Chapter 3 - THE WOMAN WHO WOULDN’T LEAVE
By the time Damian reached Room 104, two physicians were already surrounding Beatrice.
A portable monitor screamed beside the bed.
One nurse adjusted oxygen.
Another prepared an injection.
Damian stopped in the doorway.
Tessa pushed past him.
“Beatrice?”
The senior physician raised a hand.
“Please step back.”
Tessa obeyed.
Barely.
“What happened?” Damian demanded.
Dr. Samuel Reed, the private geriatric specialist Damian paid an obscene amount of money to remain permanently reachable, looked over.
“Likely aspiration combined with cardiac stress. Her oxygen saturation dropped rapidly.”
“Fix it.”
Reed’s face remained professional.
“We are.”
That answer had earned men broken teeth in Damian’s former life.
Tonight, it only made him feel powerless.
Beatrice’s body looked tiny beneath the white sheets.
Tessa stood beside the wall clutching Damian’s expensive coat around her shoulders.
She had forgotten she was wearing it.
Damian noticed.
He also noticed that her lips were silently moving.
“Are you praying?” he asked.
She glanced toward him.
“Yes.”
“You believe that works?”
“Sometimes.”
“And when it doesn’t?”
Tessa watched the doctors.
“You do it anyway.”
Twenty-eight minutes later, Beatrice stabilized.
Dr. Reed removed his glasses.
“She’s fragile, Damian.”
“I know.”
“No. I don’t think you do.”
Damian’s eyes cooled.
The doctor had known the Costa family for fifteen years and therefore enjoyed privileges other people did not.
“She needs calm routines. Familiar faces. Less clinical rotation. Fewer strangers entering and leaving.”
Reed looked toward Tessa.
“She responds to her.”
Damian followed his gaze.
Tessa seemed uncomfortable.
“She’s housekeeping.”
“Apparently she’s also the only person your mother reliably trusts.”
Tessa shook her head.
“I’m not trained.”
“You don’t need to become her nurse,” Reed said. “But companionship matters.”
Damian made the decision instantly.
“Tessa’s reassigned.”
Tessa turned.
“To what?”
“My mother.”
“No.”
Reed coughed.
A nearby nurse looked down.
Damian stared at Tessa.
“Excuse me?”
“I said no.”
“I heard you.”
“Then why did you ask?”
“I didn’t.”
“That’s the problem.”
Damian’s jaw flexed.
Tessa handed him his coat.
“I have two jobs. I have rent. I have bills. And I’m not trained for medical care.”
“Triple your salary.”
She stopped.
Damian continued.
“Forty dollars an hour. Full benefits. You work only here. No diner.”
Her face revealed exactly how enormous the offer was.
Then suspicion returned.
“And what do you expect in return?”
“To keep my mother calm.”
“Nothing else?”
The question irritated him because he understood it.
Money from powerful men often came with invisible strings.
“No.”
She studied him.
“Written contract.”
Damian blinked.
Paul, standing behind him, hid something that might have been amusement.
“Fine.”
“No live-in requirement.”
“Fine.”
“Regular hours unless it’s an emergency.”
“Fine.”
“Overtime.”
Damian stared at her.
“You’re negotiating with me while wearing twelve-dollar sneakers.”
“They’re fifteen-dollar sneakers.”
His mouth twitched.
“Anything else?”
“Yes.”
“What?”
“You visit her every day.”
The room became silent.
Damian’s expression hardened.
“That has nothing to do with your employment.”
“It does if I’m responsible for her emotional routine.”
“Tessa.”
“Thirty minutes.”
“You are testing the boundaries of your new position before you’ve accepted it.”
“Is that a yes?”
Damian looked at his mother.
Thirty minutes.
He could run entire criminal negotiations in less time.
“Twenty.”
“Thirty.”
“Twenty-five.”
Tessa extended her hand.
“Deal.”
Damian looked down at it.
Then shook.
Her palm was warm.
The cut had reopened.
Blood stained the edge of the bandage.
His eyes narrowed.
“Tomorrow morning you see a doctor.”
“I can handle—”
“That one is not negotiable.”
She sighed.
“Fine.”
From the bed, Beatrice suddenly spoke.
