Chapter 2 - THE WOMAN WHO STOPPED THE DOCTOREvelyn Price was fifty-two, elegant, composed, and so trusted inside the Rossi estate that even armed guards stepped aside when she entered the nursery.
I remember the cold metal against my temple.
I remember the baby’s tiny fingers curled against my skin.
And I remember thinking that if Lorenzo pulled the trigger, at least Leo Rossi would not die hungry.
“Put him down.”
Lorenzo’s voice was quiet.
That frightened me more than shouting would have.
I sat frozen in the nursery rocking chair, my maid’s uniform open at the front, Leo wrapped against my bare chest beneath a white receiving blanket.
Three armed men stood behind Lorenzo.
Nobody moved.
Nobody breathed.
Leo did.
His mouth worked weakly against me.
Then his throat moved.
He swallowed.
Once.
Twice.
Three times.
Lorenzo’s gun lowered half an inch.
“What did you do to him?”
“I fed him.”
His expression hardened.
“You were told never to enter this room.”
“I heard him crying.”
“That wasn’t your decision.”
“He was hungry.”
“He has nurses.”
“Then where were they?”
Silence.
Three weeks earlier, I had buried my daughter.
Her name was Lily.
I had been thirty-eight weeks pregnant when my ex-boyfriend, Ryan Cole, shoved me down the stairs during an argument about money.
Lily never took a breath.
My body never understood.
My milk came in four days after the funeral.
I bound my aching chest beneath my uniform and returned to work because grief did not excuse rent, hospital bills, or the dangerous men still hunting Ryan for debts he had disappeared without paying.
The Rossi mansion was supposed to be temporary.
Clean rooms.
Say nothing.
Notice nothing.
Collect my paycheck.
Leave.
Everyone knew Lorenzo Rossi was a dangerous man.
Everyone also knew his infant son was dying.
Leo’s mother, Sofia, had died giving birth.
Since then, doctors had tried specialized formula, donor milk, feeding tubes, expensive specialists and imported supplements.
Still, Leo lost weight.
At two months old, he looked barely larger than a newborn.
That night, around two in the morning, I had been polishing the upstairs hallway when I heard him crying.
Not loudly.
That was what scared me.
It was a weak, exhausted cry.
I checked the corridor.
No nurse.
No guard inside the nursery.
Only Leo.
He lay in his crib with his fists pressed against his cheeks.
A bottle sat beside him.
Nearly full.
I picked it up.
The milk smelled strange.
Metallic.
Bitter.
I should have walked away.
Instead, I lifted Leo.
The moment I held him against my chest, he turned his head toward me instinctively.
Searching.
My body reacted before my mind did.
Milk soaked through my uniform.
I started crying.
Then Leo cried too.
Ten minutes later, Lorenzo found us.
And now a gun was against my skull.
“Who gave you permission?” he demanded.
“No one.”
“You understand what happens to people who touch my son without permission?”
“Yes.”
“Yet you did it anyway.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
I looked down.
Leo was still eating.
His sunken cheeks moved slowly.
“Because your baby didn’t need permission to be hungry.”
One of the guards shifted.
Lorenzo’s eyes sharpened.
Then Leo suddenly pulled away.
For one terrible second, I thought something was wrong.
Instead, he opened his eyes.
Really opened them.
Dark brown.
Alert.
He looked directly at his father.
Lorenzo stopped breathing.
According to the household staff, Leo had barely opened his eyes for two days.
Then came another sound.
A tiny hiccup.
Lorenzo lowered the gun.
“Again,” he whispered.
“What?”
“Feed him again.”
I guided Leo back toward me.
He latched.
Swallowed.
Lorenzo stared as if he were watching the dead return to life.
Then I noticed the bottle on the table.
My stomach tightened.
“Mr. Rossi.”
His eyes never left Leo.
“What?”
“That milk.”
“What about it?”
“It smells wrong.”
His face changed.
I reached toward the bottle.
Lorenzo caught my wrist.
“Don’t.”
“I’m not trying to hurt him.”
He stared at me.
Slowly, he released my hand.
I lifted the bottle and smelled it again.
That same bitter scent.
My grandmother had been a pediatric nurse. She taught me enough to know spoiled milk.
This wasn’t spoiled.
It smelled chemical.
I looked at Leo’s hollow cheeks.
His dry lips.
The bottles he supposedly refused.
The nurses insisting he couldn’t keep anything down.
A terrible possibility formed in my mind.
“What?” Lorenzo demanded.
I looked toward the hallway.
Someone had left his dying baby alone.
Someone had prepared that bottle.
Someone had been controlling what entered Leo’s body.
I lowered my voice.
“I don’t think your son has been refusing food.”
Lorenzo went still.
“What are you saying?”
“I think somebody has been making sure he can’t eat it.”
His face became terrifyingly calm.
“You’re accusing someone in my house of harming my son.”
“I’m telling you what I see.”
“You’re a maid.”
“I’m a mother.”
The words escaped before I could stop them.
Pain ripped through me.
I looked down at Leo.
His tiny hand had wrapped around my finger.
Then footsteps sounded in the hallway.
A woman appeared in the doorway.
Head nurse Evelyn Price.
Her face went white when she saw Leo nursing.
She recovered quickly.
“What is she doing with him?”
Lorenzo slowly turned.
Evelyn looked at the bottle in my hand.
And for one brief second, before she hid it—
I saw fear.
Not surprise.
Fear.
That was when I knew.
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Someone inside the Rossi mansion wanted Leo Rossi dead.
And whoever it was had just realized I had noticed.
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