Chapter 2 - THE NAME BEHIND THE DOOR
Dr. Camille Hart arrived at 3:17 in the morning wearing jeans beneath a wool coat and carrying a black medical bag.
She didn't look impressed by Lorenzo Rossi.
That immediately made me trust her.
"Where's the patient?"
Lorenzo nodded toward Leo.
Still in my arms.
Dr. Hart looked at me.
Then at my half-buttoned uniform.
Then at Lorenzo.
"I'm guessing there is a story."
"There is."
"Tell me after I examine the baby."
She washed her hands.
No questions.
No judgment.
She listened to Leo's heart, checked his mouth, weighed him, examined his muscle tone and took blood using the smallest needle I had ever seen.
Leo cried.
This time, louder.
Dr. Hart smiled slightly.
"That's better than what I remember."
"You've seen him before?" I asked.
"Once. At birth."
Lorenzo stood by the window.
"Elena wanted her here."
Dr. Hart glanced at him.
"And then somebody decided Bellini was more convenient."
Lorenzo's expression darkened.
"I decided."
"Then you made a bad decision."
Nobody spoke.
I nearly stared.
Lorenzo Rossi had just been told he was wrong.
And Dr. Hart remained alive.
She pointed toward the bottle.
"That's from tonight?"
"Supposedly."
She opened it.
Smelled it.
Tipped a drop onto a testing strip from her bag.
Her face changed.
"What?"
Lorenzo asked.
"I won't speculate."
"Speculate."
"No."
She capped the bottle.
"I'll send it to my lab."
"My people can do it."
"Your people are currently suspects."
That silenced him.
Dr. Hart looked at the unconscious nurse.
"Who is she?"
"Nora Briggs."
"How long has she been asleep?"
"Unknown."
Hart examined her.
Pupil response.
Blood pressure.
Pulse.
Then she smelled the wine.
"Was this hers?"
"She doesn't drink," Lorenzo said.
"Then don't let anyone touch it."
Dr. Hart stood.
"We're taking blood from her too."
One of Lorenzo's security men appeared in the doorway.
"Boss."
"What?"
"We checked the cameras."
"And?"
"Hallway footage went offline for forty-seven seconds."
"When?"
"Beginning eleven seconds before the nursery door locked."
Lorenzo's expression didn't move.
"Internal failure?"
"No."
"Someone disabled it?"
"Looks that way."
"From where?"
"We're tracing it."
"Trace faster."
The guard disappeared.
Dr. Hart looked at me.
"How much did Leo nurse?"
"Maybe seven minutes."
"Both sides?"
"No."
She nodded.
"Would you be willing to pump?"
The question punched straight through me.
I looked away.
"I'm sorry," she said. "I understand this may be emotionally difficult."
"You don't understand."
My voice came out harsher than intended.
She waited.
"My daughter died three weeks ago."
Dr. Hart's expression softened.
"I am sorry."
I hated those words.
Not because they were wrong.
Because they were all anyone had.
I am sorry.
As though sorrow could be handed back and forth until it weighed less.
I looked at Leo.
"What happens if I don't?"
"We have donor milk."
"He wasn't taking that."
"I want to know why."
"And if he takes mine?"
"Then we learn something."
Lorenzo finally spoke.
"You don't have to."
I looked at him.
He seemed almost uncomfortable.
Maybe gratitude was unfamiliar territory.
Maybe asking instead of ordering was.
Leo stirred.
His tiny fist opened against my chest.
"I'll do it."
Dr. Hart gave me privacy.
Twenty minutes later, she fed Leo two ounces from a sterile bottle of my expressed milk.
He drank every drop.
No choking.
No refusal.
No vomiting.
Nothing.
Dr. Hart stared at him.
Then she looked at Lorenzo.
"Your son can eat."
The sentence landed like a bomb.
Lorenzo walked toward her.
"Then why hasn't he?"
"I don't know yet."
"Guess."
"I told you—"
"Camille."
Something in his voice changed.
Not threatening.
Personal.
She looked at him for several seconds.
Then at Leo.
"The medical records you've sent me showed progressive feeding intolerance, vomiting, lethargy and poor swallowing coordination."
"Correct."
"I'm not seeing that."
"Meaning?"
"Meaning either his condition has miraculously reversed tonight…"
She paused.
"Or the records don't describe what has actually been happening."
My stomach turned.
Lorenzo looked toward the feeding chart.
"Take everything."
Hart nodded.
"Bottles. Formula. Medication. Blood samples. Feeding logs."
She pointed at Nora.
"And her."
"No hospital."
"Lorenzo—"
"No public hospital."
"She needs monitoring."
"Use the private clinic."
Hart stared at him.
"Fine."
An hour later, the nursery had become a crime scene.
Lorenzo wouldn't call it that.
But that was what it was.
Bags.
Gloves.
Photographs.
Samples.
Security logs.
Nora was transported to a private medical facility under guard.
Leo was moved to a guest suite on the third floor.
And I was told to stay.
That last part was less comfortable.
Lorenzo stood across from me in his office as dawn began turning the windows gray.
The room smelled like leather, coffee and old wood.
I had changed into a clean uniform.
My hands wouldn't stop shaking.
"Sit."
"I'd rather stand."
"Fine."
He poured coffee.
One cup.
For himself.
Then, after a moment, another.
