Chapter 1 - The Man Everyone Was Afraid to Save
Six nurses had quit in five days before I walked into Dominic Rossi’s bedroom and found blood soaking through Egyptian cotton sheets.
Everyone warned me the wounded mafia boss was determined to bleed himself to death, but with rent due Monday and almost nothing left in my bank account, fear had become a luxury I could no longer afford.
Rain hammered my rusted sedan as I stopped outside the wrought-iron gates of the Rossi estate.
The mansion rose above the mountainside like a fortress—stone walls, ten-foot gates, clipped hedges, and not a single flower anywhere. My car coughed once after I killed the engine, then died like it had finally given up on me too.
A man in a black suit tapped on my window.
“Nora Hayes?”
“Yes.”
“I’m Leo. I manage the household.”
His eyes moved toward my car with barely disguised disapproval.
“Leave it. Someone will move it somewhere less visible.”
I grabbed my canvas duffel and stepped into the rain.
My sneakers soaked through before I reached the front steps.
Leo stopped beneath the portico. “You need to understand the rules before you go inside.”
I adjusted the strap digging into my shoulder.
“Rule one: you do not ask how Mr. Rossi was injured. Rule two: you speak only when he speaks to you.”
He paused.
“Rule three: whatever he tells you to do, you do it.”
I stared at him. “I was told he has a gunshot wound in his right shoulder and a secondary infection.”
“He does.”
“And the previous nurses?”
Leo’s expression hardened.
“One tried changing his dressing while he slept. He woke up and threw a lamp at her.”
My stomach tightened.
“She needed twelve stitches.”
Another nurse had reportedly left crying.
One had left with a broken wrist.
Dominic Rossi apparently didn’t want treatment.
He wanted everyone gone.
Leo looked at me carefully. “Weak stomach?”
“I have rent due Monday.”
That was the truth.
Three months earlier, I had still been working nights in a downtown emergency room. Then budget cuts erased my position, my savings disappeared into bills, and an eviction notice appeared on my apartment door.
“I can handle blood,” I said.
Leo gave one short nod.
Inside, the mansion was unnaturally silent.
Lemon polish covered almost every scent.
Almost.
Underneath it was something metallic.
Blood.
I recognized it immediately.
Leo led me upstairs and stopped outside the master suite.
“If you need me, press the call button.”
His eyes sharpened.
“Only for an emergency.”
“A bad mood doesn’t count?”
“It does not.”
Then he left me alone.
My heartbeat became louder with every step toward the double doors.
I didn’t knock.
Nobody had told me to.
The bedroom was almost completely dark when I entered, except for a thin strip of gray daylight cutting through heavy curtains.
Heat hit me immediately.
The room felt like an oven.
Then a voice came from somewhere near the bed.
“Get out.”
Low.
Hoarse.
Dangerous.
My eyes adjusted.
Dominic Rossi lay against dark pillows, shirtless from the waist up, one shoulder wrapped in blood-soaked bandages. Sweat covered his skin, his face was pale beneath dark stubble, and even half-dead, he looked like the kind of man who had spent his entire life being obeyed.
I put my duffel on the floor.
“No.”
Silence.
His eyes opened fully.
Nobody had warned me what happened when Dominic Rossi heard that word.
And judging by the way his expression changed, nobody had ever been foolish enough to say it twice.
“What did you say?”
His voice was quiet enough to be more intimidating than shouting.
I crossed the room.
“I said no.”
His gaze followed me.
“You know who I am?”
“Dominic Rossi.”
“That isn't what I meant.”
“I know.”
I stopped beside the bed.
The bandage covering his shoulder was saturated. The surrounding skin was flushed. His breathing was too fast, and beads of sweat rolled down the side of his neck.
I touched the back of my fingers to his forehead.
He caught my wrist.
Fast.
Much faster than an injured man with a fever should have been able to move.
“Don’t.”
His fingers tightened.
I looked at his hand and then back at him.
“Your temperature is probably over a hundred and three.”
“I said don’t touch me.”
“And I heard you.”
Something shifted in his expression.
Not anger exactly.
Confusion.
“You should be afraid of me.”
“I’m more afraid of explaining to your house manager why you died during my first hour.”
His eyes narrowed.
“You think you're funny?”
“No.”
