THE MAFIA BOSS'S FIANCÉE TRIED TO ERASE HIS MOTHER'S MEMORY—BUT THE MAID KNEW WHAT WAS HIDDEN IN THE HOSPITAL FILES

The letter lay between Marco's hands like something fragile enough to break him.

I had watched him face down men twice his size without blinking. Yet a few lines in his dead father's handwriting left him staring through Isabel Vega's kitchen window, unable to speak.

"Someone inside our house," he said finally.

Isabel folded her arms. "Daniel didn't name the person because he wasn't sure. He was collecting proof. He never wanted suspicion to destroy his family before he could establish the truth."

Marco turned the envelope over. A faint pencil mark appeared beneath the flap: E.M., 14 November.

"My mother's initials," he murmured. "But her birthday isn't in November."

"Maybe it wasn't a birthday," I said.

Isabel's eyes narrowed. "November fourteenth was the day Daniel asked me to move the original ledger out of New York."

"Then what is E.M.?"

"I don't know."

On the drive home, Marco sat beside me rather than across the car. Gabriel drove, his gaze moving from the highway to the rearview mirror. Rain streaked the windows. I kept thinking about the people who had keys to Elena's rooms, who knew when she slept and which medications she took. A traitor didn't need to be a stranger. They only needed to be trusted.

"You don't have to stay at the mansion," Marco said quietly. "You've already done more than anyone should have asked."

"And leave your mother with someone who might be working for Vanessa?"

"I'm asking you to consider your safety."

"So am I."

His mouth tightened, but not with anger. "You sound like her."

"Your mother?"

"She once told me that being afraid isn't a reason to abandon someone."

I looked away before he could see how much that meant.

At the mansion, the gates stood open. A delivery van blocked the service entrance, although the household deliveries had been suspended after the engagement dinner. Gabriel stopped so abruptly my seat belt caught my shoulder.

A man in a gray jacket emerged carrying a sealed cardboard box.

"Who authorized that?" Gabriel called.

The man dropped the box and ran.

Gabriel chased him through the courtyard while Marco hurried me inside. The box contained shredded paper, an empty medication blister pack, and a framed photograph of Daniel Moretti with a young Thomas Bellini. Someone had been clearing evidence out of the house while we were gone.

Inside, Elena waited in the library with Miriam, Marco's attorney. She stood when she saw us, bracing herself against the table. Marco crossed the room and supported her elbow.

"Please don't treat me like glass," she said.

"I won't. But I'm allowed to worry."

She smiled, then saw his face. "What happened?"

Marco placed the letter before her. She read it slowly, moving her finger under each line. When she reached the warning, her expression changed.

"Your father trusted a woman named Evelyn," she said.

"Who was Evelyn?"

"Evelyn March. She kept our household accounts before she retired. She was the only person who could explain every payment that passed through this house."

"E.M.," I whispered.

Elena nodded. "She disappeared from our lives after Daniel's funeral. I thought she was ashamed because she had missed the signs of his illness."

Miriam leaned forward. "Did she have access to the hospital's finances?"

"Only to the charitable trust statements. Daniel believed in having someone independent check them."

Marco asked for Evelyn's last address. Elena couldn't remember it. Her frustration showed in the way she gripped her cane.

"I know things," she said. "I can feel them behind a door, but I can't always find the key."

"Then we'll find it together," Marco promised.

That evening, I brought Elena her tea and discovered a second cup on the nightstand. She hadn't requested it. A faint chemical sweetness rose from the surface. I didn't touch either cup. I called Marco, who had the drinks secured for testing.

"Who brought this?" he asked.

Elena's eyes filled. "I thought it was Claire."

"I was downstairs," I said.

The security footage from the hallway showed the door opening at 7:42 p.m. The person entering wore a housekeeper's pale uniform and carried a tray. But the camera caught only the back of her head.

"That isn't my walk," I said, surprised by the certainty in my own voice. "And those aren't my shoes."

Marco watched the recording again. The figure had a slight limp.

Our senior housekeeper, Mrs. Doyle, had injured her ankle the previous week.

When Gabriel went to find her, her room was empty. Her wardrobe was open, and her phone lay on the bed beside an envelope containing five thousand dollars.

On the envelope, in careful black ink, someone had written: FOR KEEPING YOUR PROMISE.

Marco stared at it. "We have to find her."

Then Elena, who had been quiet for several minutes, touched his arm.

"Mrs. Doyle wasn't the one who made the promise," she whispered. "She was the one who heard it."

"Heard what, Mom?"