The Only Woman to Defy Him

CHAPTER FIFTEEN


DEMYAN HEARD THE click of the phone as the lifeline that he needed today was terminated.

Perhaps it was for the better.

Some journeys were easier shared but perhaps better taken alone and Demyan was so much stronger now than then.

He hadn’t even told Roman where he was today. He would bring him here to visit her grave when the time was right. Demyan had spoken at length with a priest who had agreed with Alina that his mother had been ill, desperately ill.

He stood at the soft mound of soil, already partly covered in a fall of fresh snow. He had heard no screams of protest from his mother this time as she had been lowered and Demyan’s heart was at peace for she could now rest in the ground of the church. Now he could remember happier times. Now that she was here he could stand and remember not the fear but the love, and there had been love. This time when he walked away he did not need to look back.

She was resting peacefully now.

It was hard.

But not the hardest part to this day.

‘Ya tebya lyublyu, syn.’ As he had when Roman had been much smaller, Demyan told his son, in Russian, that he loved him, when they met.

‘Noh?’ Roman asked.

‘There is no “but”,’ Demyan answered in English. Roman’s Russian was good but it did not quite stretch to this conversation.

The hardest conversation to have.

But it was a necessity, Demyan had decided.

Lies had come between them these past months and the truth could no longer make things worse.

‘Your mother does not want me to have this conversation with you,’ Demyan said, ‘but I have told her that I must.’

There was the crunch of snow as they walked and the air was so cold that it burnt to breathe it but the words that came were not frozen or bitter, they came from summer and love. ‘She told me something that I believe she used as a weapon against me,’ Demyan said, ‘but that weapon has since turned on you and I. We are barely speaking.’

‘You have your...’ Roman hesitated. Growing up, his father had never so much as tapped him but that morning when Roman had hurled words, once his father had caught him Demyan had shaken him till his teeth had rattled for saying such a thing. ‘You have your woman to speak with.’

‘Alina,’ Demyan said. ‘Her name is Alina but right now—’ He didn’t get to finish.

‘And my mother’s name is Nadia,’ Roman interrupted, and Demyan halted at the threat in his son’s voice. Yes, he had said less than pleasant things to Nadia but never when Roman had been there, Demyan was sure of it. Then his heart stopped beating for a couple of seconds, it just stilled in his chest as Roman turned to him and Demyan realised that he didn’t have to tell Roman the dark truth, for it would seem his son already knew. ‘Whatever she might have done in the past, my mother’s name is Nadia.’

Demyan watched as Roman’s dark eyes filled with tears and he was so, so proud to see them. Proud, not just of Roman, for even if incapable himself, he had raised a son who could show his emotions in the most natural of ways.

Maybe he wasn’t so incapable of showing emotion for, as Roman spoke on, it was Demyan who felt moisture in his eyes.

‘And my father’s name, whatever happened in the past, will always be Demyan.’

It was discussed without words, it was said without saying.

Whatever some laboratory decided, Demyan was Roman’s father.

‘I do want to be in Russia,’ Roman said as they walked further and talked more deeply. ‘I want to learn about my culture, I want to learn the language better. Can you understand that?’

‘Of course,’ Demyan said.

He had never wanted to return but now that he had, through adult eyes he could see its beauty.


It just didn’t feel like home.

‘Who is this Alina?’ Roman asked.

‘We are not seeing each other,’ Demyan said. ‘She was working for me.’ It was pointless to lie, he simply could not dismiss her. ‘We were seeing each other for a while but it did not work.’

‘Why?’

Demyan told him that it was personal. ‘We will get a drink.’

They walked into a bar and sat at the counter. ‘When I was younger, before my mother was so ill, we would come here some mornings. She worked at the market and I would come here and have kasha.’ Roman pulled a face, the thought of porridge not appealing. ‘I had it with jam,’ Demyan said, and he sat there remembering days that he had never thought of before. His mother waving a spoon at his face, smiling and laughing as she cajoled a small child to eat. He remembered too the feel of her picking him up, ruffling his hair, before her illness had taken hold.

No, he had not done the opposite of his mother with Roman—the beginnings of a parenting manual had been put in place by Annika. He had known love and affection, but only now could he remember it.

As they were served their drinks at the counter Roman, as gangly teenagers often did, knocked the salt. Black eyes met his father’s and though Demyan had done his best not to pass on the superstitions, he saw in Roman that slight start of fear. But Demyan smiled and took a pinch and threw it over his left shoulder.

‘I do that,’ Roman said, ‘when you are not looking. A friend showed me that.’

Demyan smiled. ‘Here, we don’t throw it, but a friend showed me that too...’ Except she was far more than a friend to him. ‘Alina,’ he corrected. ‘Alina showed me that.’

Roman pushed for more information when perhaps he should not have, but he had never known his father with anyone. ‘Alina is the only woman you have ever brought to our home. Were you serious?’

‘No,’ Demyan said, and remembered how he had smiled more than he ever had when he had been with her. ‘We were rarely serious. Except when we argued, of course.’

‘Not many people argue with you.’

‘Not true,’ Demyan said, and he thought of Mikael. They had worked these streets and knew how it was, so it was safe to fight with him. He thought of Nadia but he did not argue with her, which infuriated Nadia so. Demyan did not argue with Nadia because he did not care...

He cared about Alina so.

Loved Alina so.

So much so that when his phone rang Demyan smiled as he took the call.

‘She said no to Dubai?’ Demyan was still smiling when he hung up the phone. ‘Go, Alina!’

There was a job, he’d ensured that with Hassan, but it warmed his heart to know she hadn’t taken it, that Alina was surely following her own path. He looked at his son.

‘Do you want some relationship advice from someone who has never held one down for very long?’ he asked, and Roman nodded. ‘Sort yourself first,’ Demyan said, because how he wished he’d met Alina tomorrow or next week, yet he might never have made it to this point had it not been for her. ‘Know yourself first.’

‘That is what I am doing,’ Roman admitted. ‘I know you were not keen for me to come and live here but I want to be here, I want to know my history.’ He swallowed. ‘I think I want to find out...’

‘It’s okay,’ Demyan said. ‘You have every right to know.’

Roman looked at his father and they had always been close but never closer than now. ‘What would it change for you if I found out?’

‘Nothing,’ Demyan said. ‘I have been through it and over it and have grieved and I am still standing.’

‘You’re sorted, then.’

He was, Demyan realised.

Just a little too late.

As Roman checked his messages Demyan did the same. There was one from his online ‘friend’—Alina’s father. Demyan had never responded to him but he kept trying to worm his way in.





Watch your daughter soar, you bastard...





Demyan tapped it in and then deleted it. He would save his moment but he would have it, Demyan was sure.

He wasn’t his mother, trapped in an illness, he could change. And he wasn’t Alina’s father either—he would fight to keep her in his life.

Fight to make her a part of it.