Illusions

24. article

Roman's POV

I'm woken up by my alarm and a pounding headache.

Blindly feeling around, I grab my phone and shut it off.

The screen flashes with missed calls from Juliana, so I call her back.

"Roman, thank god."

"What is it, Juliana?"

She sighs.

"I know you're going after her and you can't."

She was all for this yesterday.

"What? Why?"

"She's going to meet with an agency today," she explains, "you going to see her before will mess up her confidence."

She's right.

And I fucking hate that she is.

"Fine, when's she going to be back here?"

She pauses and I lose my patience.

"Spit it out, Juliana."

"She's already here."

"You're kidding."

"Before you go after her," she says quickly, "she's not at her place, she hasn't been in a while. Just give it a week or two, okay?"

She's insane if she thinks I'm waiting any fucking longer.

"Fine."

"Thanks for understanding."

"Goodbye, Juliana."

I end the call and call Zach to tell him to cancel the flight.

He seemed surprised but didn't say anything after I told him he'd get a late cancellation fee. It's only seven, I go back to sleep and try to relax. By the time I wake up again, it's past noon, so I force myself to get up.

I'm late to work.

I call Natalie and let her know I won't be in, and she thinks I'm joking.

To be fair, I haven't missed a day of work in years.

I head down and see Edward on the couch watching TV.

"Morning."

He stands up and approaches me.

"Good afternoon, sir," he says quickly, "I ordered your favorite Russian food, I'll just go get it."

He quickly leaves.

Everyone's walking on fucking eggshells around me.

I go to the kitchen to grab water and sit down on the couch. My bar cart has a new bottle of bourbon on it. Before I know it, I'm pouring myself a glass.

"Sir, you can't be drinking before nightfall."

I turn and see Edward standing behind me with a plate of food.

"How did you do that so fast?"

He doesn't answer and puts the plate in front of me, swiftly grabbing the glass from my hand.

"You can't drink on the clock."

"I'm not," he shrugs and I hear him pour it down the sink, "eat up, sir."

I eat the food but I can't even enjoy it because I'm too preoccupied with Amira. 

Around six, I decided that I needed to get shitfaced, so I got a cab to The Medalion.

Now I'm here and getting there.

Edward was out getting an ingredient for a dish he was preparing, so I took the chance to leave. I felt bad leaving but I couldn't be alone anymore. I'm still alone, but I have an endless supply of drinks to keep me somewhat sane.