Damian Volkov arrived at my apartment twenty-three minutes later.
Not a representative.
Not an attorney.
Him.
Two black SUVs stopped outside, and four men moved through the building before Damian came upstairs.
Marco stood beside me in his Yankees T-shirt, clutching his inhaler.
“You know that guy?” he whispered.
“Unfortunately.”
Damian entered the apartment and stopped when he saw the writing on the wall.
His expression didn’t change.
That scared me more than anger would have.
He looked at the broken lock.
The overturned furniture.
Then Marco.
“Are you hurt?”
Marco shook his head.
“Did you see who did this?”
“No.”
“Anyone unusual around the building?”
“A gray car.”
Damian’s eyes sharpened.
“What kind?”
“I don’t know. Fancy.”
Marco glanced at me.
“I’m fifteen, not a mechanic.”
One of Damian’s men coughed into his fist, hiding a laugh.
Damian didn’t.
But his eyes almost did.
Then he turned to me.
“Pack.”
“No.”
“Sofia.”
“My mother is in the hospital. Marco has school. We’re not disappearing because Cassandra Vale threw a tantrum.”
“This wasn’t a tantrum.”
“How do you know?”
He pointed toward the wall.
“Because Cassandra doesn’t get her own hands dirty.”
That stopped me.
“Then who did this?”
“That’s what I intend to find out.”
“I’m not going anywhere with a man who already investigated my entire family without permission.”
“You can hate my methods from somewhere secure.”
“I don’t hate your methods.”
“No?”
“I hate your assumption that you get to make decisions for me.”
Something passed through his face.
Respect, maybe.
Or irritation.
With Damian, they looked similar.
He lowered his voice.
“Someone entered your home less than an hour after you publicly defended my mother. If they’re willing to come here tonight, they’re willing to come back.”
Marco touched my arm.
“Sof.”
I looked at him.
He was trying to be brave.
He had been trying to be brave since Dad died six years earlier.
Fifteen-year-olds shouldn’t have to practice bravery that often.
I exhaled.
“One night.”
Damian nodded.
“One night.”
“You don’t believe that.”
“No.”
At least he was honest.
We packed two bags.
Before leaving, I took a picture of the lipstick message.
Damian noticed.
“Why?”
“Because people like Cassandra survive by convincing everybody that what happened didn’t happen.”
He studied me.
“Keep the picture.”
We went to St. Agnes first.
My mother, Rosa, was awake.
She looked smaller against the hospital pillows than she had a month earlier.
Her lungs had been damaged by complications after pneumonia, and recovery had been painfully slow.
When Damian entered behind me, she immediately looked from him to me.
“Sofia.”
“Mom.”
“Who is the handsome undertaker?”
Marco burst out laughing.
I closed my eyes.
“Mom.”
Damian actually smiled.
“Damian Volkov, ma’am.”
“Rosa Reyes.”
They shook hands.
My mother looked at his suit.
Then his security man outside the door.
Then me.
“What did you do?”
“Why do you assume I did something?”
“Because expensive men don’t follow you into hospitals when nothing happened.”
I told her.
Not everything.
Enough.
When I finished, she looked at Damian.
“You hired my daughter because she stopped somebody from hitting your mother?”
“Yes.”
“She has no medical training.”
“I know.”
“She argues.”
“I noticed.”
“She doesn’t listen.”
“I noticed that too.”
My mother smiled.
“Then perhaps you deserve each other.”
“Mom!”
Damian looked away, but I saw the corner of his mouth move.
Then he did something I didn’t expect.
He pulled a chair beside my mother’s bed.
“Mrs. Reyes, your daughter is worried that accepting help from me means owing me something.”
“She gets that from her father.”
“I need her to understand that your treatment will be covered regardless of whether she finishes the thirty days.”
I stared at him.
“That wasn’t the agreement.”
“It is now.”
“Why?”
He looked at me.
“Because medical care shouldn’t be leverage.”
For the first time since meeting him, I had no comeback.
My mother watched us both.
Carefully.
Then she said, “Sofia, take the job.”
“Mom—”
“You stopped that woman because somebody needed help.”
“Yes.”
“Maybe now somebody is helping you.”
That night we slept at the Volkov residence on the Upper East Side.
Calling it a residence was ridiculous.
It was a limestone mansion with iron gates, private security, marble staircases, and a library larger than our apartment.
Elena was waiting in the sitting room.
“You came.”
“Temporarily.”
“Excellent. Damian needs more temporary people. Permanent ones make him arrogant.”
