Page 62 of Darkest Oblivion
“Come with me,” he said, his voice steady—commanding, but not unkind.
I hesitated, my body rooted to the cold marble floor.
My heart pounded against my ribs, a frantic rhythm of fear and suspicion. Why should I trust him? He was Dmitri’s shadow, his weapon, the man who had seen me at my weakest and never once flinched.
Giovanni’s gaze didn’t waver.
Sensing my unwillingness, he added, his tone lower, almost reluctant. “I have no right to hurt you, ma’am. But there are things... things I need to tell you. Things I have no right to say.”
The words unsettled me more than a threat would have. Giovanni never explained himself. Never spoke beyond what duty required. Yet here he was, standing at my door, breaking lines I hadn’t even known existed.
My legs trembled as I forced myself to move, every step a battle between instinct and defiance.
Fear clawed at me, guilt coiled tight in my gut, but beneath them both lurked something far more dangerous—the undeniable pull of the bond I could not name. The one that tied me to Dmitri even as I bled from his cruelty. Hatred. Obsession. And the stubborn, foolish love that refused to die no matter how many times he shattered me.
He led me through the winding corridors of the villa and out into one of the smaller gardens tucked away in the estate’s labyrinthine grounds.
The air changed instantly—cooler, softer—as though I’d stepped into another world.
The space was intimate, almost secret, a hidden sanctuary cradled by ancient stone walls cloaked in ivy that whispered under the faint night breeze.
The perfume of jasmine drifted through the air, mingling with the heady scent of night-blooming roses. The garden feltalive, breathing around us, guarding whatever truth Giovanni was about to bare.
He gestured to a bench, and I sat stiffly, the wood cool beneath my palms.
Giovanni lowered himself opposite me with the precision of a soldier, his back straight, hands clasped loosely in front of him, as though he were about to pass judgment.
“My father was butler to the Volkovs for decades,” he began, his voice steady, carrying the weight of memory.
His gaze lingered on the fountain, as if the ceaseless flow of water lent him strength. “Tradition dictated I take over. And I did—not only out of duty, but because I loved the family. Dmitri and I... we’ve been brothers since high school. He never treated me as less. Even in his worst tempers, he held me as his equal. He trained me as a soldier, made me his shadow, his enforcer. I am his butler, his bodyguard, his confidant. If anyone knows Dmitri inside out—not even his late parents did—it’s me.”
His words struck me as both confession and warning, but impatience gnawed at my raw edges.
I leaned forward, my hands tightening into fists against my knees. “I don’t need a history lesson about your brotherhood,” I snapped, my voice like glass ready to shatter. “I want the truth, Giovanni. Who is Seraphina, and why does he swear to my face he’s not touching her?”
Giovanni’s eyes lifted to mine at last, hard as steel but not cruel.
His lips pressed into a thin line before he spoke. “There is no Seraphina.”
The words landed like a physical strike.
I flinched, heat flooding my face, my breath hitching. “What do you mean—there is no Seraphina?”
He leaned forward slightly, his voice dropping into something low and conspiratorial, as though even the roses might carry his words back to Dmitri.
“You and your parents hurt him more deeply than you can begin to understand. When he brought you here, he had a list—a list of horrors he meant to inflict on you. Ways to break you. Ways to make you bleed for every sin, every betrayal of your bloodline. But every time he looked at you... he couldn’t do it.”
“His hatred warred with something deeper, something he refuses to name. And yet—he needed you to suffer. He needed you to believe he was faithless, cruel, unredeemable. The hickeys you saw on your wedding night? Makeup. I painted them myself at his command. He thought if you believed he belonged to another woman, it would destroy you more efficiently than any blade.”
The garden seemed to tighten around me, the jasmine choking sweet in my lungs.
“He wanted you to question your worth, to see yourself as nothing. To believe every scar, every curve, every mark on your body was something to despise. That way, every time he looked at you, every time he touched you, you would doubt. You would hurt yourself more than he ever could with fists or daggers.”
“Seraphina was never flesh and blood. She was a mask for his obsession, a way to punish you without lifting a hand. And he made me help him build that lie.”
His jaw clenched, the scar on his face pulling tight. “He thought betrayal would break you more completely than pain. Because pain heals. But mistrust? That festers. That’s the prison he wanted for you—one you’d never escape, even if he let you walk free.”
My stomach twisted violently, every memory—every cruel word, every sleepless night, every tear shed over Seraphina’s ghost—souring into a nightmare built of lies.
