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He made another without answering.

I climbed onto one of the stools and folded my hands in my lap.

The kitchen was warm. A copper pan hung above the stove, catching the light.

Demitri worked with quiet efficiency. Nothing wasted. No unnecessary movement.

I watched the knife move beneath his hand. His fingers were long and scarred, the knuckles marked by old injuries that had healed badly. These were not a priest’s hands.

He carried his plate around the counter and sat beside me. The space between our stools was narrow enough that his knee almost touched mine.

He picked up one half of his sandwich and took a bite. I watched him do it, fascinated. He chewed, swallowed, then reached for the folded napkin beside his plate. He wiped his mouth before turning to me.

“Why aren’t you eating?”

Heat rose into my cheeks for getting caught staring at him. I looked down at my plate.

“I don’t know.”

Demitri set his sandwich down.

“What is it?”

The question sat between us, direct but not impatient.

I pressed my fingers against the edge of the plate.

“What happens now?”

“I don’t know,” he admitted, after a few moments of awkward silence.

Something in my chest loosened, because he hadn’t offered certainty simply because he thought I needed it.

“But if there’s one thing I do know,” he continued, “it’s that this is the right place to figure it out.”

I glanced toward the darkened windows.

“This house?”

“This family.”

There was still something strained in the way he said it, as if family were a word he had not used aloud in years.

“We have people here who can gather information,” he informed me. “People who understand how the Coccico operate. Their allies. Their methods. What they’re capable of.”

“What if they find us here?”

His head turned. The softness vanished from his expression.

“Then they find us here. We’ll be waiting.”

Demitri picked up his sandwich again, but his attention remained on me. “My cousins will return tomorrow. We’ll talk through what we know and go from there.”

I looked at his profile. The line of his jaw had tightened.

He nodded toward my plate.

“Eat.”