Page 58 of Black Castle

Zev isn’t just laying out empty threats like when they were younger. No. Right now, he has made a promise. And Zev always keeps a promise.

Chapter Seventeen

Vivienne

The late afternoon sun casts a golden hue over the soccer field, painting long shadows across the grass.

Vivienne sits by the bleacher, her gaze following the movement of the energetic players, but her mind is barely in the present.

The exhaustion of a ninety-minutes calculus exam, sixty-minutes of geography and sixty minutes of History, presses down on her, leaving her shoulders sagging, but she is sure nursing a heartache for over two weeks now is one of the reasons for that.

Deep, rich, and vibrant laughter of boys blends with the distant school bell, marking the end of another successful school day.

Vivienne doesn’t move. Her only sign of life is a series of sighs as she sits with her knees drawn up, phone in hand.

The game on the field unfolds in bursts of movements—Kenji weaving through defenders, the ball sailing through the air, teammates calling out in sharp clipped tones. Potential distractions are scattered across the field; athletic boys, tall, dark and handsome. Yet none appeals to Vivienne, who usually gets swept away even with just a smile. All of a sudden, none of these boys matter. Not their soft, over-gelled hair, not their boyish grin, not even the abs and muscles on display. None of them matter.

Because none of them are him.

A sigh of despair breaks out of her lips yet again, the sound getting lost in the chatter going on in the field and the echo of the whistle.

She unlocks her phone for the tenth time in the last five minutes. Lucan’s picture stares back at her from the gallery—a candid shot she took once without him looking. It was at the Golden Creek community park. He wasn’t watching, so he wasn’t aware. And she hopes to keep it that way. According to him, he doesn’t like having his photograph taken.

In retrospect, her possession of it feels almost illicit, especially considering the online search she did for him due to Kenji’s insistence on confirming his identity yielded nothing concrete—only his name, lacking a photo.

She asked him and he said he doesn’t take pictures nor allow his pictures to be taken. She asked about the time he was awarded the medal of a marshal. Surely, his picture was taken at least, for record purposes.

It must have been a big day. He was the youngest recipient of that medal in decades.

Although he admitted to having his picture taken, he emphasized his collaborations with numerous security firms and expert technical groups, and they handle that well. He always uses aggressive legal teams to issue copyright claims, privacy requests, and DMCA takedown to remove images from search results and websites.

He manipulates his online image by buying relevant domains and social media handles. And he also owns an advanced cybersecurity firm that scans for and removes his images.

Because his team manipulated search results with misleading content, burying his images, she couldn’t find anything about him when she searched him up.

The lengths he goes for privacy and invisibility really intrigue her. In essence, Lucan Ardalion Raskovic is a digital ghost. A shadow where a face should be. Yet somehow, his picture is on her phone.

She traces the outline of his face on the screen, frustration curling in her chest. It’s been days, weeks, and still, she aches. Blocking him was supposed to help. It was supposed to force her heart to detach, to let go. But here she is, staring at his face like an addict hovering over a relapse.

With a sigh heavier than the thousands she has let out within fourteen days, she exits the gallery and moves over to her messages. There, Ian Griswyk’ name sits at the top, bold.

Hi

The first one came a week ago. She read it, and was shocked by it. And somehow, she couldn’t come up with a suitable reply.

Then more came some days ago.

(December 9th) Hi, again.

(December 10th) I know you are probably upset. And it’s understandable. But I wasn’t ignoring you because I was angry. I wasn’t angry at all. Not with you. Because I know you didn’t have a choice. I didn’t hold anything against you.

I promise I wasn’t seeing your messages.

(December 13th) I know you are reading the messages, Vivienne.

I was getting harassed by strangers, being called all sorts of names. I imagine they’re parents of the students from the school. And then tons of your old boyfriends. It was crazy. I was teetering on the edge of depression. I had to delete my social media and messaging apps to reduce the harassment.

And I haven’t been in Pennsylvania for a while now. I was at my uncle’s in Texas. My sister was in town for a conference. She was at my house. I’m sure you must have come to my house. But I wasn’t there.

---