Lorenzo Rossi was a man whose name was whispered in dark alleys and marble boardrooms alike. He was a feared Mafia boss who could make powerful men disappear with a single phone call.

Lorenzo Rossi was a man whose name was whispered in dark alleys and marble boardrooms alike. He was a feared Mafia boss who could make powerful men disappear with a single phone call. Tonight, he aimed his gun straight at my heart while I held his dying son against my bare chest.

He thought I had betrayed him—until the baby swallowed for the first time in weeks, and I warned him that someone inside his own mansion might have been starving the child on purpose.

Three weeks earlier, I had lost my own daughter.

My abusive ex-boyfriend had shoved me down a flight of wooden staircase when I was thirty-eight weeks pregnant. Lily was born still. Her heart had stopped before she ever took her first breath of cold air. But my body never understood that she was gone.

My milk came in three days later, heavy, painful, and agonizing.

I bound my aching chest tightly beneath my heavy maid’s uniform and kept working because grief didn’t pay rent. Worse, dangerous debt collectors were hunting my ex over thousands of dollars he had gambled away, and I knew it was only a matter of time before they came looking for me next. Desperate for protection and a paycheck, I took a job at the heavily guarded Rossi estate on the outskirts of the city.

The Rossi estate had three simple rules.

Keep your head down.

Never speak to the armed men in suits.

Never enter the nursery.

I followed every single rule faithfully until two in the morning, when I heard Leo crying.

Everyone in the sprawling mansion knew Mr. Rossi’s two-month-old son was dying. His mother had passed away during childbirth, and ever since, the boy had refused every meal. World-renowned doctors had tried specialized formulas, expensive donor milk, and custom nutritional blends, but the baby kept getting weaker, his tiny body slowly fading away.

I tried to walk past the grand staircase. I tried to mind my own business and stick to my duties.

Then Leo cried again.

The sound was so faint, so hollow and desperate, that I stopped breathing. It wasn't the pitch of a bratty infant; it was the soft, fading whimpering of a soul giving up.

My feet moved before my brain could stop them. I climbed the dark marble stairs, avoiding the creaky steps.

Inside the dimly lit nursery, the night nurse was fast asleep in a plush velvet armchair. A half-empty glass of dark red wine sat right beside her limp hand on the nightstand.

In the center of the room, little Leo lay trembling in his white crib, his ribs visible beneath his pale skin.

I reached down and picked him up. The moment his tiny, fragile frame touched my skin, he immediately turned his face toward my chest, searching wildly.

“No,” I whispered, my heart hammering against my ribs.

Holding him tore open every emotional wound I had tried so hard to bury. For one terrible, excruciating second, I imagined Lily in my arms. I imagined what my life should have been.

Then Leo whimpered against my neck, a tiny gasp for life.

I looked at the sleeping, intoxicated nurse.

I looked at the starving child in my arms.

And I made a choice that could easily get me killed in a house run by ruthless murderers.

My fingers shook violently as I unbuttoned my maid’s uniform.

The instant Leo latched on, the faint, rhythmic beep of his heart monitor accelerated slightly.

He swallowed once.

Then again.

A wave of pure relief struck me so hard that hot tears blurred my vision, spilling down my cheeks onto his delicate forehead. He was drinking. He was fighting.

That was when the heavy oak door swung open.

Lorenzo Rossi stood in the entryway, dressed in a black tailored suit, staring at me with a gaze colder than death itself. In one swift, terrifying motion, he drew a black handgun from his jacket and aimed it straight at my forehead.

“Put my son down.”

My entire body went completely rigid, but I kept one protective arm firmly around Leo.

“Please,” I whispered, my voice trembling. “Look at the monitor, Mr. Rossi.”

“I said put him down.”

Then, in the heavy silence of the room, Leo swallowed again.

Mr. Rossi heard it. The faint, wet sound of a baby taking nourishment.

His gun lowered slightly, his dark eyes widening in disbelief. For the very first time, I saw something human beneath the layer of violence and absolute power—a grieving father terrified of losing the last remaining piece of his deceased wife.

I glanced over at the sleeping nurse, then at the wineglass, and finally back at the boss.

“Mr. Rossi, there’s something you need to know,” I said softly.

His dark eyes narrowed, his jaw clenching. “What are you saying?”

“I don’t think your son has been rejecting his food.”

His face hardened into stone. "What do you mean?"

Before I could answer, the heavy nursery door slammed shut behind him.

A loud iron lock clicked shut from the outside.