Those were the words that followed Ethan Caldwell all the way back to Washington.

The air in the grand foyer felt like dry ice.

Ethan Caldwell didn’t move. His tall frame—accustomed to commanding boardrooms from Manhattan to Zurich—remained frozen in the center of the hand-woven Persian rug. Nico’s tiny hands were clutching the fabric of his tailored trousers, while Leo, sitting by Lena’s bare knees, looked up with wide, solemn hazel eyes that were an exact mirror of Ethan’s deceased wife, Claire.

“Bad Nana,” Nico repeated, burying his cheek into Ethan’s shin.

Lena Morales stood up slowly. Her hands, still encased in the bright yellow rubber gloves she had been using to play an impromptu game of “sea monster” with the twins, trembled. She pulled the gloves off with a sharp snap of latex, her knuckles white, her skin flushed red.

“Mr. Caldwell,” Lena whispered, her voice shaking so hard it cracked. “I… you weren’t supposed to be back until Friday.”

“I asked you a question, Lena,” Ethan said, his voice dropping to that lethal, quiet baritone that made corporate executives sweat through their shirts. “Why did my son just call you *Mama*? And why is he pointing at Margaret’s door?”

Before Lena could answer, the heavy oak door at the far end of the eastern corridor clicked open.

Out stepped Margaret Vance.

At sixty-two, Margaret moved with the chilling elegance of an antique clock: precise, unyielding, and impossible to ignore. She wore her signature charcoal-grey wool dress, her silver hair pinned into a bun so tight it pulled the skin around her eyes taut. For five years, Margaret had been the rock of the Caldwell estate. She had been Claire’s godmother. When Claire died thirty-six hours after delivering the twins due to sudden postpartum hemorrhaging, it was Margaret who had stepped into the vacuum of grief, taking over the household, managing the staff, and hand-picking the revolving door of nannies Ethan hired.

Margaret stopped dead in her tracks when she saw Ethan standing in the foyer, his cashmere overcoat slung over an armchair, his carry-on bag tucked beside the credenza.

For a fraction of a second, raw panic flashed across Margaret’s face—so fast that a lesser man would have missed it. But Ethan had spent fifteen years reading hostile takeovers in the twitch of an opponent’s jaw.

“Ethan?” Margaret gasped, pressing a manicured hand to her chest. “Merciful heavens. You nearly gave me an attack. What on earth are you doing here? Did the Swiss negotiations collapse?”

“They never began,” Ethan said without looking at her. His eyes remained locked on Lena, who had stepped back until her spine hit the floor-to-ceiling bookshelf. She was subtly shifting her body, positioning herself directly between Margaret and the twins.

It was an instinctive, protective reflex. An animal standing between a predator and her cubs.

Margaret’s gaze flicked to the mess on the hardwood floor: the overturned sofa cushions, the bright red plastic fire truck, the fleece blankets smelling of warm baby lotion and toast. Her lips thinned into a razor blade.

“Look at this,” Margaret said, her tone instantly pivoting into manufactured grief and indignation. “I told you, Ethan. I told you on the phone before you boarded. The girl has no discipline. No respect for Claire’s memory. She treats this estate like a public playground. And the noise… she has riled these poor boys up to the point of hysteria.”

She advanced across the room, her leather heels clicking like gunshots on the parquet floor. “Come here, Nico. Come to Nana, darling.”

The reaction was instantaneous.

Nico let out a shrill, terrified shriek. He didn't just turn away; he scrambled backward on all fours until his tiny forehead slammed softly against Lena’s shin. He reached up, grasping at the hem of Lena’s faded cotton cardigan, weeping hysterically.

“No! No Nana! Mama!” Nico sobbed.

Margaret’s face darkened with a rage so ugly it twisted her features. “She has poisoned their minds. Ethan, fire her right now. Call security. Have her escorted off the grounds before she causes permanent psychological damage!”

“Margaret,” Ethan said.

The word was quiet, but it dropped like an iron curtain.

Margaret stopped three feet away.

“Take the rest of the evening off,” Ethan ordered.

“What?” Margaret gasped. “Ethan, you can’t possibly allow her to—”

“I said, take the evening off. Go to your suite. Do not come out until breakfast tomorrow morning.”

“Ethan, I raised Claire! I have run this house since—”

“*Margaret.* Go.”

The silence that followed was suffocating. Margaret stared at Ethan, her jaw working as if she were chewing glass. Then, she shifted her eyes to Lena—a look of venomous, unadulterated hatred that promised pure destruction.

“You’ll regret this, Ethan,” Margaret whispered, turning on her heel and marching back toward the east wing. The sound of her bedroom door latching echoed like a pistol shot through the high ceilings.

Ethan waited until the sound faded completely. He turned back to Lena.

Her knees seemed to give out. She slid down the front of the bookshelf until she was sitting on the floor, both boys instantly crawling into her lap. Nico was hiccuping from crying, his tear-streaked face pressed into the crook of her neck, while Leo chewed nervously on her cardigan sleeve.

Ethan walked over, crouching down so his eyes were level with hers.