Chapter 1 - THE MAN ON THE THRESHOLDGabriel Romano did not look like a man who walked alone into the servant quarters of his own properties. In Milwaukee, people whispered that his shadow alone could foreclose a business or buy a politician before breakfast. Yet here he stood in the falling February snow, his black wool coat unbuttoned at the collar, staring past Evelyn at a one-hundred-and-fifty-pound Cane Corso currently claiming her threadbare hearth rug as his personal estate.
"He has never stayed anywhere outside the kennel wing after dark," Gabriel said. His voice was lower than it had been in the courtyard, carrying that flat, level cadence that usually signaled someone was about to lose their job, their property, or worse.
"He isn't staying," Evelyn replied, keeping her hand on the edge of the wooden door. She could feel the chill coming off the lake through the warped frame. "He’s just visiting until the floor cools down."
"Titan does not visit." Gabriel stepped closer. The light from the cottage’s single overhead bulb caught the angles of his face—the straight nose, the small silver scar near his temple that nobody in the gossip columns ever mentioned because no reporter had lived long enough to ask about it twice. "He works. Or he stays in the main house."
"Well, he’s off the clock." Evelyn didn't move. Fourteen years of dodging bill collectors, abusive stepfathers, and suspicious landlords in three different states had taught her one vital instinct: never look like you are running, and never look like you are begging. "If you want him, you can call him. But I’m not dragging him out into the snow in these shoes."
She pointed down at her left foot. The heel of her second-hand flat was split completely across the sole, held together by a strip of black electrical tape she’d applied during her lunch break.
Gabriel’s eyes dropped to her shoe, then rose slowly back to her face. There was a strange stillness in him—not anger, but the cold calculation of a man weighing inventory.
"You're missing a button on your cuff," he noted.
"And you're missing an invitation."
A short, sharp sound cut through the wind. It took Evelyn a second to realize Gabriel Romano was actually laughing—a dry, humorless expulsion of air that seemed to surprise even him.
"You have been here seven days, Miss Hart."
"Six, if you don't count Sunday when I spent four hours cleaning grease out of the rotisserie because the previous cook had a nervous breakdown."
"It was his third one this winter," Gabriel remarked smoothly. He reached past her, his sleeve brushing her arm with the faint, expensive scent of cedar and rain. He didn't touch the dog. Instead, he pulled a small silver case from his pocket, flipped it open with his thumb, and extracted a thin black cheroot. He didn't light it; he simply rolled it between his fingers. "Titan didn't break Calvin's wrist."
Evelyn blinked. "Everyone in the kitchen said—"
"Calvin was using a shock collar hidden beneath the leather. Titan doesn't tolerate cowards who use electricity when they aren't strong enough to hold a leash." Gabriel’s dark eyes locked onto hers. "When you washed him today, you didn't touch the scars on his flank."
"They looked old. And they looked like they hurt."
"They were from a chain-link fence at a property in Racine we cleared out last spring. The previous owner thought starving an animal made him loyal." Gabriel finally looked down at the massive dog, who hadn't lifted his head from the rug. "Titan bit three men that night before they could open their cages. He didn't bite you when you dropped four gallons of water on his head."
"I apologized."
"So did Calvin. Five times before he threw up." Gabriel bit down slightly on the unlit cheroot. "Pack a bag."
Evelyn’s spine went rigid. "If this is about the water on the stones—"
"This is not about the water. The guest wing in the east turret is vacant. Rosa will have your things moved within the hour."
"I'm a maid, Mr. Romano. I clean the wainscoting and polish the silver in the formal dining room. I don't sleep in turrets."
"You do as of tonight," Gabriel said, turning back toward the idling black SUV parked by the gate. Over his shoulder, his voice cut through the snow like a scythe. "Because if that animal stays in this damp shed, he will have arthritis by morning, and if I have to listen to him scratch at your door at three a.m., I will fire the entire security detail for incompetence. Move your things, Evelyn. Victor will be back with the keys at eight."
The SUV’s taillights flared red against the white pines, then vanished down the private road.
Inside, Titan let out a long, heavy sigh, his massive paws twitching as he dreamed of something violent and cold.
May you like
Evelyn looked down at her taped shoe, then around the small, drafty room where she had finally begun to feel safe. She reached for her coat.
She didn't know it yet, but moving into the main house wasn't a promotion. It was the first step down into a cellar of blood, ledgers, and buried metal that Gabriel Romano had spent twenty years keeping locked away from the world—until a clumsy girl with lemon water on her hands dropped the key.
