Page 113 of Shadowed Sins: Nitro

My knees buckle. I catch myself on the counter, but my hand shakes.

"Shit, are you okay? Your legs—" His face flushes, and I catch his eyes tracking down my body, lingering on the visible bruises. Heat flares in his gaze before concern takes over. "I mean, from last night, are you sore? I was pretty—sorry, I'm making this worse by talking about it—"

"What are you making?" The words come out raw.

"Syr... seer..." He stumbles over the pronunciation, face reddening with determination. "Syr-nee-kee? I watched like six YouTube videos trying to get the pronunciation right, but Russian is hard as hell, and I probably butchered it anyway—sorry. I'm nervous-talking again. I just wanted to do something nice. You know, after everything yesterday, and how you helped me with the anxiety stuff, and then last night was—"

He plates three perfect rounds, drizzles them with jam, sets them before me with the careful pride of a student presenting homework he's not sure he got right.

"I know it's probably not authentic or anything, but—"

The first bite stops everything.

Perfect.

Not close. Not good. Identical to Saturday mornings in Moscow, my mother singing off-key while I danced between the table and stove.

"?????? ????, ???????. ?? ?????? ??????"

Her voice. Her actual voice, not the memory of remembering but the real sound of it, warm honey over gravel.Good morning, little one. Did you sleep well?

The Russian flows through my mind exactly as she used to say it, with that little lift at the end that made everything a gentle question.

My vision blurs. One tear escapes before I can stop it. My hands shake so violently I have to set down the fork.

"Hey, you okay?" Jax moves closer, that protective instinct flaring. "Did I mess something up? You look like you've seen a ghost."

I have. I'm seeing my mother.

The second bite brings her laugh—that bright, unguarded sound when papa would steal tastes from the pan. My feet shift unconsciously into first position under the table, heels together, toes turned out.

"Papa would pretend he was reading his newspaper," I whisper, and suddenly I'm six again, watching him sneak behind mama. My arms drift into fifth position without conscious thought, muscle memory fifteen years deep. "But he'd wait until she turned to the stove, then steal one. Every Sunday, the same game. She'd slap his hand away and call him ??????—little thief—but she always made extra."

My voice breaks on the last word. I can see them so clearly—papa's guilty grin, mama's fake scolding, the way they'd look at each other like they had a secret the whole world wanted.

"They loved each other so much it made the air warm."

"Mira." His voice drops, worried now. Something dangerous flickers in his expression—not alarm, but the kind of protective fury that makes people disappear. "Talk to me."

The third bite unlocks something deeper. The feeling of being loved without condition. Of being safe without vigilance. Sensations I didn't know I'd lost because Mikhail's conditioning didn't just steal them—it made me forget they ever existed.

"He took them from me." The words slip out before I can stop them.

"Who took what?"

My body shifts, feet sliding into second position—wider stance, still turned out. The movement automatic, fifteen years deep.

"My handler. Mikhail." I take another bite, letting the sweetness coat my tongue. "He didn't just train me to kill. He systematically erased my capacity to remember being loved."

Jax goes completely still. That scattered golden retriever energy vanishes, replaced by something colder. Deadlier. His jaw clenches so hard I hear his teeth grind.

"I thought I remembered my parents. Their names, faces, facts." My arms curve overhead in port de bras, the movement pulling at sore muscles from last night. "But the feeling wasgone. The warmth. I couldn't hear my mother's voice anymore. Until right now."

"The syrniki."

"She made them on Sunday mornings." My body continues through positions—third, fourth, fifth—each transition smooth despite thirteen years of perversion. "I would dance while she cooked, practicing ballet between bites. She said I looked like a little swan."

The memory should comfort. Instead, darkness creeps in.