Chapter 2 - THE PILLS THAT DIDN’T BELONG TO HIM
By the end of Adeline Marsh’s first week inside the Alfieri estate, she had learned three important things about Nico Alfieri.
The first was that he hated the word help.
The second was that pain made him quieter, not louder.
The third was that someone in that house was lying about his medication.
She noticed because nurses were trained to notice boring things.
Colors.
Shapes.
Timing.
Blood-pressure trends.
The difference between a patient saying I’m tired and a patient whose body was being pushed toward unconsciousness.
Nico’s chart said his evening medications should reduce neuropathic pain and muscle spasms without heavily impairing cognition.
But twenty to thirty minutes after the pills arrived each night, his speech slowed.
His hands trembled.
His blood pressure dropped.
His eyes became unfocused.
And by nine-thirty, the man who had spent the day reviewing contracts and arguing with physical therapists sometimes struggled to follow a three-sentence conversation.
Everyone blamed the spinal injury.
Adeline did not.
On her eighth night, she carried the medication cup into Nico’s library.
He sat behind the desk with reading glasses low on his nose.
He looked up.
“You’re late.”
“Four minutes.”
“I noticed.”
“You should find a hobby.”
“I have several.”
“Terrifying people doesn’t count.”
“It pays better than golf.”
Adeline placed the cup down.
Nico reached for it.
She did not release it.
His eyes lifted.
“What?”
“I need to check something.”
“You checked it upstairs.”
“Yes.”
“And?”
“Again.”
His mouth flattened.
“You have developed a dangerous attachment to my pills.”
“Maybe they’re charming.”
“Adeline.”
She picked up one of the white tablets.
The imprint was faint.
Almost right.
Almost.
But not the same as the medication supplied three mornings earlier.
“What did this look like yesterday?” she asked.
Nico stared at her.
“You’re asking the man on six prescriptions to identify tablet markings?”
“Yes.”
“I hired you specifically so I wouldn’t need to.”
Fair.
She photographed the pill.
Then the bottle.
Then opened Nico’s medication administration record.
The pharmacy label matched the prescription.
The tablet did not.
Her stomach tightened.
“Don’t take these yet.”
Nico’s expression changed.
Not fear.
Irritation.
“Why?”
“I said yet.”
“I heard you.”
“Then we’re making progress.”
He leaned back.
“Explain.”
Adeline looked toward the library doors.
Closed.
She lowered her voice.
“The pills inside this bottle may not be what the bottle says they are.”
For the first time since she met him, Nico Alfieri went completely still.
“What do you mean may?”
“The imprint doesn’t match the medication I expected.”
“You’re sure?”
“No.”
That answer surprised him.
Adeline continued.
“That’s why I’m not accusing anyone.”
“Who prepares them?”
“House pharmacy delivery arrives sealed. I verify the label. Your evening dose is placed in the locked medication cabinet.”
“Who has access?”
“Me. Doctor Vargas. The previous nursing supervisor.”
“Family?”
“Not officially.”
Nico’s gaze sharpened.
“Officially.”
Adeline nodded.
“Your uncle has the administrative override code.”
“Carlo.”
“Yes.”
His uncle, Carlo Alfieri, had acted as interim head of the family’s legitimate businesses since Nico’s crash.
He was fifty-eight.
Polished.
Patient.
Always smiling.
Adeline disliked him immediately.
Not because he had done anything obvious.
Because he spoke about Nico while Nico was sitting in the room.
He’s been tired.
His judgment isn’t what it was.
We shouldn’t burden him.
Nico never corrected him publicly.
That bothered Adeline even more.
“What about Camille?” Nico asked.
“Your fiancée doesn’t have medical access.”
He stared.
“You hesitated.”
“She shouldn’t have medical access.”
“Meaning?”
“I found her in the medication room three nights ago.”
His eyes cooled.
“Doing what?”
“She said she was looking for aspirin.”
“And?”
“There’s aspirin in every guest bathroom.”
Silence.
Nico looked at the pills.
“Test them.”
“I already arranged it.”
He looked up sharply.
“When?”
“Ten minutes ago.”
“You removed medication from my house without permission?”
“A single tablet.”
