Chapter 3
The police took Camille’s statement in the east sitting room.
They took mine in the library.
Nico refused to be separated from the office until every document had been photographed.
I watched him from the doorway while Detective Mara Bell examined the safe.
He sat in his chair, one hand resting on the wheel, his face carved from stone.
But I had learned his pain signals.
The tightening around his mouth.
The way his shoulders lifted when spasms started.
The pale edge beneath his eyes.
He was hurting badly.
He would rather have swallowed glass than admit it in front of Arthur Ashcroft.
I stepped into the room.
“You need medication.”
Nico did not look at me.
“Not from that cabinet.”
“I have sealed backup doses from the pharmacy delivery. The ones I signed for personally.”
Detective Bell looked up.
“You sign for his medication?”
“Yes.”
“Always?”
“Since I arrived.”
She wrote that down.
Nico’s eyes stayed on the forged power of attorney.
“I want blood tests.”
I nodded.
“I was going to suggest that.”
His mouth tightened.
“Were you?”
“Yes. Because if someone has been drugging you, your body can say what your pride won’t.”
Detective Bell almost smiled.
Nico did not.
But he let me wheel him toward the medical room.
Arthur stepped into our path.
“This has gone far enough.”
Nico looked up at him.
“You are standing in my house beside a forged document that gives you my company.”
Arthur’s face hardened.
“You’ve been unstable since the crash. Camille was trying to protect your family from your decline.”
“My decline?”
“You are not the man you were.”
The words hit Nico.
I saw it.
So did Arthur.
He leaned closer.
“You know it. Everyone knows it.”
For one breath, Nico went still.
Then he said, “Move.”
Arthur didn’t.
So I did.
I stepped between them and pushed the wheelchair forward.
Arthur had to step back or let the chair hit his shoes.
His eyes flashed toward me.
“You are becoming very bold for a nurse.”
I looked at him.
“And you are very close to interfering with medical care.”
Detective Bell moved beside us.
“Let him pass.”
Arthur stepped away.
Camille watched from the hall with red eyes and clenched fists.
When she saw Nico leave without looking at her, something in her face broke.
Not her heart.
Her plan.
In the medical room, I drew his blood while Marcus stood outside the door.
Nico watched the needle enter his arm.
“You suspected before tonight.”
“Yes.”
“For how long?”
“Three weeks.”
His eyes lifted.
“And you said nothing.”
“I needed proof.”
“You should have told me.”
“You didn’t trust me.”
He looked away.
That was true, and we both knew it.
When I first arrived, Nico counted every pill after I set them out.
He checked every injection label twice.
He refused help with transfers until exhaustion forced him to accept it.
He had trusted no one.
Now he looked at me like my silence had wounded him.
That surprised me.
“You also would have fired me,” I said.
“I might have.”
“And then Camille would still be standing in that foyer.”
His jaw flexed.
“What did you find?”
I took a breath.
“Your night doses made you too drowsy. More than they should. You lost time after evening medication, but only when Camille was home.”
He stared at me.
“Go on.”
“Your pain bottle had different tablets mixed in. Same color. Different imprint. I kept two.”
“Where?”
“In my room.”
“Show me.”
“After your blood draw is labeled and handed to Detective Bell.”
“You don’t take orders well.”
“I take medical ones. Not reckless ones.”
For the first time that night, he gave a short, humorless laugh.
Then the door opened.
Edna stood there, pale.
“Sir.”
Nico’s face sharpened.
“What?”
“They found Paula.”
My stomach sank.
Paula was the third nurse.
The one before me.
Everyone said she quit after a week.
“She’s outside the gate,” Edna whispered. “She says she won’t come in unless Miss Marsh comes to her.”
Nico looked at me.
I didn’t understand why.
Then Detective Bell came in.
“Paula Reyes?”
Edna nodded.
Detective Bell’s expression changed.
“We’ve been trying to locate her for two months.”
Nico’s voice dropped.
“Why?”
“Her sister reported her missing after she left this job.”
The room went cold.
I thought of the caller telling me the household had difficulty retaining nurses.
Three since June.
I thought of Camille saying I had no idea what I was interfering with.
I thought of the pills hidden upstairs.
“I’ll go,” I said.
Nico’s hand caught my wrist.
Not hard.
Enough.
“You don’t go alone.”
“I won’t.”
Detective Bell and Marcus escorted me down the drive.
The iron gates were open.
A woman stood just beyond them in the rain.
She was thin.
Soaked.
Terrified.
“Paula?” I asked.
She began to cry.
“I tried to warn the others.”
Detective Bell stepped forward.
“Who threatened you?”
Paula looked past us at the house.
“Camille.”
Then she saw Nico watching from the doorway behind us.
Her voice broke.
“Mr. Alfieri, they weren’t only drugging you.”
Nico went still.
May you like
Paula sobbed.
“They caused the crash.”
