Page 71 of Claimed By My Biker Daddies

I shape biscotti while the polenta goes gold and thick. Almonds toasted last night in the ancient oven.

Anise seeds crushed with the heel of my hand. Eggs beaten with sugar until the mixture lightens the way a mood does when someone who loves you walks into the room.

The dough is sticky and perfect. I roll it into two logs and pat them into obedience.

I could cry from the relief of a recipe that behaves.

The house is quieter than this many hearts should allow.

I am grateful for it, but I do not trust it.

I hum to make it my own, an old Dean Martin tune that kept me sane in kitchens where chefs threw pans and yelled about the salt like it was personal.

The polenta thickens to the exact resistance my nonna taught me to feel with a spoon, so I finish it with butter and a handful of Parmesan and a secret spoonful of mascarpone, because life is already hard enough.

My hands reach for familiar places without me.

Behind the flour tins, my old kitchen knife waits, wrapped in a tea towel I folded last year.

I unwrap it and touch the spine with my thumb. It sits in my palm like a question that already knows the answer.

I set it down and tell it to be useful. It listens.

I check the pantry for sugar and find the grocery list from last year still wedged under the magnet shaped like a rooster.

My handwriting, smudged but legible.

Oranges, cream, yeast, patience.

I trace the word patience with my fingertip and realize I wrote it twice, then laugh because I am not subtle when I need to remind myself to be decent.

A coffee mug sits sideways in the dish rack, lip tilted in a way no one would leave it.

Not mine.

Not one I recognize.

There is a faint half moon of mud near the back door, not a full footprint, nothing obvious, just the suggestion of someone who forgot to wipe their boots.

The hair along my neck goes electric for a breath.

I look at the door latch.

It looks back at me like it did its job.

I decide to be rational.

I decide to be a person who puts polenta on plates and not a person who invents ghosts.

Roman passes through.

He does not stop.

He takes in the room the way a man does when he could fix anything that breaks and also knows he cannot fix what is bleeding under his ribs.

He nods once.

His eyes are tired and hard and very dark.