ABSOLUTE INSANITY: A forbidden bond-Chapter 233: Ex cop

Chapter 233

ROMEO POV

The door closed behind me with a sound that was barely there. I didn’t slow my steps as I walked down the hall.

I didn’t look back. I didn’t need to. Katya was exactly where I’d left her—standing still, breath held, waiting for something she didn’t yet understand.

People always thought restraint meant mercy. It didn’t. Restraint meant timing.

I entered my room and shut the door, this time properly, the lock clicking into place with a dull, solid sound.

Only then did I exhale. Not relief though

Michael. The name lingered unpleasantly, like a grain of sand you couldn’t quite get rid of. I replayed the call in my head—not the words, but the rhythm of it.

The pauses. The way Katya’s voice shifted when he suggested coming over. Panic, sharp and unfiltered.

She hadn’t been afraid for herself. That mattered. I crossed the room and poured myself a drink, the glass clinking softly against the counter.

My hands were steady. They always were. Emotion didn’t make them shake. Emotion made other people careless and I wasn’t them.

Katya had lied. That was expected. Everyone lied. What she hadn’t done was more interesting.

She hadn’t tried to provoke me. She hadn’t used him as a shield or a threat. She hadn’t even looked relieved when the call ended.

She’d looked... trapped. I took a slow sip, eyes unfocusing as I leaned back against the counter. Michael wasn’t important. Not yet. Men like him never were. Civilian. Soft edges. A voice that carried concern instead of calculation.

But Katya cared.And that was enough to make him a variable.

I hadn’t taken the phone. That choice was deliberate. Fear made people stupid. Stupid people broke rules loudly.

Quiet obedience, on the other hand, came from believing they were still safe. I set the glass down and reached for my phone, pressing the James number.

James answered on the second ring.

"Don?"

"Get me the CCTV footage from the mall Nonna took Katya to today," I said. No greeting. No preamble. "Every camera. Entrances, corridors, boutiques, parking. I want the full timeline."

There was a brief pause on the other end. Not hesitation—processing.

"By when?"

"Tomorrow morning," I replied. "First thing."

Another pause. Shorter this time. "I also want a background check," I continued, already pacing the room. "Everyone who interacted with her. Sales staff. Security. Anyone who spoke to her for longer than a greeting. Names, records, affiliations. I don’t care how small it seems."

James exhaled quietly. "That’s... a lot of people."

"I know."

Silence stretched. I could picture him frowning, mentally assembling the task, weighing it against precedent. James was efficient, loyal—but not reckless.

"I will get it done." I ended the call, setting the phone down and stared at it for a moment longer than necessary.

I knew I was going too far. The thought didn’t bother me. Excess was a luxury I could afford. Blind spots weren’t.

Antonio would have questioned this. He always did. Not out of defiance—but out of principle. He would’ve reminded me that malls were public, that Katya wasn’t a head of state, that dragging an entire building into scrutiny invited noise.

Antonio believed in restraint as strategy. I believed in restraint as timing. That was why I hadn’t called him.

I moved to the window, the estate spread out below like a map of veins and arteries, pulsing with life that didn’t know it was being watched.

____

Morning came without ceremony. Grey light filtered through the tall ground to ceiling window of my home office, settling over the polished wood and shelves of orderly files.

I was seated behind the desk, jacket on, sleeves buttoned. The glass from last night was gone.

I hadn’t slept, but that was nothing new. Sleep was optional. Information wasn’t. The door opened without a knock.

James entered, quiet as always. He crossed the room and placed a slim black folder on my desk, followed by a flash drive.

He aligned them neatly, parallel to the edge, before straightening.

Done.

I didn’t look at him right away. My eyes stayed on the estate, "Anything delayed?" I asked.

"No."

Good.

James waited. He always did. No explanations. No commentary. He knew better than to fill silence that didn’t belong to him. I turned back to the desk and opened the folder.

Inside was order. Printed stills, timestamps, names. Pages clipped and arranged with surgical precision.

The first image showed Katya and Nonna entering the mall—clear, frontal, high resolution. Time stamped to the second.

Katya’s posture wasn’t relaxed, her shoulder looked tensed with how she held the handles of nonna’s wheelchair. That detail lodged itself somewhere unpleasant.

I flipped to the next page. Corridor camera. Boutique entrance. Another store. Another angle. She appeared again and again, caught mid-step, mid-turn, her face not visible as her hoodie cap covered.

I catalogued every frame without thinking. Habit. I slid the flash drive into the laptop and brought up the footage.

The office filled with silent motion as the screen split into multiple feeds. James hadn’t missed anything.

I watched Katya from five different angles at once. The way she hid her head into her hoodie, her eyes never meeting anyone.

Fast forward to when a lady approached them, Katya and nonna followed the lady and was about entering a room when Katya stopped mid step and turned as if her name was called.

I looked through another angle how a man practically ran to Katya who was frozen, hugging her without consent until Nonna broke it.

Looking deeper into the screen, I sensed a familiarity with the man. I’d seen him before. The feeling settled low and unpleasant, like a memory sharpening its teeth.

I paused the footage, zooming in. James had already anticipated it. Another still slid out from the folder beneath my hand—profile shot, cleaner angle, face unobstructed.

I flipped the page.

Name: Michael Giovanni

Age: 25

Former Occupation: Police Officer

Country of Origin: A 𝑓𝑟ℯ𝘦𝓌𝘦𝘣𝑛𝑜𝓋𝑒𝓁.𝑐ℴ𝓂

Marital Status: Single

Parents: Both alive.

My jaw tightened.

Ex-cop.

The word carried weight it didn’t need to announce. Training. Procedure. Instinct. Men didn’t just stop being police because they took off the badge.

They learned to observe. To question. To notice what other people missed. And cops—former or otherwise—didn’t orbit my life by accident.

My first instinct was rejection. Katya wouldn’t be that careless. She wasn’t stupid. She wouldn’t knowingly invite law enforcement into my house, into my space, into my business.

Unless she didn’t know or worse.....she did and she did it intentionally. That thought settled heavier.

I didn’t want to jump into conclusions. Conclusions meant a decision is to be made and my decisions wouldn’t be good. I flipped to the next page.

Service record. Commendations. Disciplinary notes—thin, but present. Resigned, not fired. That mattered. Men who quit early usually did so for reasons they didn’t put on paper.

Then it hit me. The memory slid into place with irritating clarity. The old and falling apartment building. That day. When I’d gone to take Katya back.

I saw it again.....the way he’d ran to Katya like she was the only thing present there. The way he’d squared his shoulders despite being intimidated. The way he’d stepped in front of her like bravery could make him taller.

The way he’d opened his mouth and foolishly said he was calling the police. I scoffed quietly, the sound sharp in the still room.

So this was him.

Not coincidence. Never coincidence. I glanced back at the paused footage. The hug. Too familiar. Too fast. No hesitation. A man who assumed access.

An ex-cop who thought proximity meant protection. I closed the folder.

"Get someone on him," I said without looking up. James didn’t ask who, he already knew, he must have. He was present that day too.

"Discreet," I continued. "I want eyes. Patterns. Where he sleeps, who he talks to, where he goes when he thinks no one’s watching."

James inclined his head once in agreement "And send Katya to my office now, with her phone," I finished.

James turned and left without another word.

I leaned back in my chair, fingers steepled, eyes drifting to the darkened screen where Michael Giovanni’s face had frozen mid-motion.

An ex-cop in my orbit wasn’t a problem. An ex-cop who mattered to Katya? That was something else entirely.

Timing, I reminded myself.

Always timing.

****

Well well well