Chapter 2 - THE RED KNOT
“Vincent.”
Cassandra Vale said his name softly, as though she were the only calm person in the room.
Vincent Moretti did not look at her.
His eyes remained on the bottle in Lily’s hands.
“Give it to me.”
Lily’s little shoulders stiffened.
“He’s hungry.”
“I know.”
Something changed in Vincent’s voice.
Not softer exactly.
Careful.
“I’m not angry with you, sweetheart.”
Lily looked at me.
I nodded.
“Give Mr. Moretti the bottle, baby.”
She slowly pulled it away from Enzo.
The baby immediately began crying.
Vincent took the bottle.
His thumb touched the red strip of cloth.
Then he looked at me.
“You tied this?”
“I tied the tag.”
My head still felt as if the kitchen floor were moving beneath me.
“But not like that.”
Mrs. Hargrove stepped closer.
“Perhaps it loosened.”
“No.”
Everyone looked at me.
I pushed myself onto one elbow.
“I tie two loops.”
Vincent’s gaze sharpened.
“Why?”
“So I know if the bottle has been opened.”
Silence.
Norah Wickham’s face changed first.
Only slightly.
But Vincent noticed.
“So you expected someone to open my son’s bottles?”
“No.”
I swallowed.
“I was afraid someone already had.”
Cassandra finally turned toward me.
“What an extraordinary accusation.”
“I didn’t accuse anyone.”
“You just implied someone has been tampering with Enzo’s food.”
“I said I became concerned.”
Vincent walked toward me.
“Why?”
The room seemed to shrink.
For three weeks, I had told myself I was imagining things.
I was only Elena Hart.
Assistant housekeeper.
Single mother.
Temporary employee.
Women like Cassandra had family names carved into buildings.
Norah had credentials.
Mrs. Hargrove had seventeen years of loyalty.
Who would believe me?
But I was already lying on the floor.
Lily had been left holding a bottle that should not have been touched.
There was nothing left to protect by staying quiet.
“Enzo started acting strange after feedings.”
Vincent stopped.
“Strange how?”
“Too sleepy sometimes.”
Norah interrupted.
“Babies sleep.”
“Not like that.”
Her eyes hardened.
“You’re not medically trained.”
“No.”
I looked at Vincent.
“But I am a mother.”
That landed differently.
I continued.
“Twice last week he cried before bottles, then became so sleepy afterward I had trouble waking him while changing his clothes.”
Norah folded her arms.
“He has been evaluated.”
“By the doctor you selected.”
Her face went still.
Cassandra spoke.
“That is enough.”
Vincent finally looked at her.
“No.”
One word.
The room obeyed it.
He crouched beside me.
“What happened this morning?”
“I was washing breakfast dishes.”
“Then?”
“I heard Enzo crying.”
I closed my eyes, forcing the memory back.
“Norah wasn’t in the nursery. Mrs. Hargrove had gone upstairs. Lily was coloring at the kitchen table.”
Norah immediately said, “I was preparing—”
Vincent lifted one finger.
She stopped.
I continued.
“I warmed the bottle.”
“The one Lily was holding?”
“Yes.”
“I tied the red tag before warming it.”
“Two loops?”
“Yes.”
“What happened next?”
I remembered a cup.
Tea.
Someone setting it beside the sink.
“I drank my tea.”
“Who made it?”
My eyes opened.
I looked at Mrs. Hargrove.
She looked confused.
Then Norah.
Then Cassandra.
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know?”
“It was already on the counter.”
Vincent’s face became unreadable.
I pressed my fingers to my temple.
“I remember walking toward the nursery.”
The kitchen tilted in my memory.
“I heard Lily say my name.”
Then nothing.
Vincent stood.
“Dr. Romano.”
Mrs. Hargrove blinked.
“Sir?”
“Call him.”
“Immediately.”
“And nobody leaves this property.”
Cassandra stared at him.
“You cannot be serious.”
Vincent turned.
