Page 11 of Darkest Oblivion
I bolted.
The tent flap whipped against me as I tore through it, boots pounding over gravel, lungs burning with every gasp of icy night air.
Shouts erupted behind me—deep voices, heavy boots giving chase—but I didn’t dare look back.
My Audi gleamed ahead, salvation in black metal.
My pulse hammered in my ears as I reached it, yanking the door open with trembling hands.
I threw myself inside, slammed it shut, and jammed the key into the ignition. The engine roared to life, my only ally.
“Come on, come on,” I hissed, shoving the gear into reverse.
Tires screeched, smoke curling into the air as the car shot backward. I spun the wheel, flooring it, the dock vanishing behind me in a blur of shadows.
I didn’t care if the Italian mafia’s entire army was on my tail—I’d rather die running than be taken alive.
But as I glanced into the rearview mirror, my blood froze.
Dmitri stood outside the tent, framed in the floodlight’s glow, unmoving.
His hands were folded behind his back, his black suit unruffled, his icy blue gaze locked on mine even from a distance. Calm. Patient. As if my frantic escape was nothing more than a game he had already won.
My chest heaved, every breath scraping like sandpaper through my lungs. The city’s lights streaked past in fractured blurs as I wove recklessly through traffic, horns blaring, red lights ignored.
My pulse was a war drum, pounding in my ears, drowning everything else.
My shaking hand fumbled for my phone.
I hit Papa’s number, set it to speaker, and pressed it to the dash. “Pick up, Papa,” I whispered, my voice cracking.
The dial tone dragged on, each ring a blade carving deeper into my fear.
No answer. Not even voicemail.
Had Dmitri already made good on his threat? His voice echoed in my skull:Don’t overestimate your family’s power, Penelope. I could erase them all—your father, your mother, Rocco, Carlo. I could turn the Romano empire into smoke and bone, and it wouldn’t cost me a single sleepless night.
My stomach knotted.
Was my silence on the line the sound of that promise coming true?
The Romano estate rose before me, a dark tower of steel and glass cutting through the night sky, its lit windows a beacon of fragile safety.
I screeched into the garage, the Audi’s tires shrieking against the polished concrete, and slammed it into park.
I stumbled out, my legs nearly giving way.
My chest still ached from the earlier attack, my lungs raw, every gasp shallow.
The ground was cold against my bare foot—one boot lost somewhere in the chaos on the docks.
I limped across the garage, gripping the trunk of the car for balance, clutching the other shoe like a weapon I’d never get to use.
“Ma’am!” A butler in the Romano gray uniform rushed toward me.
His usually calm face was pale, eyes wide with alarm. “Are you—are you hurt?”
“I’m fine,” I lied between ragged breaths, my voice hoarse. “Find my father. Now. Tell him...” My grip tightened on the shoe until my knuckles went white. “...tell him I have something urgent to say. It can’t wait.”
