Chapter 6 - THE NANNY WHO OPENED THE DOOR
Threatening me was one thing.
Photographing a four-year-old child was another.
I ordered Marco to move Elena and Sophie into the secured family wing immediately.
“No arguments.”
Elena didn’t make any.
She simply held Sophie tighter.
By dawn, Marco had discovered how someone bypassed the estate’s power controls.
They hadn’t hacked their way inside.
An authorized employee had given them access.
The access badge belonged to Rebecca Shaw, the most experienced of my three private nannies.
Rebecca had cared for the triplets since they came home from the hospital.
She knew every feeding schedule.
Every allergy.
Every nighttime routine.
When Marco brought her into the library, she was already crying.
“I didn’t know what they were doing.”
“What did you do?” I asked.
She placed both hands over her mouth.
“A man contacted me six weeks ago.”
“What man?”
“He said he worked for a pediatric sleep technology company.”
Marco slid the ultrasonic emitter onto the desk.
Rebecca immediately went pale.
“He told me it was a new monitor.”
“You let him install it?”
“He had paperwork. He knew your children’s doctor. He knew the security schedule.”
Dr. Gable stepped forward.
“I authorized nothing.”
Rebecca began trembling.
“They offered me twenty thousand dollars.”
Elena stared at her.
“You took money?”
Rebecca looked ashamed.
“My mother needs long-term care. I thought it was harmless.”
“Who paid you?”
“I never met him.”
Marco pushed a photograph of Carlo across the table.
“This man?”
“No.”
The platinum-blonde woman?
Rebecca stared longer.
Then nodded.
“She was there.”
My pulse quickened.
“Name.”
“She called herself Evelyn.”
Marco searched the folder Lucia had left.
One company appeared repeatedly beside suspicious estate planning expenses.
Evelyn Mercer Consulting.
Rebecca described how Evelyn had instructed her to keep the nursery empty one afternoon while “technicians” installed new sensor equipment.
“How did they get onto the property?”
Rebecca began crying harder.
“Mr. Carlo cleared them.”
I called Carlo again.
This time he answered before the first ring finished.
“Adrien, I told you not to—”
“Who is Evelyn Mercer?”
Nothing.
Then I heard him exhale.
“My biggest mistake.”
“Try again.”
“She was your father’s attorney.”
My skin turned cold.
“My father has been dead for sixteen years.”
“I know.”
“What does she want with my children?”
Carlo’s answer came quietly.
“She doesn’t want the children.”
My hand tightened around the phone.
“What does she want?”
“The trust controlling everything they inherit.”
And then he told me the part Lucia had apparently discovered too late.
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If I were declared unable to raise my children...
Evelyn Mercer would control it.