He pushed it toward me.
I didn't touch it.
"Travis Kane," he said.
My stomach tightened.
"What about him?"
"My companies have never employed him."
"Okay."
"But one of our vendors did."
My fingers went cold.
"Which one?"
"Aster Medical Logistics."
I knew the name.
I had seen it on jackets Travis wore.
Boxes in our apartment.
Invoices left on the kitchen counter.
"I thought he was a driver."
"Maybe he was."
Lorenzo walked toward the desk.
"Aster handles private medical deliveries to several Rossi properties."
"Including here?"
"Yes."
I sat.
I didn't mean to.
My knees simply stopped cooperating.
Lorenzo watched me.
"You didn't know?"
"No."
"When was the last time you saw Travis?"
"The night Lily died."
"What did you argue about?"
"I told you."
"You said you found cash."
"Yes."
"Anything else?"
I remembered the bag.
Cash.
A second phone.
And something else.
A small insulated medical container.
Blue lid.
White sides.
I had forgotten it until that moment.
"There was a cooler."
Lorenzo went still.
"What kind?"
"Medical."
"Size?"
I held my hands apart.
"Maybe this big."
"What was inside?"
"I didn't open it."
"Think."
"I didn't open it."
His frustration flashed.
"I'm trying."
I stood.
"So am I."
The room went quiet.
I surprised myself again.
But grief had changed something inside me.
Fear no longer worked the way it used to.
What was someone going to take from me that life hadn't already taken?
Lorenzo looked away first.
"Someone here knew your name."
"Yes."
"Someone has access to my son's medical supplies."
"Yes."
"Your ex worked for the company delivering those supplies."
I wrapped my arms around myself.
"I didn't know."
"I believe you."
I stared at him.
"Why?"
"Because if you were part of this, you wouldn't have saved Leo."
Saved.
The word almost broke me.
"I fed him."
"You entered a room you were forbidden to enter. You picked up the son of a man everyone in this house is afraid of. And you fed him while that man's employee was unconscious five feet away."
For the first time, the corner of his mouth moved.
Barely.
"That was either brave or extremely stupid."
"Probably both."
"Usually is."
The almost-smile disappeared.
"Why did Travis push you?"
The question caught me off guard.
"I told him I was leaving."
"That's all?"
I looked down.
"No."
Lorenzo waited.
"I told him I was going to the police."
"About the money?"
"And the deliveries."
His eyes sharpened.
"What did you know?"
"Almost nothing."
"But he thought you knew enough."
Maybe.
I had never considered that.
The night Lily died, Travis hadn't just been angry that I was leaving.
He had been afraid.
He kept asking what I had looked at.
What I had opened.
Who I had called.
I had thought it was paranoia.
Now I wasn't sure.
My phone had disappeared after the fall.
So had the bag.
"Lorenzo."
It was the first time I used his name.
He noticed.
"What?"
"I think Travis believed I found something."
"What?"
"I don't know."
He moved closer.
"You need to remember."
"I watched my daughter die three weeks ago."
My voice cracked.
"I am doing the best I can."
Something shifted in his face.
The anger disappeared.
He looked tired.
Not the kind of tired sleep fixed.
"I know."
Two words.
Quiet.
Unexpected.
A knock came at the door.
One of the guards entered.
"Nico found something."
Lorenzo turned.
"What?"
"The nursery lock wasn't controlled from the security room."
"Then where?"
"House maintenance tablet."
"Whose?"
The guard swallowed.
"One assigned to Mr. Renato."
Lorenzo's expression became unreadable.
I knew Renato Rossi only by reputation.
Lorenzo's uncle.
His father's younger brother.
The man who had helped raise Lorenzo after his father died.
The only person in the house who entered rooms without knocking.
"Where is he?" Lorenzo asked.
"His suite."
"Has he left?"
"No."
"Good."
The guard hesitated.
"There's something else."
Lorenzo waited.
"The lab called with a preliminary result from the wineglass."
"What?"
"Prescription sedative."
My skin prickled.
"From Nora's medication?" I asked.
The guard shook his head.
"She isn't prescribed any."
Lorenzo looked toward the windows.
The first morning light spread across the estate.
His house.
His guards.
His doctors.
His family.
All of it suddenly uncertain.
Then his phone rang.
He answered.
Dr. Hart's voice was loud enough for me to hear.
"Lorenzo, I have Leo's first blood panel."
He gripped the phone.
"And?"
"There are trace levels of the same sedative in your son's system."
Nobody moved.
Dr. Hart continued.
"Not enough to kill him."
A pause.
"But enough to make a two-month-old too sleepy to feed properly."
Lorenzo's face emptied of emotion.
That frightened me more than rage.
"How long?"
"Based on the concentration and his weight?"
Another pause.
"This wasn't one dose."
I covered my mouth.
Leo had not been refusing food.
Someone had been making him too weak to eat.
Night after night.
Bottle after bottle.
Lorenzo ended the call.
He looked at the guard.
"Bring my uncle to me."
The man left.
I stood slowly.
"What are you going to do?"
Lorenzo looked at me.
For several seconds, I saw the man people whispered about.
Then I saw Leo's father.
"I don't know."
That was when I understood how frightened he truly was.
Because Lorenzo Rossi always knew what to do.
May you like
Until the enemy was family.
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