Paolo Ventresca came home from a five-day trip and found his six-week-old daughter being held dangerously over a fire.

Elise refused to sleep at the estate that night.

Paolo did not argue.

His wife had given birth six weeks earlier. Since Ava came home from the hospital, Carmela had visited almost daily and Talia had appeared nearly as often.

Paolo had considered it family support.

Elise had experienced it differently.

“They corrected everything I did,” she told him from the back seat as they drove toward a townhouse Paolo kept in Manhattan.

“How I held her. How long I fed her. What she wore. Whether I let her sleep too much.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I did.”

Paolo looked at her.

“When?”

“Three days before you left.”

He remembered the conversation.

Elise had said his mother was overwhelming her.

Paolo had kissed her forehead, told her Carmela meant well, and promised the tension would settle down.

Then he went on his trip.

He looked toward the baby carrier.

“That was my mistake.”

Elise did not reassure him.

At the townhouse, a pediatrician who had treated the Ventresca family for years examined Ava.

She was healthy.

That should have made Paolo feel better.

It did not.

Afterward, Elise showed him something Carmela had given her shortly after announcing his supposed death.

A folder.

Inside was a temporary guardianship authorization placing Ava in Carmela’s care if Elise became “medically or emotionally unable” to care for the child.

Paolo read it twice.

“You signed this?”

“No.”

“She asked you to?”

“She said you would’ve wanted it.”

Another document concerned temporary voting authority over several Ventresca family trusts until Paolo’s estate could be settled.

The proposed trustee was Talia.

Paolo’s expression hardened.

“That isn’t what my estate plan says.”

Elise looked at him.

“They told me everything had to happen fast.”

“How fast?”