Page 67 of Darkest Oblivion

“No.” His reply cracked like a whip, swift, final. “They know you’re with me. As my wife.”

My brow furrowed, Antonio’s poisonous words slithering back:your mourning parents, still searching for you.

Lies.

They had to be lies.

Dmitri didn’t lie—not about this. Still, the ache to hear their voices, to know they were safe, burned like acid.

“I need to hear them,” I pressed, my voice iron despite the fear clawing at me. “Just one call.”

“I said no.” His voice was a growl, dark and commanding, his eyes blazing with that suffocating possessiveness.

Something in me snapped. I didn’t think—I acted.

My hand darted to his pocket, fingers closing around his phone before he could react.

His voice tore the air—furious, dangerous—but I was already running.

Bare feet slapped against the marble, the cold searing my skin as I bolted down the hallway, pulse hammering in my ears.

The phone lit in my trembling hands, screen glowing like salvation. My breath caught when I saw it—Marco Romano.

My father.

I hit call, my hands shaking so badly I nearly dropped the phone.

The line rang. Once. Twice. Each tone hammered against my chest, rattling the cage of my ribs.

My breath hitched as a shadow spilled across the marble.

Dmitri stood framed in the doorway, his injured frame moving slower than his usual predator’s stride, but no less menacing.

His pale face was carved with fury, blue eyes blazing.

“God knows I’ve tried,” he rasped, his voice raw with pain yet edged with steel. “I’ve tried to hold back, to spare you from the ways I ache to hurt you, Penelope.”

The call clicked alive. My father’s voice crackled through the speaker, rough with fury and fear.

“Dmitri, what the hell do you want this time?”

The sound of him made my knees weaken. But Dmitri’s gaze locked onto mine, rage and obsession burning in equal measure, pinning me in place.

Slowly, he stepped forward and plucked the phone from my hand.

His touch was deceptively gentle, like velvet wrapped around a blade.

He didn’t hang up. Instead, he set the device on a nearby table.

He turned back to me, and I felt my chest constrict beneath the weight of his stare. His voice dropped into a growl, thick with command.

“Take it all off, Penelope. I want to see everything you’ve kept from me. Every inch. Every secret. We begin there.”

My breath caught, my heart ricocheting inside my ribs.

He began unbuttoning his own shirt despite the blood seeping through, wincing with each tug but never breaking eye contact.

His pain didn’t diminish him—it made him more dangerous.