"I don't know."
The words slipped from Nikki's lips with a quiet, frustrating honesty. She stared down into the swirling, spicy red broth of the hotpot, watching the thick steam twist and curl into the air between them.
She rubbed her temple, a phantom echo of the morning's agonizing headache pulsing faintly behind her eyes.
"He seems familiar," Nikki continued, her voice dropping to a vulnerable whisper. She lifted her dark eyes to meet his gaze. "It's like looking at a photograph that's been left out in the sun too long. I know the shape of him, and his voice... his voice makes my chest feel tight. But I don't know from where."
Adonis did not push. His internal processor immediately flagged the slight elevation in her heart rate and the subtle tightening of her facial muscles.
He remembered the violent, agonizing way she had collapsed in the walk-in closet that morning when the memory fragment had tried to force its way to the surface.
