Page 39 of The Hitman's Secret Baby
Beside him stands a woman in a pale dress, with olive skin and dark eyes and the same sharp angles to her features.
Her arm is looped through the elbow of a tall man in a linen shirt, whose hand rests on Enzo's shoulder.
A family.
I don't know what makes my chest tighten more.
The fact that he kept this.
Or the fact that he hid it.
The photograph is slightly curled at the edges, worn as though it's been handled often.
Reverently. I stare at it, heart caught somewhere between sorrow and wonder, until I hear the door open behind me.
"You're a nosy little thing, aren't you?"
His voice snaps me straight.
I spin around, the photograph still in my hand.
Enzo stands in the doorway with a white paper bag in one hand and a pair of sandwiches wrapped in butcher paper balanced inside.
His shirt sleeves are rolled to his elbows.
His throat bobs with a hard swallow.
"I—" I start, then stop.
He shuts the door with one foot, and crosses the room slowly, the bag landing on the low table by the window.
He doesn't come closer right away.
He just watches me, that gaze moving from the photograph in my hand to the robe I'm wearing.
One brow lifts.
"Looking for something?" he asks quietly.
I press the photo to my chest, my fingers curling around the edges, the silence between us raw and uneasy.
"I wasn't trying to snoop," I say finally, my voice whispery.
"No?" He moves toward me now. "Then what exactly were you doing?"
The answer won't come, because I'm not sure what I was doing myself.
Maybe I was trying to find a reason to stay.
Or to run.
Or maybe I was searching for some part of him that would make this all make sense, because I am carrying a secret inside me that will not be secret for long, and the only thing I know with any certainty is that it began here, with him.
And somehow, I need to find a way to tell him that.
But it isn't in me right now, the strength needed for a conversation.
So instead, I hold up the photo and ask, "Is this your family?"
