Chapter 2 - Blood on White Marble
Mia hesitated before placing her scraped palm into Luca Moretti’s hand.
His grip was firm, warm, and entirely unyielding.
He pulled her to her feet with effortless power, steadying her as her wounded knee buckled beneath her weight.
A sharp gasp escaped her lips when the torn flesh protested against the movement.
"Can you walk?" Luca asked, his eyes narrowing slightly as he took in the extent of her injury.
"Yes, sir," Mia lied, forcing herself to stand straight despite the fire burning beneath her skin.
"I can report back to the kitchen now. The head housekeeper will want the broken crystal cleared."
"The crystal is meaningless," Luca said, his voice slicing through the garden like a cold scalpel.
He turned toward the terrace entrance, where two personal bodyguards had already closed ranks.
"Marco," Luca commanded without turning his head.
The taller of the two guards stepped forward immediately.
"Lock down the estate perimeter. Nobody leaves this property. Not the senator, not my cousins, not the waitstaff. If a car attempts to pass the outer gate, shoot the tires out."
"Understood, Mr. Moretti," Marco replied, already speaking into his earpiece.
Panic flared across the faces of the wealthy patrons peering through the ballroom windows.
The music finally cut off with an awkward screech of violins.
Luca turned back to Mia, his gaze sweeping over her bloodstained apron.
"You are not going to the kitchen. You are coming with me to the East Wing."
Mia’s pulse hammered in her throat.
The East Wing was the private family sanctuary.
Ordinary domestic staff were forbidden from stepping beyond the oak double doors on the second floor.
To violate that boundary was considered grounds for immediate termination.
"Mr. Moretti, with all respect, I am only temporary staff," Mia said, backing away half a step.
"I haven't even completed my probationary week."
"Your probationary period ended the moment you dove onto granite to save my bloodline," Luca answered smoothly.
He turned on his heel, still carrying Leo securely on his hip.
"Walk, Miss Carter. Do not make me tell you twice."
Mia had no choice but to follow his towering figure across the stone patio.
Every step sent a jolt of pain through her leg, but she bit her lip until she tasted copper.
As they entered the grand hallway, the gathered guests parted like the Red Sea.
Whispers erupted from every corner of the marble corridor.
"Is that a maid?"
"Why is Luca carrying the boy himself?"
"Look at the blood on her apron. What happened out there?"
Mia recognized Victoria Sterling standing near the grand staircase.
Victoria was the daughter of Moretti’s primary industrial partner.
Society magazines had speculated for months that Victoria was positioned to become the next Mrs. Moretti.
Her ice-blue silk gown shimmered under the chandelier light, but her eyes were fixed on Mia with undisguised contempt.
"Luca, darling!" Victoria called out, rushing forward with a practiced look of horror on her painted face.
"We heard glass breaking! Is Leo all right? Give him to me, I’ll take him to the nursery."
She reached her manicured hands toward the child.
Leo flinched instantly.
He buried his face deeper into the crook of his father’s neck, his small body turning rigid.
Luca stepped sideways, smoothly denying Victoria any contact with the boy.
"He stays with me," Luca said, his tone chillingly polite.
Victoria’s hands remained frozen in the air for a fraction of a second before she lowered them.
Her gaze snapped to Mia, raking over her torn stockings and unkempt hair.
"Who is this girl, Luca? Why is domestic staff tracking blood onto the imported runner?"
"She is the reason Leo is breathing tonight, Victoria," Luca said flatly.
Victoria blinked, caught off guard by the venom in his voice.
"What do you mean? What happened at the pool?"
"Ask your brother," Luca replied without stopping.
"He was supposed to be overseeing the security roster for the garden patio."
Victoria’s perfect smile vanished, replaced by a momentary flash of panic that she quickly smoothed away.
Luca did not wait for her rebuttal.
He marched past the grand staircase and entered the private elevator reserved exclusively for family members.
He held the brass door open with his arm, waiting for Mia.
Mia limped into the small, mirrored compartment, feeling entirely out of place between the billionaire and his heir.
The elevator climbed silently toward the private penthouse level.
The moment the doors slid open, the noise of the charity gala vanished completely.
The East Wing was silent, cavernous, and bathed in the soft glow of amber wall sconces.
