Chapter Text
This isn’t really Logan’s scene anymore. He’s in his 80’s after all. Seedy little bars, no matter how fancy the liquor they serve, are no place for Logan Roy, yet here he is making a squalid little backroom deal to nudge that technobrat Matsson out of his company.
He’ll keep the name, maybe. GoStar is a neat little rebrand that sheds some of the baggage his company has accumulated over the years. It’ll get those fucking Donkeys off his back a little that’s for sure.
Ordinarily, he’d let Ratfucker Sam do all the skulking around, but he comes to this particular meeting for the same reason he sent Romulus to babysit the private money deal. Sometimes he has to sniff out the bullshit himself. He has a nose for it like no other, and when he locked eyes with this dead-eyed college drop out, an ex-roommate of Matsson’s while he “invented” Gojo’s tech, he knew that the intel was legitimate.
“You’re doing the right thing, son,” Logan assured the young man, who sniffed and glared at the table in turn.
“Just make sure he loses it all. The way I did.”
“He will. I’ll make sure of it.”
He lets the young man leave first, then Sam. He finishes his scotch before trailing after them. He makes it about halfway to the door when a familiar voice sends a chill up his spine.
“-I wondered why all these dumb motherfuckers were going 85 in one lane when there were no lane closures or accidents ahead. So I switch lanes and start going 120!” Romulus’s unmistakable lilting voice floats from around the corner.
Logan rounds it to see his youngest son perched on the edge of a round table, surrounded by a crowd of similarly aged white boys, hair ruffled, collars askew, sleeves rolled up and shirt buttons half undone. They’re grinning and laughing, eagerly awaiting the punchline, which Roman delivers with relish.
“So I’m zooming along,” Roman continues, hand sailing through the air. “Thinking about all these dumbasses I’m leaving in the dust. And then I get to the front of the line of cars, and the leading car is a goddamn state trooper!”
The other boys gasp, and laugh and slap their knees. Roman leans back on the table behind him, drains his coppery looking alcohol with a smug little smile and sets it down with a little smack against the wood.
“So I look over at him, and he looks over at me. And mind you, I’m going 120, and this cop is going 85 so to even keep up with him I’d have to be 15 over the speed limit, so I’m fucked. But I don’t panic or slam the brakes, I drop my speed down to 85 and I just…. ease on over into his lane behind him. And we all drive like that for another 20 minutes, some dumbass speeding in the other lane, seeing the cop, and merging behind him, until he turns off an exit and we all go back to driving like normal people. It was fucking bizarre. Some Xfiles level shit.”
Logan draws closer slowly, mildly entranced by how laid back and easy the whole scene is. It used to be, when Roman was with him, that his boy would get all jittery, couldn’t sit still, and would talk a mile a minute of pure bullshit most of the time. But here, in this room, Roman seems effortlessly charismatic, magnetic. The crowd is as drawn in as Logan is. They’re all hanging off his every word. Logan wonders if his son has been like this all night. How long has he been sitting around telling stories?
“I’ve never seen you drive anywhere,” Logan interjects, drawing the eyes of the young men over to him instead.
Roman shifts slightly, tilting his head in his father’s direction and regarding him with curiosity rather than the sheer panic of the old days, the pre-Gojo days.
“Yeah well, this is the story of why I don’t anymore,” Roman replies with a smile and soft laugh, still easy, completely relaxed.
The lull of his head to the side and slight slur of his words suggests that Romulus is drunk.
“Who’s that?” one of the little idiots whispers and is sharply elbowed in the side by a buddy.
“That’s Logan Roy,” another whispers back, awe replacing the mirth of earlier.
“Hey, Dad,” Roman says, as if them running into each other in public is a normal occurrence. “What brings you out here?”
“Good drinks,” Logan replies affably with a little smile. “You hosting a little book reading club?”
Roman giggles, as do a few of the other boys around him.
“Oh you know, just some guys hanging out. I don’t actually know half these assholes,” he teases, turning to the nearest one. “Who the fuck are you?”
“I’m Eddie,” the guy replies with a grin, a mischievous spark in his eye. “I work for IBM.”
“I WoRk fOr IbM!” Roman replies mockingly. “Fuck off. I’m having a word with my Dad.”
The others start to gather their things and go away. Some are a bit stung by the sudden rejection, but most are amused.
“Hey uh,” one of the younger men in the group approaches, ruffled brown waves in his hair and a smile that’s a bit too charming for one man speaking to another. “We’re having an after party at my place, if you want to come.”
