Page 67 of Ripped Veil (Ripped Bratva)

“Oh, no. Does it hurt?”

“Not at all,” she says with a chuckle. “Sometimes, I even forget to limp.”

I smile, even though the statement strikes me as odd. Nothing about this woman is making sense right now.

“It must be hard for you to work, though, right?” I say, hoping I don’t offend her for asking.

“Not at all,” she says. “Master Phoenix is always so gracious. He lets me work at my own pace. He calls me a housekeeper, but really, I’m more of a supervisor. I make sure the house runs smoothly and the staff fall in line. I don’t do much of the heavy lifting.”

That seems oddly benevolent for what little I know about the man. He doesn’t seem like the kind of person who tolerates inefficiency.

“You’re up really early,” I point out.

Anna shrugs. “I’ve suffered from insomnia for decades now,” she says. “So I like to just get my day started the moment I’m awake. Good thing I did, too. The little one was hungry.”

She gives Theo another smile, even though his eyes are firmly closed. The fluttering of his eyelashes has stopped, too. He looks still and composed, like a painting.

“I… I usually—I mean, always—feel him stir,” I say quickly. “And I definitely hear him cry. It was just, last night…”

“You’d been through something awful, and you were sleeping soundly,” Anna says with understanding. “You don’t have to feel embarrassed, darling. We’ve all been there.”

“Yeah?”

“One day, when I was a young mother, I fell asleep with my son right next to me. When I woke up, he was gone. I panicked, jumped off the bed, and nearly stepped on him.”

My eyes go wide. “He’d fallen?”

“Rolled off the bed in the night,” she confirms. “Thankfully, he was so wrapped up in blankets that he wasn’t hurt in the slightest. Didn’t even notice, the little bugger. But I felt guilty for weeks. Sometimes, I still do.”

I smile.

“You’re always going to worry that you’re doing something wrong,” she reassures me. “It’s part of being a mother. You’re going to make mistakes, too. That’s another part of it. But you’ll learn.”

“Promise?”

Anna laughs and her entire face softens. “Promise.”

Sunlight trickles through the glass windows in tiny gold rivulets now. I can see spasms of dust caught in the light. Everything in this house seems not quite real. Or rather,tooreal. Like Technicolor, all saturated and beautiful and breathtaking.

“I usually have a little meeting with the maids at the beginning of each day,” Anna tells me when we’ve circled back to where we started the tour. “I should go get it started.”

“Of course! Don’t let me keep you.”

Anna turns to me, forcing me to a standstill. “If you need anything, don’t hesitate to ask me,” she says. “And if you ever need a babysitter, I’d be more than happy to look after this little angel for a few hours.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” I say with a nod.

I don’t tell her the truth:We’re leaving this place as soon as we can. It’s not safe here for us.

Anna runs her finger over Theo’s cheek and then she ambles off in the opposite direction. I stand there and admire the brightening sunlight before continuing my walk around the house.

I try not to give into the sense of awe that I feel suffusing me with each new room. There’s no point in falling in love with this building or the people who live here. I can’t stay. We can’t stay.

But the world outside is scary in its own way. So I keep walking, trapped in this in-between space, unwilling to go back to the room just yet.

I’m willing to bet Charity won’t be up for a few more hours, anyway. Theo stirs in my arms, so I adjust him and walk into a room I haven’t seen yet.

Broad French doors sit in the far wall. Through the panes of glass, I can see glimpses of a veranda of sorts, though there’s no patio furniture to mar the sprawling view of the gardens. The predawn sky beyond is washed with gray and silver. The moon still hangs in the sky, bright and pure.

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