“That is still my medication.”
“Yes.”
“I could fire you.”
“Yes.”
Nico stared at her for several seconds.
Then:
“Where?”
“A laboratory used by the hospital where I work weekends.”
“Under what name?”
“Mine.”
“Why?”
“Because if I’m wrong, I don’t want rumors.”
“And if you’re right?”
Adeline looked at the medication cup.
“Then you have a much bigger problem than nerve pain.”
The laboratory called at 1:18 the next morning.
Adeline answered in the hallway outside Nico’s bedroom.
The preliminary screen was not comprehensive.
But it was enough.
The white tablet contained a powerful sedating medication that was not listed anywhere in Nico’s treatment plan.
Another component could worsen low blood pressure.
Adeline closed her eyes.
“Can you document that?”
The technician agreed to send formal results through secure hospital channels.
Adeline ended the call.
Then she stood alone in the hallway.
Three previous nurses.
One resigned.
One dismissed.
One refused to return.
She suddenly wondered what they had noticed.
The bedroom door opened.
Nico sat in his wheelchair.
Shirt untucked.
Hair disordered.
He looked exhausted.
“What?”
Adeline slipped her phone into her pocket.
“You should be asleep.”
“You’re terrible at lying.”
“I didn’t lie.”
“You made the nurse face.”
“What nurse face?”
“The one where you’re deciding how much truth a patient can handle.”
Adeline hated that he recognized it.
She entered the room.
Closed the door.
Then told him.
Everything.
Nico listened without interrupting.
When she finished, he looked toward the medication cabinet.
“Someone has been drugging me.”
“We don’t know how long.”
“How long have my symptoms matched the evening doses?”
Adeline thought.
“From the records? Months.”
A muscle moved in his jaw.
“And Vargas?”
“I don’t know.”
“You trust her?”
“Yes.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
Adeline sighed.
“I trust her medically. I don’t know what she knows about the household.”
Nico rolled toward the window.
Lake darkness beyond the glass.
After a while he said:
“Everyone thinks the crash changed me.”
“It did.”
He looked back.
“Not like that.”
Adeline stayed quiet.
“They say I’m slower.”
“They say I’m unstable.”
“They say I get confused.”
His hand tightened around the wheel rim.
“My uncle has delayed three board votes because I was supposedly too fatigued to review them.”
Adeline felt cold.
Nico continued.
“Camille has insisted we move the wedding earlier twice.”
“Why?”
“Because marriage gives her rights under several trust structures.”
That mattered.
“What rights?”
“Access to family voting agreements. Certain emergency proxy provisions.”
Adeline’s stomach tightened.
“Healthcare?”
“No.”
He paused.
“Not currently.”
“Currently?”
Nico looked at her.
“Our marriage contract includes a revised medical proxy.”
There it was.
“To Camille?”
“Yes.”
Adeline felt something settle into place.
Keep Nico weak.
Make him appear cognitively unreliable.
Marry him.
Gain authority.
Maybe not enough to control everything.
Enough to start.
“You need an attorney outside your family.”
Nico almost laughed.
“You’re very comfortable ordering a mafia boss around.”
“I’m ordering a patient to get independent legal advice.”
“Different?”
“Legally.”
He studied her.
Then:
“Jonathan Reese.”
“The man who hired me?”
“Yes.”
“Family attorney?”
“Outside counsel.”
“You trust him?”
“I trust him more than Carlo.”
Again, not the same as trust.
Adeline moved toward the medication cabinet.
“We change everything tonight.”
“How?”
“No pills enter your mouth unless I verify them from sealed supply.”
Nico’s expression hardened.
“You’re assuming you stay employed.”
She looked at him.
“You’re welcome to fire the person who just discovered someone is drugging you.”
The corner of his mouth moved.
“Arrogant.”
“Efficient.”
He looked at the pills.
Then at his legs.
“Could this affect physical therapy?”
“Yes.”
“How much?”
“I don’t know.”
The answer hurt him.
She saw it.
For months, Nico had assumed every failed standing attempt meant his spinal cord was failing to recover.
Every tremor.
Every collapse.
Every period of weakness.
What if some of it had been manufactured?
Adeline softened.
