Chapter 4: Eleven Years of Trust, Dissolved
Alessio let it ring twice.
Then he answered.
"Where are you."
"Downstairs, boss.
Wanted to check if you needed anything.
Dr.
Rossi left his bag — I can bring it up."
"No."
A pause.
"You sure?
It's no trouble."
"I said no." Alessio's voice carried nothing.
No anger, no suspicion.
Just flat refusal.
"Go home, Caruso.
I'll call you in the morning."
Another pause.
Longer this time.
"Everything all right?"
"My son nearly d*ed tonight.
Nothing is all right.
Go home."
The call ended.
Alessio set the phone face-down on the desk.
He stood with his back to me for a moment, both hands pressed against the desk's edge.
"He's still in the house," I said.
"Yes."
"He called to find out if you'd checked the camera."
"Yes."
"Which means he knows the card was there.
He just doesn't know if you found it."
Alessio turned around.
"Can you walk?
With Leo?"
"Yes."
"Then we're moving.
Not the main wing.
There's a room on the east side — no connected security system.
Old part of the house.
My father's study."
I stood carefully, keeping Leo against my chest.
He shifted but didn't wake.
His weight was warm and solid and I focused on that.
We moved through the corridor without lights.
Alessio knew every step by memory.
I followed the sound of him.
The study was small for a room in that house.
Bookshelves floor to ceiling.
A desk with a green lamp.
A leather sofa against the far wall.
Alessio locked the door behind us with a key from his watch chain.
"Sit," he said.
Not unkindly.
I sat on the sofa.
Leo curled against me, one fist near his mouth.
Alessio pulled the laptop from under his arm — he'd carried it without me noticing — and set it on the desk.
He plugged a small drive into the side and began copying the footage.
"You planned this before we left the nursery," I said.
"I plan most things."
"You didn't plan tonight."
He glanced at me.
"No."
He copied the footage to the drive, then to a second drive he produced from the desk drawer.
He sent a file to an encrypted address I couldn't read from where I sat.
Then he removed the memory card and held it.
"I need you to keep this," he said.
I looked up.
"Why me?"
"Because if Caruso searches this house tonight, he won't search you."
That was logical.
It was also the moment I understood that whatever had begun in the nursery, it was not finished.
I was inside it now.
Not as a nanny.
As something else.
I took the card and put it in my bra.
Alessio sat down in the desk chair and looked at his son sleeping against a stranger's chest.
"Tell me about Voss," I said.
"Why?"
"Because if Caruso didn't decide this alone, Voss is the reason.
And I need to understand what Leo is worth to someone like that."
Alessio was quiet for a long moment.
"Voss wants a shipping contract.
International.
Worth more than I'll say.
I refused him six months ago.
He came back.
I refused again.
Three weeks ago, his lawyer sent a letter suggesting I reconsider — for the sake of my family's continued wellbeing."
"You didn't take that seriously enough."
"I took it seriously.
I increased security.
I vetted the staff again." He stopped.
"Apparently not carefully enough."
"Caruso passed the vetting."
"Caruso ran the vetting."
The room went quiet.
Leo made a small sound.
I rubbed his back in slow circles and he settled.
"He's been with you eleven years," I said.
"Since I was twenty-six.
He trained under my father."
"What changed eight months ago?"
Alessio looked at the lamp.
"His daughter.
Medical bills.
Something with her spine.
The kind of treatment that costs more than a security salary."
I didn't say anything.
"I would have helped him," Alessio said.
It came out raw.
"If he had asked."
"He didn't ask."
"No."
A sound came from somewhere in the house.
Distant.
A door, maybe.
Or a floorboard.
Alessio's head lifted.
His hand moved toward his jacket.
Then his phone lit up on the desk.
A text.
No name — just a number.
He read it.
His face went still in a way that was different from before.
Not controlled.
Frozen.
He turned the phone so I could see.
May you like
*The nanny knows too much.
Voss says she doesn't leave the property.*
