Chapter 1 - THE WEIGHT OF SCARS IN THE DARK
The copper pan was already gleaming.
I could see my reflection in it, distorted and grotesque.
The left side of my face was a canvas of deep purples and angry reds.
The cold water from the tap numbed my fingers, but it couldn't touch the fire burning in my jaw.
I was thirty-one years old, a ghost in Boise’s most feared mansion.
I was the girl who vanished into the wallpaper whenever the heavy doors opened.
I was Ivy, the invisible maid.
But tonight, I felt every bit of my existence through the throb of my injuries.
Rocco had been waiting for me near the service entrance.
He was a man who thrived on the fear of those beneath him.
He was a captain in the DeLuca hierarchy, a man who thought the world was his for the taking.
When he cornered me, he didn't see a human being.
He saw a toy.
A nuisance.
"Nobody cares about a maid, Ivy," he had whispered, his breath smelling of expensive cigars and cheap cruelty.
He told me Carmine DeLuca wouldn't even remember my name if I disappeared.
Then he showed me exactly how little my safety mattered to him.
The blow had sent me spiraling into the gravel.
My uniform tore as I scrambled to get away.
I didn't scream.
I knew better than to scream in a house filled with wolves.
I had dragged myself back inside, hidden in the shadows of the servant’s quarters, and waited.
I waited until I thought the world was asleep.
Then I went to the kitchen.
If I kept working, I could pretend it didn't happen.
If the kitchen was spotless, I still had a job.
And I needed this job more than I needed my own dignity.
My mother was lying in a hospital bed across town.
Her lungs were failing, and the bills were a mountain I couldn't climb.
Fifty thousand dollars.
That was the price of her life.
To Rocco, it was a weekend at the casino.
To me, it was the reason I stayed silent while my blood dripped into the sink.
Suddenly, the kitchen doors swung open.
The air in the room shifted instantly.
It became heavy.
It became charged with a terrifying authority.
Carmine DeLuca walked in.
He wasn't the monster the tabloids described, nor was he the saint the charities praised.
He was a force of nature in a tailored white shirt.
His sleeves were rolled up, revealing forearms that looked like they were carved from granite.
I immediately looked down at the copper pan.
My heart was a frantic drum against my ribs.
“I’m sorry, sir,” I whispered, my voice cracking.
“I’ll finish cleaning and leave.”
I waited for him to snap at me for being in his sight.
I waited for the dismissal.
Instead, I heard the heavy "click" of the deadbolt.
My knees nearly buckled.
I thought Rocco had sent him.
I thought this was the end.
But Carmine didn't move toward me with the intent to harm.
He walked to the sink and reached past my shaking hands.
He turned off the faucet.
The sudden silence was louder than the running water.
“Look at me, Ivy.”
The way he said my name sent a shiver down my spine.
It wasn't a threat.
It was a command.
I slowly lifted my head, trying to keep the bruised side of my face in the shadow.
But Carmine was a man who noticed everything.
He reached out, his fingers surprisingly gentle, and tilted my chin toward the light.
I saw his eyes.
They weren't filled with the boredom I expected.
They were filled with a cold, terrifying clarity.
He saw the torn fabric.
He saw the swelling.
He saw the fear I had been trying to bury under the suds and the copper polish.
“Who did this?” he asked.
The question wasn't just a query.
May you like
It was the beginning of a storm.
***
