Chapter 2 - The House of Shadows
By 7:00 AM, the Marquetti estate was a fortress operating under wartime protocols.
Dr. Vance, the family’s longtime physician, had reset my wrist on the kitchen table while I bit down on a leather strap, and now I sat wrapped in a thick wool blanket in the west parlor, my arm immobilized in a heavy plaster cast and a white gauze bandage taped neatly across my left temple.
Standing by the floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the grey expanse of the lake was Gideon.
He hadn't sat down once since the ambulance had been called off—he had personally countermanded the call, having his own private medical team treat me in-house rather than let paramedics track questions and police reports into his domain. He still wore the unbuttoned gray shirt, his sleeves rolled to the elbows, exposing the faint, jagged scars of a life built on violence.
In the center of the room stood Walter, the elderly majordomo whose face was usually as expressionless as a stone monument. Right now, Walter looked like he was about to be physically ill.
“The kitchen staff were questioned?” Gideon asked, his voice flat, emotionless, and terrifyingly cold.
“Yes, Mr. Marquetti,” Walter replied, his hands clasped tightly behind his back. “Maria was prepping the bakery downstairs by five. She swears she didn't touch the back stairs. The night guard, Henderson, logged his final perimeter check at 5:45. He claims the service corridor doors were double-locked from the inside.”
“What about my sister?”
The temperature in the room dropped ten degrees.
Walter swallowed hard, his eyes darting briefly toward the double doors leading to the grand staircase. “Miss Elena came down briefly around six for a glass of water, sir. She returned to her quarters before the commotion started.”
Gideon turned slowly from the window. His dark eyes locked onto Walter’s.
“Did she see Adeline on the floor?”
“She... she stated she heard the scream from her dressing room, Mr. Marquetti. She claims she assumed it was just another nurse throwing a tantrum before packing her bags.”
A bitter, humorless laugh escaped Gideon’s lips. He walked slowly across the Persian rug, stopping a few feet away from my chair. He looked down at my bandaged wrist, then up at my face.
“A tantrum,” Gideon repeated softly. “Is that what falling down nineteen stairs with a broken wrist feels like to my family?”
“I don't think Miss Elena views me as a nurse,” I said, my voice raspy from the shock and the pain medication Dr. Vance had administered. “She views me as a trespasser.”
“You were hired by my legal office to manage my father’s post-stroke rehabilitation,” Gideon said firmly. “You are an employee of this estate. No one has the right to make you feel unwelcome—let alone put your life in danger.”
“With all due respect, Mr. Marquetti,” I said, meeting his intense gaze without flinching, “your sister made it clear on my very first day that she expects every nurse to leave within a week. The last one—Nurse Henderson, no relation to the guard—left crying because her uniforms were slashed in the laundry room.”
Gideon’s jaw tightened. A muscle pulsed violently in his cheek.
“Walter,” Gideon commanded without looking back.
“Sir?”
“Bring Elena down here. Now.”
“Gideon—please,” I protested, wincing as a sharp twinge shot up my arm. “We don't have proof. It could have been an accidental spill from the pantry stock—”
“Olive oil does not migrate uphill, Adeline,” Gideon interrupted, his voice dropping an octave into a register that brook no argument. “And someone did not accidentally pour half a liter of cold-pressed EVOO across three wooden treads and a stone landing while carrying a carton of groceries. Someone wanted you broken.”
Walter bowed his head slightly and hurried out of the room.
I leaned my head back against the upholstery of the armchair, closing my eyes. I had taken this job because the pay was triple what any hospital in Manhattan offered, and I needed the money to clear my mother’s mounting medical debts. I had told myself I could handle a wealthy, arrogant mafia family, spoiled siblings, and a difficult patriarch.
I hadn't factored in attempted murder disguised as a household accident.
Heavy, deliberate footsteps approached the parlor doors a moment later.
The polished mahogany doors swung open.
Elena Marquetti stood in the entryway, wrapped in a floor-length white silk robe, a diamond tennis bracelet glittering on her wrist, and an expression of supreme, bored annoyance plastered across her face.
“Gideon, really?” she drawled, stepping into the room as if she were inspecting a slightly subpar floral arrangement. “Must you summon me before seven in the morning like a delinquent schoolchild? Some of us actually value our beauty sleep, especially when the help decides to shatter glassware at the crack of dawn.”
She glanced sideways at me, her eyes lingering on the plaster cast and the white bandage with a look that wasn't shock, or concern, or even guilt.
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It was disappointment.
The realization hit me with the force of a physical blow: She wasn't surprised I was hurt. She was angry I was still breathing.