“You two argue like married people.”
Everyone froze.
Tessa’s face went scarlet.
Paul turned away completely.
Damian stared at his mother.
Beatrice opened one eye.
Then smiled.
For one impossible second, she looked exactly like the woman who had ruled the Costa dinner table thirty years earlier.
Damian started laughing.
The sound surprised everyone.
Most of all him.
Tessa smiled.
And something shifted.
---
The next morning changed the rhythm of the estate.
Tessa arrived not in gray housekeeping clothes but in jeans, a cream sweater, and the new soft-soled shoes Paul had quietly arranged after Damian insisted he had nothing to do with them.
She carried a notebook.
Damian arrived at exactly ten.
Tessa checked her watch.
“Twenty-six minutes late.”
“I run several businesses.”
“You agreed.”
“I’m here.”
Beatrice sat near the window.
Morning light illuminated her profile.
Tessa placed a second chair beside her.
Damian sat.
“What do I do?”
“Talk.”
“About what?”
“Something she remembers.”
Damian looked uncomfortable.
Tessa waited.
Finally he said, “Mother used to make Sunday sauce.”
Beatrice’s fingers moved.
Damian continued.
“She refused to let anyone else touch the pot.”
A faint smile appeared on Beatrice’s lips.
Damian noticed.
“She cooked enough for thirty people even when only six were coming.”
“Because your father ate like three men,” Beatrice murmured.
Damian froze.
Tessa smiled quietly.
For the next half hour, Damian talked.
He spoke about childhood dinners.
Christmas mornings.
A terrible vacation to Florida when Beatrice threatened to leave his father beside the highway.
Stories he had not thought about in decades returned.
Tessa listened.
Damian had spent half his life convincing himself his childhood contained only violence.
He had forgotten the laughter.
That frightened him more than the violence did.
When his thirty minutes ended, he stood reluctantly.
“I’ll return tomorrow.”
Beatrice did not respond.
But Damian saw Tessa’s approval.
He disliked how much he cared.
---
Three days later, someone tried to kill Tessa.
It happened in the employee parking garage.
She had stayed late because Beatrice refused to sleep.
Damian had already left for a meeting downtown.
At 10:14 p.m., Tessa walked toward the car Damian’s HR department had arranged through an employee transportation program she strongly suspected did not actually exist.
She heard footsteps.
Too fast.
A man emerged between two concrete pillars.
His face was hidden beneath a baseball cap.
“Tessa Miller?”
Her instincts screamed.
She turned.
The man grabbed her.
Tessa drove her elbow backward.
He cursed.
Something metallic flashed.
A knife.
She screamed.
The attacker slammed her against the car.
Then a gunshot exploded through the garage.
The man dropped.
Not dead.
His knee shattered.
Paul stepped from the stairwell with his weapon raised.
Two guards rushed forward.
Tessa slid to the pavement.
Paul crouched.
“Are you hurt?”
“I don’t think so.”
He examined her quickly.
“Who is he?”
The wounded attacker groaned.
One guard pulled away his cap.
Paul’s face changed.
Tessa saw it.
“You know him?”
Paul looked at her.
“No.”
“You’re lying.”
He stood.
“Take her inside.”
Tessa grabbed his sleeve.
“Paul.”
For the first time, the security chief appeared genuinely worried.
“This isn’t about your debt.”
Her stomach dropped.
“Then what is it about?”
Paul looked toward the bleeding attacker.
“We’re going to find out.”
But miles away, Damian already knew something was wrong.
His private phone rang during a meeting.
Paul spoke only four words.
“Someone came for Tessa.”
Damian rose.
The men around the table fell silent.
His expression was empty.
Terrifyingly empty.
“Alive?”
“Yes.”
Damian closed his eyes once.
Then opened them.
“Lock down the estate.”
One of the capos stood.
“What happened?”
Damian looked toward him.
And suddenly noticed something.
A tiny spot of blood on the man’s cuff.
Fresh.
Damian’s gaze lifted.
The capo slowly realized his mistake.
Damian smiled.
“Interesting evening, Victor.”
Victor Marino went pale.
And Damian understood that the attack on Tessa had never been about Tessa.
May you like
Someone was using her to reach him.
---
