Elena stood three yards away from the edge of the water, her hands occupied with a heavy silver tray laden with crystal glasses of iced lemonade and freshly sliced fruit. Her dark hair was pinned back in a tight, practical bun that was already coming undone from the humidity, and her gray domestic uniform clung uncomfortably to the back of her neck.

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Elena collapsed onto the wet flagstones, coughing water from her trachea, shivering violently under the warm midday sun.

Leo was lying on a plush outdoor towel two feet away, crying at the top of his lungs, his rosy cheeks flushed as his small lungs cleared the chlorinated fluid.

Suddenly, the glass French doors of the sunroom burst open with a concussive bang.

Victoria Sterling sprinted across the deck in four-inch designer wedges, her silk robe billowing in the wind. Her diamond earrings caught the sunlight, her eyes wide with theatrical, shrieking hysteria.

“Leo! My baby! My God, Leo!”

She scooped the soaked infant into her arms, checking his face, trembling dramatically. But instead of turning to thank the gasping maid who lay shivering at her feet, Victoria’s eyes locked onto the shattered crystal glasses and the dented silver tray.

Her panic twisted into instantaneous, venomous fury.

Victoria stepped forward and swung her hand with all her weight.

SLAP.

The crack echoed across the vast estate grounds.

Elena’s head snapped sideways. The impact tore across her bruised cheek, sending her falling flat against the wet marble. Blood welled at the corner of her lower lip.

“You clumsy, incompetent gutter rat!” Victoria screamed, her voice reaching a shrill, hysterical pitch that brought the groundskeepers running. “You dropped the tray! You made a loud noise that startled the carriage! You pushed my child into the pool!”

Elena blinked through stinging tears, clutching her throbbing face. “Mrs. Sterling... the wind... the stroller wasn't locked. It was rolling—”

“Shut your mouth!” Victoria shrieked, pointing an accusatory, manicured finger directly at Elena’s nose. “I left my baby in a locked, secure stroller for thirty seconds! You threw that heavy silver tray to startle him! You wanted him to drown so you could sue this family for hazardous working conditions!”

Two private security guards and the head butler, Mr. Henderson, arrived at the patio edge, looking pale and uncertain.

“Madam,” Mr. Henderson began cautiously, “the paramedics are already dispatched—”

“Call the police!” Victoria commanded, her chest heaving as she clutched Leo tightly. “Have this girl arrested for attempted homicide and willful child endangerment! If my father-in-law sees this, she will rot in prison for the rest of her miserable life!”

Elena sat in the puddle of water, shivering in her soaked uniform, tasting copper in her mouth.

She had plunged into ten feet of water without knowing how to swim, tore her nails to pieces beneath the surface, and handed a breathing child back to the world.

And her reward was a bloody lip and a threat of life imprisonment.