Chapter 3
Lorenzo Rossi did not trust miracles.
Miracles made people careless.
He trusted patterns.
Doors.
Schedules.
Men who lied too quickly.
Women who stayed too calm.
Rooms where danger should not exist and somehow did.
When Leo was born too early, Lorenzo turned the mansion into a private hospital wing. Air filtration. Locked corridors. Rotating medical staff. Background checks. Camera coverage. Panic buttons. Nutrition logs. Two nurses per night until someone convinced him that too many people disturbed the baby’s rest.
That advice had come from inside the house.
Now Lorenzo stood in the nursery, looking at the unconscious nurse, the suspicious glass, the unopened bottle, and Hunter Higgins holding his son while the monitor steadied by fractions.
His fury wanted a target.
His mind forced him to wait.
Hunter shifted Leo carefully against her chest, keeping his blanket high and secure, protecting his tiny body with both arms.
She was terrified of Lorenzo.
That was obvious.
But she was more afraid for Leo than of him.
That mattered.
“Tell me exactly what happened,” Lorenzo said.
Hunter swallowed.
Her voice shook.
“He wouldn’t settle after the bottle. His breathing changed. I came in because the monitor alarm sounded twice and Nurse Mallory wasn’t answering.”
Lorenzo’s eyes cut toward the nurse.
“Why were you near this room?”
“I was folding linens in the hall.”
“After midnight?”
“Leo needed clean blankets every few hours.”
Lorenzo stared at her.
She did not look away.
“I know what everyone thinks of me,” she whispered. “But I did not touch him until she was on the floor and he was crying.”
Leo’s tiny hand flexed against her robe.
The monitor beeped again.
Steadier.
Lorenzo moved close enough to see his son’s throat work with another weak swallow.
His face changed before he could stop it.
Stunned fear.
Then something worse.
Hope.
He reached out carefully, two fingers near Leo’s cheek, not disturbing the infant’s position.
Leo did not recoil.
Lorenzo inhaled.
For weeks, his son had fought every bottle like pain lived inside the milk.
Now, against a woman everyone dismissed as unstable, he fed.
Lorenzo looked toward the unopened bottle.
“Who prepared that?”
Hunter’s eyes moved to the nurse.
“I saw her take it from the warmer.”
“Did anyone else enter?”
Hunter hesitated.
That hesitation tightened the room.
“Hunter.”
Her lips parted.
Before she could answer, the red warning light changed speed.
May you like
Then the door slammed shut.
Read Chapter 4 👉 Because someone outside the nursery reacted before Hunter could name who had been near Leo’s bottle.