Luca walked straight into a massive study lined with dark mahogany bookshelves.
He set Leo gently down on a plush leather sofa.
The boy immediately grabbed a velvet throw pillow and curled into a tight ball.
"Marco," Luca said to the guard who had followed them up the service stairs.
"Bring the trauma kit from my bathroom. Now."
"Sir, really, I can take care of my own knee," Mia protested, standing awkwardly near the door.
Luca ignored her entirely.
He stripped off his custom tuxedo jacket, tossing it carelessly over a leather armchair.
He rolled up the sleeves of his crisp white dress shirt, exposing forearms corded with muscle and faint, faded scars.
Marco returned within seconds, placing a heavy metal medical case onto the low coffee table.
Luca knelt down on the Persian rug right in front of Mia.
"Sit," he commanded.
Mia swallowed her pride and sat down on the edge of an armchair.
Luca did not call a house doctor or assign a maid to assist her.
He opened the kit, pulled out a bottle of medical disinfectant, and tore open a packet of sterile gauze.
"This is going to burn," he warned quietly.
Before Mia could respond, Luca’s large, calloused fingers took hold of her ankle.
His touch was surprisingly steady, but the cold antiseptic made Mia hiss through her teeth.
Luca did not flinch.
He worked with clinical precision, cleaning the stone grit out of her torn flesh.
"You didn't hesitate," Luca murmured, his eyes focused entirely on the wound.
"Most people freeze when they see an heir in danger. They worry about liability."
"I didn't see an heir," Mia answered, her voice trembling slightly from the sting of the alcohol.
"I only saw a child about to drown."
Luca paused his movements for a heartbeat.
He looked up through his dark eyelashes, his gaze piercing directly into her thoughts.
"My wife drowned two years ago, Miss Carter."
The confession hung in the air like a lead weight.
Everyone in the city knew Elena Moretti had died in a tragic boating accident off the coast of Lake Como.
Yet hearing Luca say the word out loud sent a cold shiver down Mia’s spine.
"She was an Olympic-level swimmer," Luca continued, his voice dropping to a gravelly whisper.
"Yet the police report concluded that she simply lost consciousness in shallow water."
He wrapped clean white bandage tape around Mia’s knee with tight, deliberate pressure.
"Tonight, someone baited my son toward the water with the promise of a message from his dead mother."
Luca stood up, towering over Mia once again.
"The gate was sabotaged by someone who holds the master security codes. There are only five people in this house with that clearance."
Mia looked toward the sofa, where Leo had already fallen asleep, clutching his knees.
"Why are you telling me this, Mr. Moretti?" Mia asked, her heart racing.
Luca walked to his massive desk and pulled up a live surveillance feed on three separate monitors.
All three screens showed static over the garden pool.
"Because the camera feed covering the pool terrace was looped on a four-minute delay starting at ten-fifty-eight," Luca said, tapping the glass.
"Whoever planned this knew the blind spots. They knew the shift changes. And they knew Leo was vulnerable."
Luca turned around, leaning his hips against the mahogany desk, his arms crossed over his chest.
"You have no family connections in this city. You have no stock in my shipping conglomerates. You have no reason to want my son dead."
"I would never hurt a child," Mia said fiercely.
"I know," Luca replied, a dangerous glint returning to his eyes.
"Which is why you are not returning to the domestic staff pool."
He took a slow step forward.
"As of tonight, you are Leo’s personal primary guardian. You will live in the suite adjacent to his bedroom. You will eat what he eats. You will go wherever he goes."
Mia shook her head in disbelief.
"Mr. Moretti, I am a maid. I clean floors. I don't know how to protect someone from professional assassins."
"You don't need a gun, Miss Carter," Luca said, his voice dropping into an intimate, commanding register.
"You have instincts. You saved his life when my multi-million-dollar security force failed."
He reached into his pocket and placed a black ceramic keycard onto the table before her.
"Accept the position, and your mother’s hospital debts will be settled by sunrise. Refuse it, and I will still pay for your silence, but you will walk out into the street knowing that the next time someone opens that gate, I might not be there to stop them."
Mia looked at the keycard.
Then she looked at the sleeping boy on the sofa, whose tiny fingers still twitched with leftover terror.
May you like
There was no real choice.
She reached out and took the keycard.