“This doesn’t mean your injury disappears.”
“I know.”
“It doesn’t guarantee more function.”
“I know.”
“But it means we cannot evaluate your real baseline until the medication issue is corrected.”
Nico nodded slowly.
For the first time, hope entered his face.
He immediately killed it.
Hope frightened him.
Adeline recognized that too.
“Don’t.”
He looked at her.
“What?”
“Don’t decide not to hope just because disappointment might hurt.”
His expression darkened.
“You are overstepping.”
“Probably.”
“You know nothing about what I lost.”
“No.”
She held his gaze.
“But I know what it looks like when someone thinks wanting something is dangerous.”
That silenced him.
She thought of Wesley.
Two canceled surgeries.
Bills.
Promises she could not afford.
Hope she kept making anyway because a seven-year-old boy needed her to.
Nico looked toward the cross around her neck.
“You have family.”
“My brother.”
“Parents?”
“Dead.”
He waited.
She did not elaborate.
Finally:
“Your brother is why you took this job.”
Adeline stiffened.
“How do you know?”
“Dependent medical coverage.”
Of course.
Nico noticed contracts.
“You read my employment file?”
“I read everything connected to my house.”
“Apparently not your medication records.”
The words came out before she could stop them.
Silence.
Adeline winced.
Nico stared.
Then, unexpectedly, laughed.
Low.
Brief.
Real.
“That was cruel.”
“You deserved it.”
“Probably.”
He rolled toward the bed.
Adeline moved automatically to assist.
Nico lifted one hand.
“I can transfer.”
She stopped.
He positioned the chair.
Locked it.
Moved carefully.
His arms took his weight.
His left leg gave no useful support.
The transfer was slower than before.
But he completed it.
Alone.
When he was settled, Adeline checked his blood pressure.
Better than most nights.
Because he had not swallowed the altered tablets.
Nico noticed the reading.
“So.”
“Yes.”
“They have been keeping me weak.”
“Possibly.”
“Stop protecting the conclusion.”
“I’m protecting evidence.”
He looked at her.
“Why?”
“Because anger makes people stupid.”
His eyebrows rose.
“That sounded personal.”
“It’s professional.”
“Lie.”
Adeline packed the cuff.
Nico watched.
“Your brother.”
She stopped.
“What about him?”
“What kind of surgery?”
Her body tightened.
“You investigated that too?”
“No.”
He sounded offended.
“I’m asking.”
She looked at him.
For once, Nico Alfieri was not collecting leverage.
He looked almost human.
That word again.
“Heart.”
His expression changed.
“Serious?”
“Yes.”
“Treatable?”
“Yes.”
“Scheduled?”
Adeline hesitated.
“Not yet.”
“Why?”
She looked away.
Nico understood.
Money.
Of course he did.
“I can—”
“No.”
The answer came instantly.
He stopped.
Adeline turned.
“You are my patient.”
“Yes.”
“I am your employee.”
“Yes.”
“You are not buying my gratitude.”
His face hardened.
“I wasn’t.”
“I know what men with money call help.”
“And what is that?”
“Something they remember later.”
Nico stared.
Adeline immediately regretted how personal that sounded.
But he did not get angry.
Instead, he said quietly:
“Then if I ever help your brother, I won’t ask you to owe me.”
Her chest tightened.
“That isn’t how the world works.”
“No.”
His voice became colder.
“It’s how mine will.”
Adeline said nothing.
At 2:13 that morning, unable to sleep, she returned to the medication room.
The cabinet was open.
Not unlocked.
Open.
One shelf disturbed.
A foil seal lay beneath it.
And behind the cabinet leg, partly hidden beneath the baseboard, was a pharmacy label torn from another bottle.
Adeline crouched.
Picked it up.
Read the printed account name.
Her stomach dropped.
The prescription had been processed through a private medical service.
A service owned by Ashcroft Health Management.
Camille’s family.
Adeline photographed it.
Then heard a sound behind her.
Footsteps.
She turned.
Camille stood in the doorway wearing a silk robe.
Her eyes moved from Adeline—
May you like
to the label in her hand.
And for the first time since Adeline entered the Alfieri estate, Camille Ashcroft looked afraid.
