Page 69 of Twisted Addiction

“Maybe not today, Penelope,” I whispered, each syllable a blade, “but someday, you’ll pay for shattering my heart.”

I stared at her window one last time, pain chewing through me from the inside out, then tore into the night, heedless of her father’s guards.

The rain lashed my face, cold needles against burning skin, and the full moon glared down like a mocking witness as I sprinted back toward the oak tree—our sanctuary, now the grave of everything I’d ever believed in.

I collapsed to my knees, the mud swallowing me whole, and the sound that ripped out of me didn’t sound human. It was a howl, low and broken, torn from someplace deep in my gut.

The storm drowned my sobs, but I screamed anyway, until my throat felt flayed raw.

Tears and rain blurred together as I slammed my fists into the earth, over and over, the bark and stones slicing my knuckles open. I welcomed the sting, needed it—because it was real, because it couldn’t lie to me the way she had.

“Penelope...” I gasped, the name tearing from me like a curse. “You betrayed me. You betrayed my love... my everything.”

The oak loomed above me, the same tree that had once hidden our whispered vows, now an unmarked headstone for what used to be my heart.

I hit it again, again, until the pain numbed and all that was left was emptiness.

Then—

A voice, soft but clear, broke through the storm.

“Dmitri?”

I froze. My head jerked up, breath ragged.

A figure stood a few paces away, half-shrouded by rain and moonlight. She held an umbrella, her coat glistening, her hair plastered to her face. Her eyes—there was something painfully familiar about them.

“Who the hell are you?” I rasped, my voice shredded from crying. “Get away from me.”

She took a tentative step forward. “I’m your mother.”

The words didn’t land—they detonated. For a moment, all I could do was stare, the world tilting under me.

“My mother?” I laughed, bitter, hollow. “She’s dead. She died years ago.”

Her chin trembled. “No. Those people in Italy... they’re not your parents. They’re your foster family. You were stolen from us in Moscow when you were five. I’ve been looking for you ever since.”

Rain roared between us. My heart stuttered, half-believing, half-breaking all over again.

“No,” I whispered, shaking my head. “No more lies. No more ghosts.”

But even as I said it, something deep inside me—a wounded, desperate part that had never stopped hoping—wanted to believe her.

She took a step closer, desperation flickering in her eyes. “Dmitri...”

“Stop.” I sliced the air with my hand, shaking my head. “I don’t want your story. You’re just another liar with good timing.”

“Look at me,” she pleaded. “You have my eyes. My son—”

“I don’t believe you,” I said, voice raw, but even as I spoke a sliver of doubt skated across me.

The papers I’d found hidden in the attic hadn’t lied about a thing: the family I’d lived with wasn’t mine. They’d made that very clear. They’d made me nothing.

She didn’t flinch. Her eyes were enormous in the downpour, bright with a danger that felt like truth. “You have to believe me,” she said, urgency cutting through the rain. “Your father and I—we’ve been looking for you for years. We spoke to people, paidpeople, begged people. The Romanos finally told us where you were.”

At the name, something cold uncoiled in my gut.

The Romanos. Penelope’s family.