Page 208 of Sins of the Hidden

"Sweet Summer's," I read aloud, my fingers brushing over each letter.

V nodded once. He reached for the can of paint beside us. I watched as he dipped his large hand into the paint, coating his palm and fingers. He pressed his hand firmly onto the left side of the sign. His handprint, strong and solid, marked the wood—all six foot four of him represented in that single handprint. I watched as he held it there for a moment longer than necessary, as if sealing a vow.

He nodded toward the lavender paint. With shaking fingers, I dipped my much smaller hand into the lavender paint and moved toward the sign.

My hand hovered over the wood, visibly shaking. I pressed my hand down on his fresh black handprint. Lavender bloomed fragile and false inside his print—like a promise whispered into darkness, a lie I let him believe. He called it a future. I knew it was a lie.

V's arms came around me from behind. The difference in our sizes was stark and somehow perfect.

For a moment, neither of us spoke, just stared at our hands immortalized together. I felt the rise and fall of his breathing—controlled, unshaken—while my pulse thudded like a warning under my skin. V reached around me, his chest warm against my back, and touched the space where my palm and fingers had left their mark.

"Summer's handprint will go here." His finger hovered above the much smaller lavender splotch on the sign.

The words stabbed through me, sharp and merciless. The tears I'd been holding back spilled over, not from joy but desperation. A secret I'd carried too long crashed through my defenses, demanding to be heard.

My hand didn't belong next to his. It should have dried alone, quietly, without expectation. My handprint would contaminate the future he'd just painted—a permanent stain on his perfect dream.

For a moment, I could almost see it. The smallest handprint, right above mine. Lavender. She'd have loved lavender. Her small voice filled this empty bakery with laughter, flour-dusted fingertips holding tightly to mine as we shaped dough together. She'd never be more than this phantom in my mind—yet she already felt more real than anything I'd ever touched. Her fingers would've been smaller than mine, delicate and innocent. I would've pressed them down for her, guided her tiny hand onto the paint and then onto the sign. Then it vanished like a mirage, leaving lavender and black behind.

I pulled away from his embrace, my hands shaking as I faced him. The air between us suddenly felt thick and hard to breathe, the weight of what I had to say crushing my chest.

I could say nothing. Let him believe. Walk out now, and let the dream live one more day.

The thought flashed through my mind, tempting in its simplicity. One more day of watching him plan for a child that would never exist. One more day before I destroyed everything.

I couldn't look at my reflection in the storefront window, afraid to see the woman who would take this from him. I turned toward the door. Just a few steps. One lie, and I could leave him with the dream intact. Let him build the bakery without knowing it was built on ash.

But then he looked at me. And I hated myself for what I hadn't said. "I need to tell you something."

His eyes fixed on mine, unblinking, waiting.

"I can't..." my voice cracked, the confession stuck in my throat like broken glass. I closed my eyes, unable to watch his reaction. I braced for silence. Or worse—his back turning. The sound of him walking away, leaving only his handprint behind. The dream being abandoned along with me.

I hated my body. Hated this useless, defective vessel for every period that never came, every hormone that betrayed me, every promise it couldn't keep. Each heartbeat felt like a cruel joke. This wasn't just about a malfunctioning organ or hormone imbalance. This was about failing at the most fundamental aspect of being a woman. What was I if I couldn't create life? “I can’t… I can’t have children.”

His expression didn't change, but his focus sharpened to a cutting edge. "Explain."

He said it like a man asking how many bodies were buried, not how many babies I could carry.

My chest tightened with each inhale, the words I dreaded finally breaking free. "PCOS affects everything—my hormones, my cycles." I swallowed hard, forcing myself to continue past the lump in my throat. "The doctors... they said I can't have children."

I waited for the explosion, for the rage, for the loss of everything we'd been re-building. I'd seen what happened when V lost control, when his anger erupted.

I wanted to vanish. I wanted to tear off my own skin just to find the part of me that had failed and rip it out by hand. My throat burned. I couldn't tell if I was choking on the truth or on the silence he was giving.

His face remained impassive behind his mask, eyes revealing nothing as they studied me. I wished he would rage, and wouldshatter something against the wall. His lack of reaction brought tears to my eyes.

"You're crying," he said instead, his voice unnervingly calm as his thumb collected a tear from my cheek, his touch lingering on my skin.

"Aren't you upset?" I asked, confusion threading through my fear as I searched his eyes for any reaction. My hands clenched and unclenched at my sides, anticipating a storm that hadn't come. "I can't give us Summer."

Our sweet dream he'd carved into wood—the family he'd already named—the future he'd decided on. All of it, impossible because of my body. The weight of my inadequacy crushed against my chest until each inhale burned.

V's head tilted, that familiar assessment that always made my heart race. His fingers curled around my wrist, grip firm, his thumb resting over my racing pulse. The pressure increased slightly, an involuntary reaction revealing what his face would not.

"We'll have Summer one day," he repeated softly, his voice dropping into something deeper, almost threatening in its conviction.

I blinked. "W-What?"

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