“Good.”
“I think you’re septic.”
That got his attention.
Dominic released my wrist.
I pulled a thermometer from my bag.
“One hundred three point eight.”
“I’ve had worse.”
“Congratulations.”
He stared at me.
“You always talk this much?”
“Only when people are doing something stupid.”
A faint muscle moved near his jaw.
I started arranging sterile gauze.
“You aren’t changing that dressing.”
“Yes, I am.”
“No.”
I glanced at him.
“Now you know how it feels.”
For one long second, I thought he might throw something.
Then something unexpected happened.
The corner of his mouth twitched.
Not a smile.
Almost one.
It vanished immediately.
I carefully peeled back the outer bandage.
Dominic’s muscles locked.
The wound itself had been treated, but the surrounding skin looked angry and inflamed.
“This is worse than I was told.”
“Leave.”
“No.”
His breathing changed.
Pain.
Not anger.
I lowered my voice.
“When was your last antibiotic?”
He didn’t answer.
“Dominic.”
His gaze snapped toward mine.
Calling him by his first name had apparently broken another invisible mansion rule.
“Four hours ago.”
“What did they give you?”
“Whatever was on the tray.”
That bothered me.
“Who prepares your medication?”
“Doctor.”
“What doctor?”
“You’re asking questions.”
“I’m a nurse. It happens.”
His eyes closed.
“Dr. Felix Mercer.”
The name meant nothing to me.
Yet.
I replaced the dressing as gently as possible. Dominic never made a sound, but I watched his fingers grip the sheets.
When I finished, I noticed something on the bedside table.
A syringe.
Already opened.
My attention sharpened.
“Was this used today?”
Dominic opened his eyes again.
“What?”
I lifted it.
“This.”
“I assume so.”
“By whom?”
“Mercer.”
I studied the label.
Something felt wrong.
The printed sticker identified the medication as a broad-spectrum antibiotic.
But the liquid left inside the barrel was almost perfectly clear.
That alone wasn’t suspicious.
The concentration written on the sticker was.
I had given that drug hundreds of times in the emergency room.
The dosage didn’t match the preparation.
I smelled the port carefully.
Saline.
Maybe.
My pulse changed.
“Where’s the medication box?”
Dominic watched me.
“In the cabinet.”
I opened it.
Three vials.
Two unopened.
One half-used.
I inspected the lot numbers.
Then the seals.
The half-used vial had been tampered with.
Very carefully.
But definitely tampered with.
My financial problems suddenly seemed far away.
“Who has access to this room?”
Dominic’s voice came from behind me.
“Why?”
I turned.
“Who?”
His expression changed.
The weakness disappeared behind something colder.
“Leo. Mercer. Security. Housekeeping when supervised.”
“Anyone else?”
“No.”
I walked toward him.
“Dominic, your infection should be improving if you've been receiving what this label says.”
“It isn't.”
“I noticed.”
His eyes dropped toward the syringe in my hand.
“What are you telling me?”
I hesitated.
Then decided lying to him would be far more dangerous.
“I’m telling you I don’t think you’ve been receiving the medication your doctor claims he’s giving you.”
The room became completely silent.
Outside, thunder rolled over the mountains.
Dominic stared at the syringe.
Then at me.
“Say that again.”
“I think someone altered your medication.”
His expression hardened.
“You’re certain?”
“No. And anyone who tells you they're certain before testing it is lying.”
I placed the syringe carefully into an evidence bag from my kit.
“But I’m certain enough that I wouldn't let anyone inject you with another dose until I knew exactly what was inside.”
Dominic slowly looked toward the bedroom doors.
For the first time since I had entered the room, he didn’t look like a sick man.
He looked like the person everyone downstairs was afraid of.
“Call Leo.”
I reached for the call button.
Dominic caught my hand again.
“No.”
His voice dropped.
“Not through that.”
I frowned.
“Why?”
His eyes remained on the door.
“Because if you're right, Nora…”
It was the first time he had said my name.
“…then somebody inside this house is trying to make sure I never leave this bed.”
And suddenly I understood something the six nurses before me hadn't.
Dominic Rossi wasn't refusing treatment because he wanted to die.
He was refusing treatment because he no longer knew who was trying to save him.
May you like
And who was trying to kill him.
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