Chapter 3 - Shadows and Safeguards
Viktor’s face darkened instantly, his hand dropping automatically toward the holster beneath his tailored suit jacket. "Boss. Should I remove them?"
"No, Viktor," Damian said, his voice dropping back into its customary, razor-sharp authority, though a faint fatigue still clung to the edges of his words. "Mrs. Vance and her daughter are staying. In fact, effective immediately, Elena is assigned as my personal daytime caretaker."
Viktor blinked, genuine shock cutting through his habitual stoicism. "Caretaker, sir? But the nurses—"
"The nurses were incompetent, judgmental spies sent by my rivals or overly dramatic physicians who couldn't handle a man coughing blood," Damian interrupted, his eyes narrowing. "Elena brought a child into a room everyone avoids, and that child managed to calm my heart rate more than any pharmaceutical cocktail your doctors forced down my throat. Dismissed, Viktor."
The giant security chief cast a suspicious, protective glance in my direction before bowing his head and backing out of the room, closing the heavy oak door with a soft click.
I stood frozen in the center of the sprawling, master suite. My mind raced. Being a kitchen maid was hard enough, but being the personal daytime caretaker to a dying, poisoned mafia kingpin? That was a death sentence wrapped in a paycheck. Yet, as I looked around the room—at the expensive medical monitors flashing erratic green lines, at the empty pill bottles littering the mahogany nightstand—I realized something else.
The pay was triple what I made in the kitchen. With my mother’s mounting medical bills and Lila's specialized audiology appointments, I couldn't afford to say no.
"I accept," I said clearly, looking straight into Damian's dark eyes. "On two conditions, Mr. Volkov."
Damian raised a dark eyebrow, clearly amused that a lowly kitchen worker was attempting to negotiate terms with him. "Oh? You have conditions for the master of Grayhaven House? Go on."
"First, Lila stays with me in the adjacent sitting room during my shifts. She goes nowhere alone. Second, no foul language, no violent outbursts, and no weapons displayed while she is in the room. She is four years old. She absorbs everything."
For a long moment, the room grew so quiet I could hear the rhythmic ticking of an antique grandfather clock in the hallway. Damian studied me, searching my face for deceit, fear, or hidden motives. What he found seemed to satisfy him, because a slow, genuine smirk finally broke across his scarred face.
"Agreed," Damian murmured. "You have spine, Elena Vance. I can respect that. Now, help me sit up. The doctor is coming in an hour, and I refuse to look like a corpse when he arrives."
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Over the next few weeks, the routine of Grayhaven House shifted on its axis. The staff whispered in the corridors, exchanging bewildered glances as they watched the feared boss of the Baltimore underworld accept broth spoon-fed by a quiet single mother, while a little girl with a pink hearing aid drew crayon masterpieces on legal pads at the foot of his bed.
Yet, beneath the fragile domestic peace, dark forces were closing in. The man who had poisoned Damian Volkov was growing impatient, realizing that the boss was not dying fast enough.
