“The Taste Of Secrets”

She started dreaming again.

Not of Nigeria. Not of her mother’s voice or the scent of rainy earth.

This time, she dreamed of shadows… thick and silent… whispering in a language her bones remembered but her tongue could not speak.

Every night, someone stood at the edge of those dreams.

A man — faceless. Tall. Still. Watching.

Sometimes she thought it was her father.

Sometimes it felt like her bodyguard.

Sometimes… it felt like herself, staring back.

Her days grew strange.

Sweet in moments.

Sour in others.

Like biting into a fruit that bleeds sugar… and poison.

John began to walk beside her now, his silence softening.

He told her stories — old ones.

Of how she once danced barefoot in the rain.

Of how she hated chocolate but loved burnt rice.

Of how she forgave too easily.

And with every story, something inside her flickered.

Not just memory…

But feeling.

She found herself laughing with John again.

And he with her.

And in the distance… always in the distance…

Her bodyguard stood.

Silent.

Cold.

Unblinking.

She didn’t call him by his name because she forgot and even her grandfather rarely calleohis name, she noticed her grandfather respected him so much that it felt like he was scared of him . She wonders how he knows when she needs him but he knows when she needs him and without any words said he appears.

That was the rule.

No need to be called.No questions. No answers. Just be there ready for everything.

But now, she wanted to ask.

Not just his name, but everything.

Who was he before the uniform?

Why did he always look at her like she was something sacred… and doomed?

Why did he flinch every time John touched her arm?

One night, after dinner, she passed him in the hallway.

Their shoulders brushed.

And for the first time ever…

He spoke first.

“You’re smiling a lot lately.”

She froze. Turned.

“And that bothers you?”

A long silence. His jaw clenched.

“Just means you’re forgetting.”

Her chest tightened. “Forgetting what?”

He didn’t answer.

He just walked away — but not before she saw it.

Jealousy.

The next day, a box appeared in her room.

Wrapped in gold, no note. Inside: a necklace.

Simple. Thin. A tiny black stone at its center.

She touched it, and something cold shivered up her spine.

She wore it anyway.

When John saw it, he frowned. “Where did you get that?”

“I don’t know. It was in my room.”

He paled. “Take it off.”

“Why?”

“Because… that necklace used to be yours. And it was cursed.”

Cursed.

The word shouldn’t have made sense.

But it did.

Later that night, she saw her bodyguard in the moonlit garden, speaking to someone on the phone — his voice low, tense.

“I don’t care what she remembers… if she keeps getting close to him, everything will fall apart again. She’s been through a Lott and it’s taking me all I have to not maker them feel the taste of their own plot . I want every evidence of their corruption especially that two brats . I want everything. I must protect her even if my secret is to be known “

Then silence.

Then a name, spoken with a kind of venom she hadn’t heard in him before.

“John.”

It began to unravel from there.

Little things. Strange things.

She found a photo hidden in one of her old schoolbooks — of her, John, and a third girl with white braids.

Yuri.

The girl who had vanished.

The girl John never spoke of.

The girl she once called sister.

But something was off. The background in the photo looked… warped. Like it had been taken in a place that didn’t exist anymore.

When she asked John, he lied. She could see it in his eyes.

And that night, she felt someone watching her from the ceiling corner — though no one was there.

Her bodyguard grew colder.

Not cruel, not distant ,just tight.

His movements were sharper.

He flinched when she smiled at John.

And when she touched John’s arm in class, he turned away so fast she thought he might break.

She began wondering…

Did he know something about John she didn’t?

Or was it something else?

Jealousy?

Could he… feel something?

But then it happened.

She fell. Not hard. Just a small slip on the school staircase.

John rushed forward. Grabbed her. Pulled her into his arms.

And her bodyguard?

He snapped.

In seconds, he was there — pulling her out of John’s grasp, his hand gripping John’s collar so hard she heard fabric tear.

“Don’t touch her,” he growled.

John didn’t back down. “She’s not yours.”

The air sizzled with something unspoken.

Old. Burning. Broken.

Anne stood between them, breathless.

“What is wrong with both of you?!”

Neither answered.

That night, she stood on the balcony of her room.

Necklace around her throat. Cold wind brushing her hair.

And the stars above ,watching. Unmoving. Uncaring.

Her life was splitting.

John knew something.

Her bodyguard knew more.

And she?

She was caught between them — between loyalty and love, between the past and the truth.

But as the wind whispered secrets she couldn’t understand, Anne realized something…

She wasn’t afraid anymore.

Not of the dark.

Not of the mansion.

Not of her cousins.

Not even of the truth.

She would keep wearing the necklace.

She would dig deeper.

She would find Yuri.

She would force her bodyguard to speak.

And she would decide who deserved her trust.

Not out of fear — but out of fire.

Somewhere in the garden below, her bodyguard stood again.

Watching her.

And in his hand…

A letter.

Unopened. Unsent.

With her name written on it.

He stared at her back clenching his fist “only if you cann remember me… I miss you so much that I want to kiss you”

***Download NovelToon to enjoy a better reading experience!***