Victor didn't ask Maria to repeat herself.

He simply stared at her.

"What do you mean?"

Maria gripped the railing.

"I saw things."

Serena stepped toward her.

"She's lying."

Maria recoiled.

Victor moved between them.

"Nobody speaks to her except me."

The command was calm.

Absolute.

Serena stopped.

Victor looked at Maria again.

"What did you see?"

Maria's eyes found Ethan.

He was curled against my chest, exhausted from crying.

"Miss Serena losing patience with him."

"When?"

Maria hesitated.

"More than once."

My stomach tightened.

I looked down at Ethan.

Suddenly memories I'd dismissed began rearranging themselves.

A bruise on his thigh three weeks earlier.

I'd assumed he'd hit the edge of his toy chest.

A red mark around his wrist.

Serena had said he'd gotten caught in his high-chair strap.

The way Ethan sometimes became strangely quiet when Serena entered a room.

The way he had started reaching for me whenever she approached.

I had noticed.

God help me, I had noticed.

But every incident had an explanation.

Toddlers fell.

Toddlers bruised.

Toddlers cried around people for reasons nobody understood.

And Serena was never openly cruel when Victor was home.

Never.

She became sweetness itself.

She bought Ethan expensive toys.

She kissed his forehead when Victor watched.

She posted carefully framed photographs of the three of them at charity events.

She told reporters she couldn't wait to become a mother.

I'd believed Ethan was simply struggling with change.

Now I wondered how many warnings I had explained away.

Victor's voice brought me back.

"Tell me everything."

Maria swallowed.

"The first time I saw it was maybe two months ago."

Serena shook her head.

"Victor, this is absurd."

He didn't look at her.

"Continue."

Maria's voice trembled.

"Mr. Ethan wouldn't eat. Miss Serena was feeding him while Lily was at the pharmacy."

I remembered that afternoon.

Serena had insisted she wanted time alone with Ethan.

She'd called it bonding.

"When he pushed the spoon away," Maria continued, "she grabbed his face."

Victor's jaw tightened.

"How?"

"Hard."

Maria touched her own cheeks.

"She squeezed until he cried."

I felt sick.

"Why didn't you tell me?"

Maria looked at me.

"I wanted to."

"Then why didn't you?"

Her eyes filled again.

"Because Miss Serena told me she'd have me fired."

Serena laughed once.

It sounded brittle.

"This is unbelievable."

Maria turned toward Victor.

"She said no one would believe a maid against the woman you were marrying."

The words were almost identical to what Serena had said to me.

Victor noticed.

His expression became colder.

"Was there anything else?"

Maria nodded.

"Once, in the nursery, he kept crying because he wanted Lily. Miss Serena shut the door and told me not to go inside."

"What happened?"

"I heard him crying."

"For how long?"

Maria looked down.

"Almost forty minutes."

My eyes burned.

I had been downstairs that evening organizing Ethan's clothes for a charity donation.

Serena had told me she had put him to sleep.

I remembered how quiet she'd been when she came downstairs.

How she'd poured herself wine.

How she'd smiled and said, "See? He doesn't need you every second."

My throat closed.

Victor turned to Serena.

"Did you leave my son alone crying for forty minutes?"

"No."

"Did you grab his face?"

"No."

"Did you twist his arm today?"

"No!"

She finally broke.

"This is insane! They're coordinating this!"

"Why?"

"Because they hate me!"

Maria stared at her.

I said nothing.

Serena pointed at me.

"Especially her."

Victor looked at me.

"Why would Lily hate you?"

Serena laughed bitterly.

"You really don't see it?"

"See what?"

"She's obsessed with this family."

I felt my face burn.

"There it is," Serena said. "She acts like Ethan belongs to her. She acts like this house belongs to her. She watches me constantly. She undermines everything I do."

"I protect Ethan."

"You're an employee!"

"And he's a child!"

Victor raised his voice.

"Enough!"

Ethan startled.

Victor immediately lowered his tone.

Dr. Harris arrived fifteen minutes later.

Those fifteen minutes felt like an hour.

Nobody was allowed to leave.

Victor called his head of security and ordered the mansion secured.

Then he asked for every available camera log from the previous three months.

Serena stared at him.

"You can't be serious."

Victor's eyes stayed on Ethan.

"I have never been more serious in my life."

Dr. Harris examined Ethan in the nursery.

I stood nearby because Ethan wouldn't let me go.

Victor stood on the other side.

Serena was not allowed inside.

The doctor moved Ethan's arm carefully.

Ethan whimpered.

I had to look away.

Finally, Dr. Harris exhaled.

"It doesn't appear broken."

Victor closed his eyes briefly.

"But?"

"There's an injury around the elbow. I want imaging done to be safe. With children this young, we don't guess."

"We'll go now."

Victor looked at me.

"You're coming."

I nodded.

As we left the nursery, Serena was waiting in the hallway.

"Victor."

He walked past her.

She grabbed his sleeve.

He stopped.

"Don't touch me."

I'd never heard him speak to her that way.

She released him.

"You're destroying our relationship because of a nanny and a maid."

Victor slowly turned.

"No."

He held up the recorder.

"I'm questioning our relationship because I heard your voice while my son screamed."

Serena had no answer.

Victor carried Ethan downstairs.

I followed.

As we reached the foyer, Maria called my name.

"Lily."

I turned.

She hurried toward me and pressed something into my hand.

A small silver button.

"What is this?"

Her voice dropped.

"From Ethan's cardigan."

I recognized it.

The cardigan he'd worn two weeks earlier.

One of the buttons had been missing when I collected it from the nursery floor.

I'd searched everywhere.

"Why do you have this?"

Maria looked toward the stairs.

"I found it in Miss Serena's dressing room."

I stared at her.

That didn't prove anything by itself.

But Maria wasn't finished.

"He was wearing that cardigan the day I heard him screaming behind the nursery door."

A chill moved through me.

"Why didn't you say this downstairs?"

"Because there's something else."

"What?"

Maria looked terrified.

"The cameras didn't just stop working today."

My heart began pounding.

"What do you mean?"

"Every time something happened with Ethan..."

She swallowed.

"...the camera nearby was already off."

---