Chapter 20 #2
I’d believed Giovanni’s lie like a desperate fool. Of course he’d said what Dmitri wanted him to. Of course they’d both played me—master and servant, puppeteer and string. The realization twisted deep in my gut, hot and cold all at once.
I hated them.
But most of all, I hated myself—for ever trusting him. For ever loving him.
Giovanni dragged me down the corridor, his grip tightening as I fought him with everything I had left.
My feet scraped marble, my hair whipping into my face.
“You’re a monster, Dmitri!” I screamed, my voice echoing down the hall. “You killed the only part of me that ever loved you.” I sobbed. “I’ll never forgive you for it.”
My words chased him as he disappeared around the corner, swallowed by the mansion’s silence.
And then it hit me—the unbearable quiet, the weight of my own sobs echoing against the walls.
I turned on Giovanni, fury snapping through tears. “And you,” I hissed, my voice cracking. “You lied to me. You said Seraphina didn’t exist—you let me believe she was fiction!”
He said nothing, his jaw clenching as he tried to guide me forward again.
“You knew she was real—an Orlov heir, Elena’s sister,” I choked out, my voice cracking between sobs. “And you let me drown in his lies, Giovanni!
Giovanni’s eyes darkened, guilt flickering there, but he didn’t defend himself.
So I did the only thing I could—lash out. My teeth sank into his hand, hard, until I tasted the salt of his skin and the copper of blood.
He flinched, hissing, pulling away, but didn’t retaliate.
“Ma’am,” he said, softer, almost broken. “Please... don’t make this harder.”
He looked torn apart, but his hand still reached for me—steady, deliberate, determined.
“Let me go!” I cried, twisting hard, my body jerking in panic. His fingers clamped around my wrist like steel.
“You don’t have to do this,” I pleaded, my voice shaking violently. “If you had an ounce of conscience left, Giovanni, you’d let me go! You know this isn’t right—you know what he’s become!”
He shut his eyes, jaw tightening as if my words were blades, but his grip didn’t loosen.
He pulled me toward the heavy wooden door at the end of the hall.
The hinges groaned as he forced it open, the smell of dust and cold air bleeding out like a warning.
Inside, the darkness was almost tangible—thick, suffocating, like it wanted to swallow me whole.
“Giovanni—wait!”
He said nothing, just guided me over the threshold.
The door slammed behind me with a brutal thud, the echo shattering the silence.
A second later came the metallic click of the lock—final, merciless, like a coffin sealing shut.
“Giovanni!” I screamed, slamming my palms against the door until they burned. “Please—don’t leave me here!” My voice cracked, echoing back at me from the cold walls.
“You know I’m planning to escape!” I gasped, pounding harder, my nails scraping against the wood.
“I told him you gave me misoprostol—that I aborted the baby! You know it’s not true! If he finds out, he’ll make sure you and I never see daylight again!”
No response. Just the echo of my own voice, ragged and breaking.
I pressed my forehead to the door, tears streaking my cheeks. “You’re not like him, Giovanni. I know you’re not. You’ve seen what he’s capable of—what he becomes when he’s angry. You can’t let him do this to me!”
My voice dropped to a whisper, shaking. “Please. I’m scared. It’s too dark—I can’t stay here alone!” My words dissolved into sobs. “Giovanni, please... Don’t leave me here. I can’t... I can’t breathe in the dark...”
A pause.
Then, muffled through the wood: “I’m sorry, Penelope.”
His voice trembled—barely holding itself together. “I can’t help.”
“No—no, you can,” I begged, my palms slamming against the door until my skin burned. “You can help me. You always have. Please, Giovanni, don’t leave me here!”
His silence felt like betrayal—heavy and deliberate.
“Don’t you dare walk away!” I screamed, my voice breaking, raw from panic. “Giovanni—a pregnant woman in the dark, alone? You know how dangerous that is! You know what this could do to me!”
Silence.
Then the slow, heavy drag of his footsteps retreating down the corridor—hesitant at first, then faster, desperate to escape the sound of me falling apart.
“Giovanni!” I slammed both palms against the door, my skin stinging. “Please! Don’t leave me here—please!”
My voice cracked into sobs.” You can’t do this! It’s too dark! I can’t see a thing. It’s too scary here... Giovaniiiiii! Don’t go. Please. I’m begging you... don’t go...”
