Chapter 2 - The Silent Prince
Just forty-eight hours earlier, the Mercer estate had felt like an elegant prison.
Nora had taken the job as live-in governess and maid three months ago through an anonymous agency. She needed the money to pay for her younger sister’s leukemia treatments, but the moment she walked through the iron gates of the Mercer compound, she realized this wasn't an ordinary mansion. It was a fortress run by Julian Mercer, a man whose legitimate shipping empire veiled one of the most ruthless syndicates in North America.
Julian was a ghost in his own home. He arrived at midnight and left before sunrise, leaving his five-year-old son, Theo, in the care of rotating nannies who never lasted more than a week. Theo hadn't spoken a single word since the car crash that took his mother two years ago. The psychologists called it selective mutism.
Victoria Sterling, the daughter of a corrupt state senator, treated Theo like an inconvenient dog. Her engagement to Julian was a calculated political alliance arranged by the syndicate elders, and she made sure everyone beneath her knew their place.
"You missed a spot on the baseboard, orphan," Victoria sneered on Tuesday morning, kicking Nora’s cleaning bucket over with the sharp tip of her red Christian Louboutin heel. Murky soapy water splashed across Nora’s skirt and soaked into the antique Persian rug. "Clean it with your hands. And keep that mute little freak out of my sight. His staring gives me a headache."
Nora’s fingers tightened around her rag, her fingernails biting into her palms. She swallowed her pride, dropping to her knees to mop the spill. But when she looked up, she saw Theo standing behind the heavy velvet drapes, his small hands trembling, clutching a wooden toy train.
Nora caught the boy’s eye and gave him a gentle, reassuring smile. She whispered softly under her breath, "It's okay, little bear. I've got you."
Theo blinked, his big hazel eyes softening. In three months, Nora was the only person in that cold stone palace who had ever spoken to him like he had a soul.
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👉 What Victoria didn’t realize was that Nora had seen where she hid the little glass vial inside Theo’s daily juice box.
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