Becoming Mrs DeLuca novel Chapter 83

**Through Shadows We Painted Our Forever by Erynn Vel Coren**

**Chapter 83**

**VALENTINA**

Entering this room was like stepping into a vacuum where the air felt thick and suffocating, as if I’d forgotten the very essence of breathing.

Serena stood before me, a vivid figure against the stark, sterile white walls that surrounded us in this hidden space. The sight of her—a woman who was supposed to be resting eternally beneath the earth—was so vibrant, so hauntingly alive, that it churned something deep within me.

Her eyes, wide and pleading, held a depth of sorrow that made my stomach twist painfully, even though my appetite had long since abandoned me.

What could I possibly say in response to a ghost?

What do you utter when the dead reach out to you with their unspoken truths?

Her fingers quivered as they gripped the blanket draped over her shoulders. “You’re already here, Valentina… you might as well just hear the truth,” she murmured, her voice barely above a whisper, as if she had been holding her breath for an eternity. “You came, even though I didn’t think you would.”

I swallowed hard, the movement feeling like shards of glass scraping against my throat. “I… I shouldn’t have come. I don’t even know what compelled me to.”

“Yes, you do,” she insisted, her tone delicate yet unwavering. “You had to know if I was real.”

I couldn’t refute her words. My heart raced, pounding so loudly against my chest that it drowned out the faint beeping of the machines in the corners. The sharp scent of antiseptic hung in the air, making me dizzy.

“Serena, you must understand that none of this makes sense to me,” I finally managed to whisper, my voice trembling. “Everyone insisted you were dead. It was the only topic of conversation at my wedding with Adrian. I-I even stood before your grave.”

A small, bitter smile flickered across her lips, yet it never reached her haunted eyes. “That’s precisely what he wanted everyone to believe.”

I instinctively took a step back, my mind racing. “But why? It defies all logic.”

She settled onto the edge of the bed, her movements deliberate and cautious, as if every action required immense effort. “But you deserve to know the truth, Valentina. You’re living in the same house I once did, beneath the same roof where my life ended—”

“You’re not dead.”

“I was,” she replied softly, her voice almost a whisper. “Not in the way people think. But he killed me just the same.”

A chill ran down my spine. I didn’t want to hear this. I didn’t want to know. Yet, paradoxically, I felt an insatiable need to understand.

I remained rooted in the doorway, my body frozen as Serena gently beckoned me over to the bed, urging me to sit beside her.

She gazed up at me, her eyes glistening with unshed tears yet focused with a clarity that pierced through the haze of confusion. “Do you know how old I was when I married him?”

I shook my head, uncertainty swirling in my mind.

“Nineteen,” she revealed, her voice laced with a bittersweet nostalgia. “I had just finished school. My father told me it was an honor to marry someone like Adrian. That he would provide me with a good life… even though, at that time, Adrian was hardly more than a boy himself.” A faint curl of her lips betrayed the pain of memory. “He said Adrian was quiet, powerful, and dependable. That he would protect me.”

An itch crept behind my ear, but I remained still. The weight of her words was too heavy to interrupt.

“For a while, I believed everything I was told. I thought that perhaps Adrian’s silence was merely a sign of shyness.” A soft laugh escaped her, tinged with bitterness. “But I quickly learned that it was far from shyness. He simply didn’t care.”

Serena’s brows furrowed in confusion. “What about him?”

“Adrian said… I thought… Rico was—”

She gently touched my arm, grounding me. “I barely knew the man. Yes, he was the Don, but I was just a young girl. I never even met him face to face.”

My confusion multiplied. “But Rico was—”

A shadow crossed Serena’s face as she interrupted me. “Lorenzo adored Stefan. He would come by when Adrian was away, just to see him quietly and in secret. We thought we were being careful. But when I became pregnant with Sofia, the visits grew more frequent.”

The room felt increasingly constricted, my pulse thrumming in my ears.

“But Adrian found out,” she whispered, her voice trembling. “I still don’t understand how. Perhaps someone saw us. Maybe he always knew. One night, he returned home early. Lorenzo and I were… we didn’t realize he had entered.”

Her voice cracked as she continued. “He didn’t say a word. He simply pulled out his gun.”

I flinched, the weight of her revelation crashing over me like a tidal wave.

“I screamed,” Serena recounted, her eyes wide with the memory. “I tried to shield Lorenzo, but Adrian didn’t hesitate. He shot him right there, right in front of me. I remember feeling paralyzed. It was as if the entire world had come to a standstill.”

She pressed a trembling hand to her mouth, her composure wavering. “Afterward, he didn’t speak. He didn’t shout. He just looked at me with that same cold expression and said I had ruined everything. And then he started hitting me.”

**Chapter 84**