“I am completely serious.”
Her mouth tightened.
“I have a charity luncheon at noon.”
“Cancel it.”
“Vincent.”
“My nine-month-old son is drinking from a bottle that someone opened after Elena marked it.”
His voice dropped.
“And Elena collapsed thirty feet away.”
“No one leaves.”
This time Cassandra said nothing.
Dr. Luca Romano arrived nineteen minutes later.
He had treated the Moretti family long enough to enter without introductions.
He examined me first.
Blood pressure.
Pupils.
Pulse.
Then he smelled the tea cup.
“Don’t touch anything else.”
Vincent’s eyes darkened.
“Why?”
“Because we need it tested.”
Enzo was already crying again.
Dr. Romano examined him.
Then he took the bottle.
“What formula?”
Norah answered.
“Same as always.”
The doctor looked at her.
“Was anything added?”
“Vitamins.”
“What kind?”
She hesitated.
I saw it.
Vincent saw it too.
Norah recovered.
“The pediatric drops.”
Dr. Romano removed the bottle nipple and smelled the contents.
His expression changed.
“Enzo goes to the hospital.”
Cassandra stepped forward.
“For what?”
“I want toxicology.”
Vincent lifted his son from the crib himself.
Enzo immediately pressed his face into his father’s chest.
I had rarely seen Vincent hold him.
Not because he did not love him.
Because grief had made him afraid.
Enzo’s mother had died when he was four months old.
Since then, nurses and nannies had filled the spaces Vincent did not know how to enter.
Until now.
Lily tugged my sleeve.
“Mommy.”
“Yes?”
“I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“I gave baby Enzo the bottle.”
My heart twisted.
“You were helping him.”
Her lower lip trembled.
“He cried so much.”
I pulled her close.
“You didn’t do anything wrong.”
Vincent heard me.
For the first time, he looked at Lily not as the employee’s child who had wandered into the nursery.
He looked at her as the only person who had tried to comfort his son.
“Lily.”
She turned.
“Thank you for staying with him.”
She nodded seriously.
“He doesn’t like being alone.”
Something moved across Vincent’s face.
Pain.
Because perhaps the sentence was not only about Enzo.
Dr. Romano arranged for both Enzo and me to be tested.
Vincent refused to send me alone.
His security team drove us to a private hospital.
Cassandra insisted on coming.
Vincent refused.
That was the first time I saw fear behind her perfect expression.
Three hours later, Dr. Romano entered the consultation room carrying laboratory results.
Vincent stood.
“Well?”
The doctor shut the door.
“Elena had a sedating medication in her system.”
My blood went cold.
“I don’t take sedatives.”
“I know.”
Vincent asked the next question.
“And Enzo?”
Dr. Romano stared at him.
“The same class of medication.”
The room became silent.
Vincent’s face changed.
Not rage.
Something colder.
“How much?”
“Not enough to cause severe harm at the level we found today.”
“Today?”
Dr. Romano placed another report on the table.
“Enzo’s bloodwork suggests this may not have been the first exposure.”
My stomach dropped.
Vincent did not move.
“How long?”
“Weeks, possibly.”
The words barely left the doctor’s mouth before Vincent’s phone rang.
His head of security.
Vincent answered.
“Yes.”
He listened.
Then looked at me.
“What?”
I asked.
He lowered the phone.
“The nursery cameras stopped recording for seventeen minutes this morning.”
Dr. Romano frowned.
“Equipment failure?”
“No.”
Vincent’s voice became almost emotionless.
“Someone disabled them.”
Lily was sitting beside me coloring on a hospital brochure.
She suddenly looked up.
“The shiny lady did it.”
Every adult in the room froze.
I crouched toward her.
“What shiny lady?”
“The lady with white hands.”
My heart stopped.
Vincent slowly turned toward the hospital doorway.
Because only one woman in the Moretti mansion had walked through the nursery that morning wearing white satin gloves.
May you like
Cassandra Vale.
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