Chapter 1
Damiano did not ask about the suitcase.
Not yet.
Marina nearly collapsed again when he tried to move her.
That made every other question irrelevant.
“Hospital.”
Helena pushed herself upright among the fallen baskets.
“She needs sleep, not an emergency room.”
Damiano looked at her.
Marina had given birth nine days earlier after a difficult labor and significant blood loss. Her doctor had discharged her with instructions to rest, continue iron supplementation, hydrate, avoid heavy lifting, and return immediately if she developed worsening weakness, dizziness, fever, severe pain, or abnormal bleeding.
Now she was barely conscious while standing beside a basket filled with wet table linens.
“Call the car,” Damiano said.
A bodyguard was already moving.
Helena tried again.
“You’re making this dramatic.”
Damiano ignored her.
He lifted Marina himself.
She clutched the front of his suit.
“The baby.”
“I have him.”
A housekeeper lifted the bassinet only after Marina saw who was doing it.
That detail disturbed Damiano.
His wife was afraid to let someone else touch their own son inside their own home.
Twenty minutes later, Marina was in a private emergency department.
The newborn, Nico, was examined separately and found healthy.
Marina was not.
She was significantly dehydrated, severely anemic from the recent delivery, sleep deprived, and showing signs that her recovery had been pushed far beyond what her physician had recommended.
There was no dramatic new hemorrhage.
No mysterious poison.
Something more ordinary had nearly put her back into the hospital.
Exhaustion.
Neglect.
And repeated physical strain during the most medically vulnerable days of her life.
Her obstetrician, Dr. Rachel Greene, looked at Damiano.
“Who has been caring for her at home?”
He hated the question.
“We have staff.”
“That isn’t what I asked.”
Damiano looked through the glass toward Marina.
“My mother has been staying with us.”
Rachel’s expression changed.
“Was your mother aware Marina had restrictions?”
“Yes.”
Damiano stopped.
He actually did not know that.
He had assumed.
That was different.
Rachel continued.
“Marina missed her postpartum follow-up two days ago.”
Damiano frowned.
“She did?”
Marina had told him the doctor moved it to the following week.
At least, that was what he remembered Helena telling him at breakfast.
He looked back at Rachel.
“Who canceled it?”
“That’s what I was going to ask you.”
Damiano’s stomach tightened.
He entered Marina’s room ten minutes later.
She was receiving fluids.
Her face looked impossibly tired.
He sat beside her.
“Why didn’t you tell me how bad it was?”
Marina’s eyes filled.
“I tried.”
Damiano went still.
“When?”
May you like
She looked at him as if the answer frightened her.
“Every day.”
