At 1:47 in the morning, I caught my housekeeper’s six-year-old daughter secretly cleaning my forbidden office with her baby sister tied to her back because she believed one unfinished room would cost her family their home. But before I could discover why her mother had disappeared, the little girl pointed at my bookcase and asked why a woman was crying inside a room no outsider knew existed.

The silence in the study was heavy, broken only by the sound of rain beating against the glass.

Victor realized he had lost all leverage. His chest heaved as he stared at me with pure, unadulterated venom. "It doesn't matter! Vance has three boatloads of armed men at the South Boston pier! If I don't check in by 4:00 AM, they’re going to storm this mansion and burn it to the ground with everyone inside!"

I checked my watch.

It was 3:20 AM.

"Frank," I said without taking my eyes off Victor.

"Yes, Boss?" Frank stepped forward.

"Take Victor down to the cellar. Tie him to the pipes. If Julian Vance's men show up here, shoot Victor first."

"Understood, Boss." Frank grabbed Victor by the collar, dragging the screaming traitor out of the study and down the back stairs.

I stood alone in the study for a long moment.

I walked over to the open vault, stepped down the concrete stairs, and approached the steel safe. I pulled out my father's brass key, inserted it into the lock, and turned it along with the combination dial I had memorized fifteen years ago.

The heavy vault door clicked open.

Inside lay three thick, leather-bound books.

The first two were financial ledgers detailing the Duca family's historical assets.

The third was a handwritten diary belonging to my father, along with a certified legal trust document dated eighteen years ago.

I opened the document under the beam of my flashlight.

It was a legal deed granting fifty percent ownership of the Beacon Hill mansion, along with a twenty-million-dollar trust fund, to Grace Harper and her legal heirs—as restitution for the wrongful conviction of her father, Thomas Harper.

My father hadn't kept Grace as a servant out of pity or cruelty.

He had kept her here under a false name to hide her from Victor and Julian Vance while the legal trust matured on her thirtieth birthday—which was next month.

My father had died of a sudden heart attack before he could execute the trust. And Grace, unaware of her true inheritance, had worked faithfully as a housekeeper, believing she was merely earning an honest living to feed her daughters.

Tears welled up in my eyes—a rare, unbidden emotion that caught me off guard.