Chapter 1 - THE MAID WHO STOOD BETWEEN DEATH AND THE DEVIL|
The first gunshot shattered the chandelier above Julian Cross's head.
Crystal rained across the marble floor of his Manhattan mansion. Six masked men stormed into the living room, their black weapons raised, their boots crushing the fragments beneath them. Beyond the tall windows, Manhattan glittered beneath the midnight sky, completely unaware that one of the city's most feared men was about to be murdered.
Julian sat motionless in his wheelchair.
And I, the twenty-four-year-old maid who had spent three months caring for him, made the stupidest and bravest decision of my life.
I stepped between him and the guns.
"Don't touch him!"
My voice cracked, but I didn't move.
The tallest gunman tilted his head.
"Get out of the way, sweetheart."
"No."
"You're protecting the Black Devil?" He laughed. "Do you even know what he's done to people?"
I knew enough to understand that Julian Cross wasn't an ordinary employer. He controlled shipping companies, nightclubs, warehouses, and an underground network that powerful men pretended didn't exist. His enemies called him the Black Devil because men who crossed him rarely got a second chance.
But I also knew the man who woke from nightmares with his jaw clenched, who refused pain medication because he hated appearing weak, and who stared through his bedroom window long after everyone else had gone to sleep.
I knew the man who had once asked me why I treated him like a human being.
And I had promised him I would never abandon him.
"Move!" the gunman barked.
Behind me, Julian's voice was low and dangerous.
"Elena. Step aside."
I shook my head.
"They'll kill you."
"That isn't your concern."
"It became my concern when you hired me."
"You're risking your life for a man you barely know."
I turned just enough to look at him.
"Maybe you should have thought of that before making me care about you."
For one strange second, his gray eyes changed. The coldness disappeared, revealing something almost like pain.
Then the gunman raised his weapon.
"Last warning."
My knees trembled so badly that I could barely stand. I thought about my younger brother, Daniel, waiting for my next paycheck to cover his medication. I thought about my mother's funeral and the promises I'd made to the woman who had raised me alone.
I thought about dying on a marble floor in a mansion where nobody knew my real name.
And still, I refused to move.
"If you want him," I whispered, "you'll have to shoot me first."
The gunman took aim.
Julian placed his tattooed hands on the wheelchair's armrests.
Then he stood.
Not slowly. Not painfully. Not with the desperate effort of a man whose legs had supposedly failed him in a mountain-road accident.
He rose in one smooth motion, straightened his broad shoulders, and looked at the six armed men as though they were late for a meeting.
Every weapon lowered.
One of the gunmen removed his mask.
"Boss."
I couldn't breathe.
Julian stepped around me. His boots crunched over broken glass, and his massive frame blocked the nearest gunman from my view.
"Who authorized this?" he asked.
"The perimeter was compromised," the man answered. "We needed to make it look real."
"Then next time, don't fire above my head."
My stomach dropped.
Make it look real?
Julian turned toward me.
His expression was colder than I'd ever seen it.
"The test is over, Elena."
I stared at him.
"What test?"
He took another step.
"The one that tells me whether someone is loyal when they believe I can't protect them."
For three months, I had lifted his legs into bed, helped him bathe, pushed his wheelchair through the gardens, and stayed awake when he claimed the pain was unbearable.
I had believed he was broken.
He had watched me believe it.
"You can walk," I whispered.
"Yes."
"You've been able to walk this entire time?"
"Yes."
My eyes filled with tears.
"You let me think you were helpless."
"I needed to know who would remain beside me without the power, money, or fear that usually comes with my name."
I backed away from him.
"You could have asked me whether I was loyal."
"People lie when they're asked."
"So you made me your prisoner in a lie?"
His jaw tightened.
Before he could answer, another voice cut through the room.
"She didn't invent the lie, Julian."
A woman stood beneath the ruined chandelier, dressed in a black evening gown. Her dark hair was swept into a flawless knot, and her expression carried the kind of fear that expensive jewelry couldn't conceal.
Julian turned.
"Margaret."
His older sister stepped into the light.
"I arranged Elena's employment. I gave her the reference that got her through your security."
Julian's hands curled into fists.
"Why?"
Margaret looked at me, then at her brother.
"Because someone in our family has ordered your death."
Julian's expression changed.
Margaret swallowed.
"And Elena is the only person who can identify the person who gave the order."
I shook my head.
"I don't know what you're talking about."
Margaret's eyes filled with tears.
"Not yet," she whispered. "But you will."
Then she reached into her purse, pulled out a photograph, and placed it on the shattered glass between us.
The picture showed me standing outside a hospital room seven years earlier.
May you like
Beside me was a man I had believed was dead.
My father.
