Clara Carter lay unconscious on the nursery floor in torn

The heavy, oppressive silence of the locked nursery was broken only by the ragged, terrified breathing of the fallen matriarch. Evelyn Carter stared up at her son, her fair, rosy complexion completely drained of color, replaced by the stark, ashen pallor of a cornered animal. She scrambled backward slightly, her hands slipping on the plush toys and scattered diaper boxes, trying to put distance between herself and the lethal, quiet fury radiating from Daniel.

"Daniel, please," Evelyn stammered, her crisp American accent fracturing into a pathetic, desperate whine. "You must understand. She is an outsider. She doesn't understand the discipline required to run an estate like ours. I was only trying to harden her. To make her worthy of the Carter name!"

"Worthy?" Daniel repeated, the word slipping from his lips like a drop of venom. He did not raise his voice. He shifted Noah gently to his shoulder, patting the newborn's back with a steady, rhythmic motion. "You sent a woman, recovering from major abdominal surgery, into a freezing cellar. You denied her medication. You forced her into hard labor."

"She is weak!" Evelyn shrieked, a brief flash of her old arrogance piercing through her terror. "If she cannot handle a mop, how can she handle the wives of the other bosses? I was testing her loyalty!"

"You weren't testing her loyalty, Evelyn," a trembling voice interrupted from the other side of the room.

Daniel turned his head slightly. Marissa, the young housekeeper, was kneeling beside Clara, gently pressing a cool, folded towel to the unconscious woman’s forehead. Marissa’s fair skin was flushed with tears, but her eyes burned with a fierce, protective anger. She looked directly at the Mafia boss, ignoring the armed guards stationed at the doors.

"Tell him the truth, Evelyn," Marissa demanded, her voice shaking but resolute. She looked up at Daniel. "Boss... she didn't just make her clean. Yesterday, when Clara couldn't stand up anymore, Evelyn brought Victor down to the cellar. They took away her blankets. They poured freezing water over her while she begged for her baby. Victor told her that you had signed the divorce papers while you were out of town, and that they were going to put Noah in an orphanage."

The temperature in the bright, cinematic room seemed to plummet below freezing.

"They told her..." Daniel began, his voice dropping into a register so dark it barely sounded human. "That I abandoned her."

"Yes," Marissa sobbed, stroking Clara’s matted hair. "They broke her mind, Mr. Carter. They wanted her to give up and die down there so you wouldn't have to legally divorce her."

Daniel slowly turned his gaze back to Evelyn. The matriarch was shivering uncontrollably now, pressing herself flat against the baseboards beneath the ruined nursery display.

"Is it true?" Daniel whispered.