The echo of my voice came back twisted, warped by the emptiness.
I turned, chest heaving, but the dark was everywhere—total, consuming.
My eyes strained, searching for anything, a crack of light, a window, but there was nothing. Not even the faint shimmer of my own reflection in the air.
It pressed against me, heavy and alive.
The walls seemed to breathe.
The air thickened, every exhale bouncing back into my lungs like someone else was sharing it.
My heartbeat thundered in my ears, too loud, too fast.
And then—voices. Laughter. Whispered and wrong.
No. No, it wasn’t real.
But the dark didn’t care about what was real.
The shadows shifted, crawling closer, and suddenly I was a child again—cornered, small, helpless.
My uncles’ rough hands gripped my arms, dragging me into their corners of the house where no one looked, no one cared.
Their breath, sour and hot, burned my skin.
They were dead. They were dead.
But here, in this dark room, they weren’t. They lived inside the dark.
“Get away!” I screamed, backing into the wall, my palms scraping against cold stone. “Don’t touch me! Don’t—”
Hands weren’t there—but I felt them.
On my arms, my throat, my thighs.
I clawed at my skin, my nails leaving burning welts.
The copper tang of blood hit my tongue before I even realized I was biting my lip raw.
I punched at the air, at ghosts that wouldn’t fade, at memories that refused to stay buried.
Their laughter echoed, low and distorted. The sound of my own sobs joined it until I couldn’t tell which belonged to me anymore.
And for a terrible, shattering moment, I thought maybe Dmitri had been right—maybe I was cursed.
Maybe I’d always been.
Then my legs gave out. I hit the floor hard, the cold concrete knocking the breath from my lungs.
My hand brushed my thigh—wet, sticky—and I realized it wasn’t just from the scratches. The bleeding had started again. The subchorionic hematoma.
A shudder tore through me.
“This... this is too much,” I breathed, shaking my head in disbelief. I shot him, I know I did—but I was scared, desperate. I didn’t deserve this. To be locked away, alone, like something to be discarded.” My hand pressed over my belly, trembling.
I’m only trying to protect my child... and he wants me buried alive for it. Alone with ghosts that won’t stop haunting me.
I pressed my back to the wall, trembling, my breath shallow. Exhaustion wrapped around me like chains.
I didn’t know when I slipped under—whether it was sleep or the mercy of unconsciousness—but when I woke, the air was colder.
Footsteps echoed. Slow. Deliberate.
A man’s voice followed, low and sharp, cutting through the dark like a knife.
“Penelope.”
No. No. It couldn’t be—
My father.
The sound of him dragged every nerve raw.
I clamped my hands over my ears, squeezing my eyes shut, but his voice pushed through, closer, louder, like it lived inside my skull.
“You failed us,” he whispered, venom threading every syllable.
My body convulsed with a sob.
“You’re not real!” I screamed, my voice hoarse, breaking on the word. “You’re not real!”
But he stood there, or something like him—his outline flickering in the dark, his eyes twin shards of judgment.
The world fractured, and the memories came, violent and unstoppable.
My father’s hand striking my face.
My uncles’ laughter.
Dmitri’s voice—his fury. Blood on his arm. Seraphina’s shadow behind him.
I couldn’t breathe. The images came too fast, too loud. I clawed at my scalp, my nails tearing skin, desperate to silence it, to end it. My screams tangled with sobs, the sound bouncing off the walls until it didn’t even sound like me anymore.
Then my chest constricted. A sudden, vicious clamp, like someone had wrapped their hands around my lungs and refused to let go.
The asthma attack hit without warning.
I gasped, each breath thinner than the last.
Panic clawed up my throat, my body jerking in reflex as I fell to my knees.
The floor was freezing, the air thick and heavy, impossible to pull in.
I clawed at my neck, at the air, wheezing, my mind screaming breathe, breathe, but my lungs refused.
The room spun. My vision fractured into specks of light and black. My fingers fumbled against the floor, searching for the inhaler that wasn’t there.
“Help...” I rasped, barely a sound. “Please...”
No answer. Only silence.
My chest burned.
My heart slammed against my ribs, each beat slower than the last. The world tilted—then folded.
And the darkness devoured me whole.