Logan raises his brow at the brazen nature of this request. He doesn’t have the finest tuned gaydar, but he finds the man’s interest in Romulus to be glaringly obvious and unnerving. He glances over at Roman, patiently awaiting the brutal rejection such an open proposition deserves and pales immediately as he sees Roman’s expression go soft and contemplative. His son’s eyes are slightly glazed over, unfocused.
He’s wasted. That’s all, Logan consoles himself.
As if on cue, Roman sways on his feet, and Logan wraps an arm around his son to keep him upright.
“I think someone has had enough for the evening,” Logan replies with a good natured laugh. “Some other time perhaps.”
Roman shifts naturally, pressing against his father’s chest and replying in a mildly slurred tone.
“What he said.. See you around.”
Hopefully not.
“Come on, son,” Logan huffs quietly, rubbing his shoulders. “Let’s get you sobered up.”
Roman laughs quietly, but allows himself to be guided through the bar by the shoulders like a wayward toddler. He even seems to enjoy it a bit as he is neatly tucked into the back seat, his father sliding in right beside him.
“Now what on earth was that about?” Logan asks once they are all settled.
He notes that Roman isn’t turned away from as usual. He’s not looking determinedly out the window or fidgeting. If anything, he’s sitting too close. Their clothes are touching.
“Oh you know… Went out for some beers! Made some friends…”
“Friends?”
“They’re really cool guys… I didn’t get any numbers,” Roman says with a yawn. “But I don’t know… maybe if I come back?”
“Why don’t you spend some time with your brothers instead? Shiv maybe?”
“Pffft,” Roman blows a little raspberry, stretching and leaning against his father’s shoulder. “Kendall’s a sourpuss. Shiv is a bitter sourpuss. Connor is….Connor.”
Roman’s voice trails and he yawns, leaning his head against his father’s shoulder. Logan attempts to gently shrug him off, and is surprised when the weight of him proves to be too much. He blinks, bewildered. For all the times he couldn’t get Roman to stand within six feet of him without ordering him to do so, he now can’t get his near 40-year-old son to stop leaning on his shoulder.
“What have you taken tonight, son?” Logan presses gently, wrapping an arm around him as carefully as one might pet a snake for the first time.
“Booze.”
“That’s all? Nothing… recreational? To take the edge off?”
“ ‘m not Ken, Dad…” Roman murmurs, yawning again before going so silent and still that Logan is mildly concerned that he might have died right there, leaning against him.
Logan stares at him a little longer, marveling at how quickly and easily Roman has gone to sleep, laying on him no less. He’s been slowly acclimating to the fact that he and his son have grown…closer… since the sale of Waystar to Gojo. There’s a tension that used to be between them that has utterly vanished. It’s as if Roman were a pet tiger that has been caged its whole life, and now that the bars have been removed Logan has sat very still, waiting to be eaten or mauled, only to be met with nuzzles and licks.
He likes the new Roman. He seems less desperate for attention, more confident in his opinions, and less antsy overall. He’s fun to be around. He tells good stories and makes funnier jokes. Logan doesn’t have to worry about him fucking up any deals, or shitting on Frank, because that’s not Roman’s sphere of influence any longer. Their association is strictly social, something Logan can rely upon for good company, when he needs a break from Tom and Greg’s sycophantic worship.
He wouldn’t exactly frame their time together as father and son bonding. He’s done that with all of his sons and none of that seems to match up with what they’re working with now. Roman once referred to their current relationship as “Strangers who don’t hate each other.” Logan rejected that too. He may not be the world’s best father, but even he recoils from the idea that his son is a total stranger to him. He knows Romulus. He’s just finding new angles to look at him.
He’s concerned by this latest angle…
Did Roman not notice the way that man had looked at him, or had he simply not cared? Was that interest he’d seen before that dizzy spell? He rejects the idea fiercely, outright. Romulus is not queer. The dick pic had rattled Logan a lot, but he would surely know if his son was by now. They spend enough time together.
And never mind his sexuality.
It occurs to Logan that Roman is very good at holding his liquor, at least he has been these last few weeks they’ve spent together. For him to be knocked out so suddenly, when he was lucid just moments ago suggests…
Did someone slip something in his son’s drink?
What would have happened if he’d let Roman go with those young men? Total strangers. Would Roman be sleeping on one of their shoulders? What might they have done to him?
He wraps his arm around his son’s shoulder more firmly, as if to shield him retroactively from these men who might have taken advantage of him given the chance. He didn’t know better. He doesn’t know better. He needs protecting.
The car stops in front of Logan’s home.
“Keep driving. I want him to sleep.”