Chapter 3 - The Badge in Her HandRenata Bellini’s body lay in the chapel corridor beneath a statue of Saint Michael.
I did not want to see her.
Lorenzo made sure I did.
Not because he was cruel. Because in that house, truth had become a weapon, and he wanted to see whether I flinched when it was pointed at me.
I walked between Massimo and Dr. Rowe, still holding Leo. Lorenzo would not let anyone take him from me. That should have comforted me, but every guard we passed stared at my arms like they were waiting for me to drop proof of my own guilt.
Renata lay on the marble floor in her gray dress.
Her eyes were open.
Her right hand clutched my employee badge.
Clara Hayes.
Night Cleaning Staff.
The plastic was cracked down the middle.
Massimo crouched beside her. “No blood. No obvious wounds.”
Dr. Rowe passed Leo to me more securely and knelt. She checked Renata’s neck, her pupils, her mouth.
“Poison,” she said.
Lorenzo’s eyes moved to the badge. “When?”
“Recently. Within the hour.”
I stared at Renata’s hand.
“She didn’t have my badge.”
Massimo looked up.
“I lost it yesterday,” I said quickly. “I thought I dropped it in the laundry room. I reported it to Mr. Keller.”
“Who is Keller?” Lorenzo asked.
“The staff supervisor.”
Massimo stood. “Keller left the property at midnight.”
Lorenzo turned slowly. “Nobody leaves my property during a lockdown.”
“He left before lockdown. Security log says he had authorization from Renata.”
Lorenzo’s face hardened.
“Find him.”
Massimo gave orders through his radio.
I looked at Renata’s dead face and felt a sick wave of understanding.
“She hired me. She trapped us. Then someone killed her and put my badge in her hand.”
Lorenzo said nothing.
“You think I killed her?” I asked.
His eyes met mine.
“I think someone wants me to.”
That was not innocence.
But it was not accusation either.
At that moment, it was enough to keep me breathing.
Leo stirred. His little mouth opened. A sound came out, small but stronger than before. Hunger.
Dr. Rowe looked at him. “He needs to feed again.”
Lorenzo’s gaze dropped to his son.
For one suspended second, power, suspicion, grief, and need warred across his face.
Then he turned to Massimo. “Clear the family sitting room. Only Dr. Rowe. Only female staff she approves. Clara stays with the child.”
Massimo nodded.
One of the guards muttered, “Boss, with respect—”
Lorenzo did not raise his voice. “Do you want to finish that sentence?”
The guard went pale. “No, sir.”
In the sitting room, Dr. Rowe hung a blanket across two chairs to give me privacy. My hands shook as I unbuttoned my uniform again. It was not embarrassment. That had burned away hours ago.
It was the grief.
Every time Leo latched, Lily came back to me.
Not as she had been in the hospital, silent and wrapped in white.
But as she should have been.
Warm.
Fussy.
Hungry.
Mine.
I bit the inside of my cheek hard enough to taste blood.
Leo swallowed greedily now. Not perfectly, but enough that Dr. Rowe watched the monitor with wet eyes she tried to hide.
Lorenzo stood on the other side of the blanket, turned away.
He could have left.
He didn’t.
“My wife’s name was Alessia,” he said quietly.
I froze.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“She died six days after Leo was born.”
I looked down at the baby. Six days. He had lost his mother before he knew her face.
“They said infection,” Lorenzo continued. “Complications. Things no money could stop.”
Something about his voice made me look toward the silhouette of him through the blanket.
“You don’t believe that anymore,” I said.
“No.”
Leo swallowed again.
Outside the room, men moved fast through the corridor. Doors opened. Voices snapped orders.
Dr. Rowe came around the blanket with a small packet.
“I tested residue from the nursery wineglass.”
Lorenzo turned.
“And?” he asked.
“It was drugged.”
My stomach dropped.
“Enough to keep Nurse Celeste unconscious for hours,” Dr. Rowe said. “Also enough to make her confused when she woke.”
“That explains what she said,” I whispered.
Dr. Rowe looked at me. “Maybe.”
Lorenzo caught the hesitation. “Say it.”
“She may have been repeating something she heard before she passed out.”
The words Celeste had rasped returned to me.
She’s the one they warned us about.
Lorenzo’s eyes sharpened. “Who warned her?”
A knock hit the door.
Massimo entered without waiting.
“We found Keller’s car.”
“Where?”
“Service road, half a mile from the estate.”
“And Keller?”
Massimo’s jaw tightened. “Gone. But there was blood in the trunk.”
“His?”
“Unknown.”
He handed Lorenzo a sealed evidence bag.
Inside was a phone.
“Found under the driver’s seat. Last outgoing text was sent at 1:41 a.m.”
Lorenzo read the screen.
His face did not move, but the room turned colder.
“What does it say?” I asked.
He looked at me.
Then at Leo.
Then back to the phone.
“It says, ‘The milk girl entered the nursery. If the child survives, kill Renata and frame her.’”
My knees nearly gave out.
The milk girl.
Not Clara.
Not maid.
Milk girl.
They had known exactly what I was before I ever walked through the Rossi gates.
May you like
And they had been waiting for me to do the one thing a grieving mother’s body could not refuse.
Save a starving baby.
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