THE OTHER MAIDS SENT ME TO THE MAFIA BOSS’S SILENT MOTHER TO GET ME FIRED—BUT WHEN SHE TAPPED THREE TIMES ON MY WRIST, I ANSWERED WITH A SECRET I WAS NEVER SUPPOSED TO KNOW. The first time Margaret Vale touched my hand, three housekeepers were standing outside the conservatory, waiting for me to make a fool of myself.

I didn't look back.

I grabbed Josie, who was screaming in terror, and shoved her behind the heavy oak door of the master bedroom. I grabbed the handles of Margaret's wheelchair, hauling it backward over the threshold just as a spray of bullets shattered the plaster wall where we had been standing.

"The closet!" I yelled at Josie. "Get in the closet!"

She scrambled under the hanging clothes, pulling her knees to her chest.

I slammed the bedroom door shut and threw the deadbolt. It wouldn't hold them for long, but it bought us seconds.

Margaret grabbed my arm. She pointed to a sleek, seamless panel on the far wall of the bedroom. The panic room.

I pushed her toward it, slapping my hand against the biometric scanner next to the panel. It blinked red. Access Denied.

"It only opens for Roman!" I panicked.

Margaret frantically tapped the panel. She pressed her own thumb against the scanner.

Green.

The wall slid open, revealing a steel-reinforced room with monitors and weapons. I pushed her wheelchair inside, then turned back to get Josie.

The bedroom door splintered. A heavy boot kicked through the wood.

"Go!" I yelled to Margaret.

I dove across the bed just as the door burst open. Two of Silas's men poured into the room. I grabbed Josie from the closet, dragging her to the floor as they raised their weapons.

But a shadow moved behind them.

Patricia.

She moved with terrifying, lethal grace. She didn't use her gun. She used a combat knife, dropping both men in total silence before they could pull their triggers. She stepped over their bodies, her leather jacket stained with blood.

"Get in the room," Patricia ordered, breathing heavily.

We scrambled into the panic room. Patricia hit the emergency lock, and the heavy steel door slid shut, plunging us into silence.

The monitors flickered on. We could see the living room through the security cameras. Roman was systematically taking down Silas's men, moving with the brutal, calculated efficiency of a man born into violence. But there were too many of them.

Mark was on the floor, bleeding out from a gunshot wound to the stomach.

"We can't stay here," Patricia said, rapidly loading a fresh magazine into her handgun. "They brought thermite. They'll burn through this door in ten minutes."

"There's an emergency chute," Margaret tapped out on the armrest, her eyes frantic. Patricia watched her fingers, reading the code. "It leads to the service tunnels beneath the building."

Patricia nodded. She pulled a lever on the wall. A section of the floor opened, revealing a dark, narrow slide.

"I'll hold them off," Patricia said, looking at me. "You take Margaret and the kid. Get to your apartment. Get the coat."

"I'm not leaving you or Roman!" I cried.

"You don't have a choice," Patricia snapped. "If Silas gets his hands on Margaret, he wins. Go!"

I grabbed Josie, holding her tight against my chest, and slid down the chute into the darkness. Margaret followed, her wheelchair abandoned in the panic room, descending via a small mechanical lift Patricia activated.

We landed in the damp, echoing service tunnels beneath the city.

The air smelled of rust and river water. I helped Margaret to her feet. She was frail, leaning heavily against my shoulder, but her eyes burned with determination.

"We have to walk," I whispered to Josie. "Can you be brave for Mommy?"

She nodded, tears streaming down her dirty face.

We moved through the tunnels for what felt like hours, emerging finally into a dark alleyway on the South Side. The rain was still coming down in sheets.

My apartment building was two blocks away.

We crept through the shadows, avoiding the streetlights. When we reached the back of my building, I saw them. Two black SUVs parked on the street. Men in suits standing by the front entrance, smoking cigarettes.

Silas's men.

"The fire escape," I whispered.

I carried Josie on my back, helping Margaret climb the rusted iron stairs. It was agonizingly slow. Margaret's breath hitched with every step, but she refused to stop.

We reached the third floor. My kitchen window was unlocked—it was broken and didn't latch properly. I pushed it open and helped them inside.

The apartment was pitch black. It smelled like cheap soap and old coffee. It was the only home I had ever known, but right now, it felt like a trap.

"Stay here," I whispered to Margaret and Josie, pressing them against the wall in the narrow hallway.

I crept into my tiny bedroom.

I opened the closet. Hanging in the back, wrapped in a plastic dry-cleaning bag, was Evelyn’s heavy wool coat. It was a dark, military-green trench coat, threadbare at the cuffs.

I pulled it down, my hands shaking.

I ran my fingers over the pockets. Empty. I checked the collar. Nothing.

"Come on," I muttered, tears of frustration pricking my eyes. "Where is it?"

I remembered Margaret's gesture. Pulling the collar up.

I grabbed the thick, padded shoulder of the coat. I felt the fabric between my fingers. There was a hard lump buried deep in the lining of the left shoulder pad.

I grabbed a pair of scissors from my nightstand and ripped the lining open.

Something heavy and metallic fell onto the bed.

It was a pocket watch. Gold, heavily scratched, attached to a broken chain.

I picked it up. I flipped the cover open.

The watch was broken. The hands were frozen at exactly 11:42.

But that wasn't what mattered. Etched into the inside of the gold cover was a tiny, intricate engraving. It wasn't words. It was a map. A schematic of the Chicago waterfront, with one specific warehouse marked with an 'X'.

Suddenly, a floorboard creaked in the living room.

I froze.

The front door hadn't opened. Someone had been waiting inside.

I gripped the scissors tightly, slipping the watch into my pocket. I crept out of the bedroom.

The lights flicked on.

Standing in the center of my small living room, holding a suppressed pistol aimed directly at Margaret's head, was Silas Vale.

He didn't look like a monster. He looked like an older, refined version of Roman. Silver hair, a bespoke suit, a charismatic but profoundly sad expression on his face.

"Hello, Lena," Silas said gently. "You have your mother's eyes."

Josie was crying, clinging to Margaret's leg.

"Let them go," I said, stepping forward, raising the scissors.

Silas smiled, a tragic, hollow thing. "I can't do that. Not until Maggie tells you the truth."

He looked down at Margaret.

"Tell her, Maggie," Silas whispered. "Tell the girl why you haven't spoken a word in three years. Tell her whose blood is on your hands."

Margaret stared up at Silas. Her chest heaved.

Then, she opened her mouth.