Page 160 of Sweet Ruin

She has Kane’s eyes. Green and vibrant.

I look from the photograph to the haunted tension in Kane’s face.

“Your mother?” I ask.

Kane’s thumb presses once against my thigh.

“She cooked for everyone,” he says. “They never once gave her a place to sit.”

29

KANE

I shouldn’t have said that.

They never gave her a place to sit.

Lilah looks from me to the photograph behind my shoulder. Everyone else at the table keeps eating, but I can tell exactly who heard by the looks on their faces.

Niko has gone silent beside us. Anton pauses near the kitchen door. Two of my oldest captains become very occupied by their plates.

I have spent decades refusing to explain my mother to these men.

They know the broad, chalked-in outlines of the story.

They know Semyon Makov discarded her. They know she died with almost nothing. They know I visit her grave every Sunday morning and punish anyone stupid enough to mention it without permission.

But they never heard the rest from me.

They don’t know what it’s like to be haunted by a ghost story—and then see that ghost come to life.

Because that’s how Lilah looks to me right now.

When she circled the table with serving dishes in her hands, offering help to whoever needed it—I saw my mother in every step.

It’s only now that I realize what I’ve been trying to do.

Some deep, dark part of me thought, If I bring her here, into the same spaces she used to inhabit, I can rewrite the ending.

That’s why I ensured she had the place of honor.

Does it actually change anything?

Fuck no.

But you can’t blame a man for trying.

“Kane?” Lilah asks.

I turn my hand over and link our fingers beneath the edge of the table. “Eat.”

Her eyebrows draw together. She wants more of an answer.

She will not get it here.

“Trust me,” I add with a hint of a smile to encourage her. “If you don’t, Niko will start stealing from your plate.”

On her other side, Niko gasps in mock horror. “I reject this vicious attack on my character!”