“Mother.”
She ignored him.
Elena had lost much of her mobility after a stroke eighteen months earlier. She could move one leg better than the other and had strength in both arms, but fatigue made daily tasks difficult.
The strange thing was that she didn’t need someone to baby her.
She needed someone to stop everyone else from babying her.
The next morning, I understood immediately.
A nurse tried to choose Elena’s breakfast.
A physical therapist spoke to Damian instead of her.
A housekeeper moved her handbag out of reach “for safety.”
By 9:15, Elena looked ready to throw something.
So I did what I apparently did best.
I interfered.
“She said she wants coffee.”
The nurse frowned.
“Mrs. Volkov is supposed to limit caffeine.”
“One cup,” Elena said.
The nurse looked at Damian.
I stepped between their sightlines.
“She’s sitting right there.”
Damian watched me.
The nurse blinked.
Elena smiled.
By noon, I had rearranged Elena’s side table so she could reach her phone, changed her therapy schedule because she hated early mornings, and convinced the chef that “low sodium” did not mean “food without a soul.”
At lunch Elena asked, “Are you always this bossy?”
“Yes.”
“Wonderful.”
Damian was standing in the doorway.
“Don’t encourage her.”
Elena looked at him.
“You hired her.”
“An error I’m beginning to appreciate.”
I looked at him.
“Was that almost a joke?”
“No.”
“It was.”
“I don’t joke.”
“That sounds exhausting.”
Elena laughed so hard she started coughing.
Damian immediately moved toward her.
She held up one hand.
“I’m fine.”
He stopped.
That was when I saw it.
His fear.
Not the polished businessman.
Not the rumored criminal power broker people whispered about.
A son terrified of losing his mother.
That afternoon, Elena fell asleep after therapy.
I went downstairs and found Damian in his office.
“Can I ask you something?”
“You usually do without permission.”
“Why does everyone call you dangerous?”
His gaze lifted from a folder.
“That’s your question?”
“It’s one of several hundred.”
“Some answers would make your thirty days uncomfortable.”
“Try me.”
He leaned back.
“My family owns legitimate companies. Hotels. Shipping. Real estate. Security.”
“And?”
“And my father built parts of that empire with men who did not always solve problems legally.”
“Did you?”
His expression became unreadable.
“I inherited enemies along with companies.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
“No.”
Silence stretched.
Then I noticed the folder on his desk.
VALE FOUNDATION.
“Is that Cassandra?”
“Yes.”
“What are you auditing?”
“Something that began before last night.”
I remembered his first phone call.
Freeze the Vale review.
“Cassandra was already being investigated.”
“Yes.”
“For what?”
“Money disappearing from a charitable housing fund.”
“How much?”
“Eleven million dollars.”
My stomach turned.
“The gala last night was raising money for housing.”
“Yes.”
“And she may have been stealing from it?”
“Yes.”
“Does she know you were investigating?”
“She suspected.”
I slowly sat down.
“So what happened to Elena might not have been random.”
Damian’s jaw tightened.
“That possibility has occurred to me.”
“Why would she target your mother?”
“To provoke me. Distract me. Make me act emotionally.”
“Did it work?”
He looked at me.
“Ask Cassandra tomorrow.”
That answer chilled me.
Before I could speak, his phone rang.
He listened for ten seconds.
Then stood.
“What happened?”
His gaze moved toward the window.
“The gray car Marco saw.”
My pulse jumped.
“They found it?”
“Yes.”
“Who owns it?”
“Vale Holdings.”
My anger came hot and immediate.
“So Cassandra did this.”
“Maybe.”
“Maybe?”
“Obvious evidence is sometimes evidence someone wants you to find.”
That was the first time I understood why Damian was still alive in a world full of people who wanted his power.
He didn’t just look at what was in front of him.
He looked at who benefited from him believing it.
His phone rang again.
This time his expression changed.
“Where?”
He listened.
Then his eyes met mine.
“Lock the house down.”
“What happened?”
He crossed toward me.
“Someone tried to enter St. Agnes using credentials from my security company.”
Everything inside me went cold.
“My mother?”
“She’s safe.”
“Marco?”
“Here.”
“Who were they after?”
Damian didn’t answer immediately.
He didn’t need to.
Because the fake security officer had asked hospital staff one specific question.
What time Sofia Reyes usually visited her mother.
And suddenly Cassandra wasn’t the only person I needed to fear.
Someone inside Damian Volkov’s world knew my schedule.