Chapter 1 - THE WAR OF THE NURSERY
The first morning began with a bucket of ice water balanced precariously over my bedroom door,
but I had spent a decade dodging swinging kitchen doors in crowded diners,
so I stepped aside before the handle even turned fully.
The heavy plastic pail crashed to the floor,
splashing freezing water across my shoes,
but I didn't blink.
Behind me,
Rosie gasped,
clutching her stuffed rabbit to her chest.
I looked at the three boys peeking from behind a marble pillar in the hallway,
their faces a mixture of shock and disappointment.
"You missed,"
I said calmly,
wiping a stray droplet from my cheek.
Leo,
the eldest by four minutes,
stepped forward with his chin held high.
"We didn't miss,"
he declared,
"we were just testing your reflexes."
"And?"
I asked,
crossing my arms.
"You're faster than the one who cried,"
Asher muttered,
adjusting his glasses.
"The one who cried was number fifteen,"
Nico added,
checking a small notebook he pulled from his pocket.
I realized then that they were keeping a tally,
a scorecard of psychological warfare.
I looked down at the mess on the floor,
then back at the three miniature versions of Matteo Ricci.
"Clean it up,"
I said,
my voice low and steady.
The boys laughed in unison,
a cold,
practiced sound.
"We don't clean,"
Leo said,
"we have people for that."
"Not today,"
I replied,
taking a step toward them.
"In this house,
I am the person in charge of you,
and I say that if you make a mess,
you fix it."
"Or what?"
Nico challenged,
his dark eyes flashing with the same fire I had seen in his father’s.
"Or there is no breakfast,"
I said,
shrugging my shoulders.
"And I happen to know the chef is making chocolate chip pancakes with whipped cream."
I could see the internal struggle on their faces,
the battle between pride and hunger.
Rosie stepped out from behind me,
her small voice ringing through the hall.
"My mommy makes the best pancakes,"
she said,
"but she only gives them to people who are nice."
The boys looked at Rosie as if she were a strange alien species.
They weren't used to children who weren't like them,
children who didn't have everything handed to them on a silver platter.
For a long moment,
the hallway was silent,
the tension thick enough to cut with a steak knife.
Then,
slowly,
Asher walked to the utility closet and pulled out a mop.
"Just this once,"
he grumbled,
"because I'm hungry."
I watched them work,
clumsy and annoyed,
while I stood guard.
I knew this was only the first skirmish in a much longer war.
They weren't just bad kids;
they were lonely kids wrapped in layers of privilege and grief.
By the time the floor was dry,
Henry appeared at the end of the hall,
his eyebrows shooting up toward his hairline.
"They are cleaning?"
he whispered,
completely baffled.
"They are learning,"
I corrected him.
As we walked down to the dining room,
I felt a pair of eyes watching us from the shadows of the upper balcony.
It was Matteo,
standing perfectly still,
observing the scene with an unreadable expression.
He didn't say a word,
but the way his hand gripped the railing told me he was surprised.
I led the four children to the table,
Rosie sitting cautiously between Leo and Asher.
The boys tried to ignore her,
but she kept offering them her stickers,
insisting that Nico needed a glittery dinosaur on his hand.
To my surprise,
he let her put it there.
I realized that these boys didn't need another nanny to fear them;
they needed someone who wasn't impressed by their father's name.
They needed a mother,
even if they didn't know it yet.
But as I looked at the security cameras tucked into the corners of the ceiling,
I remembered where I was.
This wasn't a normal home,
and these weren't normal children.
May you like
They were heirs to an empire built on blood,
and someone was always waiting for the king to fall.
