my attention to the screen. “Do you see her?”

When I see my daughter, Winter Ivy the choked sob I’d been holding back from the minute I saw Roman, shoves its way from my chest. “She’s beautiful.”

“Of course she is, she looks exactly like her mother.” He whispers. When I look up into his eyes I see something beneath the awe, I see something I have never seen on Roman’s face…I see fear.

After the nurse wipes the gel off my belly, turns the machine off and quietly leaves, I keep my eyes on his and ask him the question I don’t want answered, “Roman, what have you done?”

Tears spill down my cheeks when he stands and begins pacing, raking his hands through his hair and the begging words spill out around my sobs, “Roman, what? What have you done?”

He stops at the door and in a broken Roman voice tells me, “You’ll never be number thirteen.”

He leaves me staring at the door as it clicks closed behind him.

How does someone feel both numb and shredded all at once?

Since leaving Heather the night of our wedding day, I stayed intoxicated every waking moment, and I never stayed in one city for more than a night. And every night, I was with a different woman, sometimes as many as three or four at a time. I choked them all, I nicked them all, watching them bleed out as my starved sadist relished in their screams and pleas.

At first the women were from my social circles, but after the beast inside me grew to the monster I was turning into, Sebastian began lining up escorts in city after city. And somewhere between number thirteen in Brazil and number seventeen in Toronto, he was forced to began lining up whores, cheap whores who wouldn’t be missed when I went too far.

Yesterday morning when I awoke from a three month binge on scotch, lying in a puddle of every ounce of number twenty’s blood, I knew there was no going back.

I am so far away from being the person I was before I spilled my heart in front of our friends and family while Heather’s cool aloofness and dead eyes were the only thing staring back at me, and now there is no going back.

I must say, several times in this journey I honestly believed that I was capable of being the antithesis of the man you first met. I fought with the reality of having to explain to you that people do change, and perhaps Heather was the one who would change me for the better.

Instead, she has changed me for the worse.

Before Heather, I truly thought my mishaps, or the twelve women who’s death I had a hand in, was simply my naivety. I was certain before Heather barged into my life that age and practice would prevent there from ever being a number thirteen.

Now, I know it isn’t true. I am
a
creature of pure evil. This is who I am, who I’ve always been, who I’ll always be.

What did I tell you in the beginning? What did I warn you of? Here, allow me to refresh your memory…

I told you I've lived this life the only way I've deemed necessary. You will not agree with the decisions I've made, and you will hate me for the ones I did not. Every sin I’ve committed, every life I’ve ended, every soul I’ve purchased to watch in amusement fade out, I did with whole and complete intentions…
of
watching these sins and transgressions of mine affect the life of another.

My intentions are my own, and I own every single one.

I had to be where I am today in order to meet my daughter without ever having her look into Satan’s eyes. I had to be here today to silently tell the love of my life goodbye.

I had to be here today to extract and cauterize myself like the cancer I am from the only two people I have and ever will love.

On the car ride back to the Manor after drowning myself in scotch, Andrew’s voice jars me from fucking hell.

“All of your belongings have been packed and are currently in route to the Boulder mansion as per your request, sir. Sebastian just sent a text message informing me all the legal paperwork has been filed and the movers are there furnishing the house. As soon as we land everything should be done.”

My head sinks back into the leather seat as I mutter, “Thank you, Andrew.”

Boulder, Colorado. That is where I plan to have a new clinic built and start my life over away from Heather and our child.

You and I both know I was never meant to have blessings like Heather and Winter, not a demonic lusus naturae like me.

Andrew pulls the car to a stop in front of the manor’s entrance.

“Stay in the car, I just have to grab the last of my business files and I’ll be right out. Leave the motor running.”

“Will do, sir.”

I silently open and close the door before making my way to my office and barely closing the door to.

In less than five minutes I feel her eyes on me, I feel her angelic presence even with my back to the door..

A bomb implodes within my chest cavity when I look up and see the mess I have made of her.  Her makeup is smeared and her mascara is staining her beautiful face as her tears fall in rivulets. Through her whimpering she mutters broken pleas until she’s standing directly in front of me. Her arms wrap around my neck tightly and she sobs in the crook of my neck, “Please, please. Roman. Don’t do this, I beg you. I can’t. Please don’t leave me. I-I-I can’t lose you.” Her hands fist in my hair before she pulls my face to hers and kisses me with passion and fervor.

Our mouths consume one another, our tongues slide against each other, our teeth break skin and our lips suck and pull each others into our mouths. My briefcase thuds to the floor and I cup her face in my hands, sweeping away the tears my sins have caused.

I pull back and smile down into her beautiful messy face, and whatever heart I once harbored shatters into nothingness, “My sweet little mouse, you’ve already lost me, love.”

After I have to literally yank her hands from clutching my suit jacket and shirt, I grab my briefcase and turn to leave. The sight of my pregnant wife sinking to the floor crying out in a sobbing mess while cradling her swollen belly is a sight I will try every minute, of every day to erase. And I will fail.

“Goodbye, Heather. Everything is yours. I’ve made sure you and our daughter will never go without.” I straighten my suit jacket and button it on my way out of the office, then I walk down the massive staircase, and through the front doors of Payne Manor.

Tears bite behind my eyes as the driver pulls away and down the willow tree lined driveway. Thankfully I am able to quickly blink them away and efficiently shut Heather out of my conscious mind and thoughts.