“Apologize to her.”
Brock stared.
“What?”
“You heard me.”
Brock reluctantly turned.
“Sorry, Josephine.”
Vincent looked at the broken ceramic.
“Now clean up the mess you made.”
Nobody laughed this time.
I thought that would be the end of it.
But later that night, when I returned to my small bedroom in the servants’ wing, I found a folded piece of paper beneath my door.
There were only six words.
“You should have kept your mouth shut.”
My blood turned cold.
The next night, I heard footsteps outside my room.
Then someone quietly tested the handle.
I didn’t sleep.
The following night, it happened again.
And again.
I was terrified to tell Vincent.
Brock had worked for him for years.
I was just the new housekeeper.
So I made a desperate decision.
Every night, after the mansion became quiet, I carried an old blanket and a pillow upstairs.
I slept outside Vincent Rossi’s bedroom.
It was the only place in the entire mansion where I believed nobody would dare touch me.
Until that stormy night at 3:17 A.M.
Vincent opened his door.
And found me curled against the wall, clutching a brass fireplace poker.
“What the hell are you doing here, Josephine?”
I struggled to stand.
“I’m sorry, sir.”
He looked at the blanket.
The pillow.
My bare feet.
Then his expression changed.
“How many nights have you been sleeping here?”
I couldn’t answer.
Vincent crouched in front of me.
“Josephine, look at me.”
Tears spilled down my cheeks.
“Please don’t make me go back to my room.”
His eyes narrowed.
“Why?”
I swallowed.
“Because someone keeps coming to my door at night.”
For several seconds, Vincent didn’t speak.
Then he reached for his phone.
But before he could make the call, I grabbed his sleeve.
“Mr. Rossi, please. There’s something else.”
He looked at me.
My voice dropped to a whisper.
“I think someone inside this house is planning to hurt you, too.”
CHAPTER 2: The Audit of Traitors
The silence in the third-floor corridor became so absolute, so dense, that I could hear the steady, rhythmic ticking of the antique grandfather clock on the landing below.
Vincent didn’t scream. He didn’t curse.
He stood up smoothly, his broad shoulders squaring as the quiet, domestic employer vanished entirely. In his place stood the feared King of the East Coast Underworld, a man whose cold, tactical mind calculated every variable in seconds.
He reached down, took my arm, and lifted me effortlessly to my feet.
“Inside,” Vincent commanded softly, guiding me past the threshold into his spacious master suite.
The room was vast, furnished in dark velvet, heavy mahogany, and Persian rugs, warmed by a crackling fire in the stone hearth. He pulled a plush cashmere throw blanket from the foot of his king-sized bed and wrapped it securely around my shivering shoulders, then guided me to a deep leather armchair near the fire.
He walked over to a small mahogany sideboard, poured a glass of amber liquid, and handed it to me. “Drink. It’s brandy. It will stop the shaking.”
I took the crystal glass with trembling hands, taking a small sip. The burning liquid trickled down my throat, spreading a sudden, blessed warmth through my chest.
Vincent walked over to his massive mahogany desk, opening a drawer and pulling out a heavy, encrypted satellite phone. He dialed a single number.
“Sal,” Vincent said into the phone, his voice flat, razor-sharp, and icy. “Gather Gideon, Joey, and the first-tier loyalists. Secure the third floor. I want Brock Lazzaro brought up to my private study in five minutes. Quietly. No sirens, no commotion.”
He paused, his eyes turning to me as I sat wrapped in cashmere by the fire.
“And Sal?” Vincent added, his voice dropping into a lethal register. “Search Brock’s quarters in the servants’ wing. Look for an off-ledger satellite phone and a keycard for Pier 42.”
He ended the call, tossed the phone onto the desk, and walked back to sit in the armchair across from me. He leaned forward, resting his forearms on his knees, his hands clasped together, watching me quietly.
“For three weeks,” Vincent said softly, his gray eyes searching my pale face, “you worked in this house, cleaned my study, and never said more than three words at a time. Why didn’t you tell me about the note under your door on the first night?”
I looked down at the brandy glass in my lap. “Because Brock has worked for your family for eight years, Mr. Rossi. I was just a thirty-year-old housekeeper who needed twelve dollars an hour to pay her mother’s nursing home bills. I thought… I thought if I complained, you would fire me and believe him.”
Vincent let out a quiet, dark exhale. “Brock Lazzaro was my father’s lieutenant. I kept him around out of respect for old debts. But I never let a rat stay in my house once he showed his teeth.”
He reached out, his warm, calloused thumb gently wiping a tear from my cheek.
“You slept outside my door because you knew he wouldn’t dare touch you near me,” Vincent murmured, a rare, profound warmth flickering in his dark eyes. “You were smart, Josephine. Braver than half the men I pay to stand at the iron gates.”
Before I could answer, a heavy, rhythmic knock echoed against the double mahogany doors of the master suite.
PART 3
The knock came again, three slow raps, a pause, then two more.
Vincent didn’t move toward the door. He lifted one finger to his lips, rose from the armchair without a sound, and crossed the room to the desk. From the second drawer he took a compact black pistol and checked it with the ease of a man tying his shoes.
“That’s not Sal’s knock,” he said quietly.
My heart climbed into my throat. “Then who…”
“Stay in the chair.”
He opened the door a few inches.
It was Sal. A broad, gray-templed man in a rumpled suit, breathing hard, with Gideon behind him holding a small cardboard box. Both looked grim.
“Boss,” Sal said. “We found it.”
Vincent stepped aside and let them in. Sal’s eyes landed on me, softened for half a second, then returned to business. He nodded at Gideon, who set the box on the desk and lifted the lid.
