I was unfairly fired from my job, and that same night I found myself in the mafia boss’s bedroom, and his reaction amazed me

That night, when I was thrown out of the hotel on suspicion of theft, I could not imagine that in a few hours I would wake up in the arms of a man at whose name the whole city fell silent.

I came out of the hotel’s underground office and remained on the rainy sidewalk. My bag was empty, and I had forty-eight dollars in my bank account. Six days remained until the rent was due, while my brother, Ellis, had an accumulated bill at the rehabilitation center.

The phone rang immediately.

“Noel, is work over?” Ellis asked.

“Yes,” I answered, pushing my wet hair away from my face. “I simply have to find a new job.”

“Are they deceiving you again?”

His voice was so weak that the lie got stuck in my throat.

“Not this time. This time I will deceive life.”

I hung up the phone and saved the photo of the hotel clock once again. My mother had learned one thing: no one believes a poor person’s memory, so everything must be written down. Her old nursing notebook lay in my bag. The corners of its gray-faded fabric cover were softened, and its pages were covered with her small, tight handwriting.

That same evening I found an advertisement pushed under the door. Nanny, night caregiver, live-in. The pay was such that I could not believe my eyes.

The address belonged to an apartment on the forty-second floor rising above the river.

A man dressed in black was waiting for me at the door.

“Surname?”

“Hart.”

“Do you have a weapon?”

“No.”

“If you need to escape, do not use the left elevator.”

“Is this a job or a prison?”

The man looked at me for the first time.

“It can be both.”

Silence stood in the apartment. Cassius Marchetti was lying by the bedroom door. The city knew him as a wealthy investor, but the people who knew his second life pronounced his name only in whispers.

He opened his eyes.

“The previous six caregivers did not last until morning.”

“Then you are a difficult patient.”

“I do not sleep.”

“That is not my problem. My problem will be if I am not paid in the morning.”

The corner of his lip moved slightly.

By two o’clock at night, the fever had dropped, but Cassius was still looking at the ceiling. I was sitting in an armchair, my mother’s notebook on my knees, and reading a message from Ellis’s center: “If you cannot pay, we will have to transfer him.”

“Why aren’t you sleeping?” I asked.

“When I close my eyes, people die.”

“Then close your eyes and save someone for the first time.”

He turned his head toward me.

“Aren’t you afraid of me?”

“I am afraid of rent, hospital bills, and an empty refrigerator. You have not yet made it onto this list.”

The wind struck the windows. Cassius chuckled quietly, and then his face suddenly changed. Three short knocks sounded from outside the door.

He grabbed me by the wrist.

“Do not get out of bed.”

“Who is it?”

Instead of answering, Cassius pressed a button hidden in the wall. The guards’ voice sounded beyond the door, then heavy footsteps. I pressed my mother’s notebook to my chest when a dark-colored folder slid across the floor and stopped directly at my feet.

Cassius saw the folder and lost color for the first time.

“Noel, do not touch it.”

But I was already reaching toward it…

The folder had a black clasp, and my mother’s surname was written on it.

“Why is this here?” I asked.

Cassius got up from the bed.

“Because you were not brought here by chance.”

“Who brought me?”

There was another knock at the door. This time the voice was harsher.

“Mr. Marchetti, I am the head of security. We have to open the door.”

Cassius took his place in front of me.

“Noel, tell me what your mother’s name was.”

“Elena Hart.”

His eyes darkened.

“And your father?”

“I do not remember my father. Mother said that he had abandoned us.”

Cassius looked at the folder.

“No one abandoned your mother.”

Suddenly, the sound of gunfire came from the corridor. Cassius gripped me and hid me behind the bed. Security broke down the door, but no one entered the room. In a few seconds everything fell silent again.

I leaned against his chest. His heart was beating quickly.

“If this is about me, let me go.”

“If this is about you, I cannot let you go alone.”

“Then tell me the truth.”

He looked at me for a long time.

“In the morning.”

But I could not last until morning. I fell asleep in the armchair, and then found myself in his bed, my head resting on his chest, while my mother’s notebook was clenched in my hand.

Cassius did not move. It was as though he was afraid that if he woke me, he would lose the only person who still believed in him.

In the morning, a lawyer knocked at the door.

“Mr. Marchetti, it is time to open the folder.”

Cassius answered faintly:

“No. Now it is already necessary to hear her.”

The lawyer opened the clasp and looked at the first page. Then his face changed.

“This is impossible…”

On the second page lay a copy of my birth certificate. Beneath it was one sentence that Mother had never mentioned…

The lawyer, Luca Bellini, placed the document on the table. Morning light entered the room, but it warmed nothing. My hands held my mother’s notebook so tightly that the edge of the cover cut into my skin.

“Read it aloud,” I said.

Luca looked at Cassius.

“Are you sure?”

“She is already involved in all this,” Cassius said. “Let us no longer hide the truth from her.”

Luca adjusted his glasses.

“Twelve years ago, Elena Hart worked at Marchetti Harbor Hospital. She discovered that millions were being stolen from the company’s charitable foundation. The money was intended for children’s treatment.”

“Who was stealing it?” I asked.

Luca picked up the second sheet.

“Bruno Valente. At that time he was Cassius’s father’s chief financial adviser.”

Cassius’s jaw tightened.

“Bruno forced my father to sign false accounts. When Elena found the evidence, she handed everything over to an investigator.”

“Then what happened?”

Luca lowered his voice.

“That same night your house burned down. The official report says that the cause was a gas leak. In reality, the recording shows that the door was locked from the outside.”

The sound of blood rang in my ears.

“Did Mother save me?”

“Yes,” Cassius said. “She got you out through the window. She herself could not get out.”

I stared at Cassius.

“How do you know?”

He took a small wooden medallion from the inside pocket of his coat. Inside was a photograph of my mother. On the back, in a child’s hand, was written: “For Noel, when the truth returns.”

“Your mother was asking my father for help,” he said. “My father was afraid. He left her alone. I was nineteen then and could do nothing.”

“But you knew that I was alive?”

“I knew only that the child had survived. Years later I found your name on the hotel employees’ list. Bruno appeared there too.”

“At the hotel?”

Luca took out a new document.

“Daniel Morrow secretly obeys Bruno Valente. The search of your bag was staged. Jamie was forced to say that he had been in the room beside you.”

Cassius lowered his eyes.

“I wanted to protect you first.”

“Is that why you brought me here?”

“Because Bruno had already reached you.”

At that moment the phone rang. Luca answered and immediately turned pale.

“It is from the rehabilitation center.”

He took the phone from me.

“Mrs. Hart, your brother was no longer in his room this morning. The cameras turned out to be switched off. And they left this on the bed.”

On the other side I heard the rustling of a child’s sheet of paper.

Then an unfamiliar man said quietly:

“If you want to see Ellis alive, you must take everything from Cassius Marchetti that your mother hid…”