Chapter 3 - The Rules of the House
The sun had barely cleared the high brick walls of the Long Island estate when Dominic walked down the grand mahogany staircase the next morning. He was dressed in a charcoal-grey tailored suit, his tie knotted with surgical precision, his briefcase clutched in his left hand.
The house was quiet. Too quiet.
As he reached the bottom landing, he expected to find the hallway empty, save for the digital security screens blinking green in the alcove and perhaps a silent guard standing by the front door.
Instead, there was a pair of yellow rain boots blocking the path to the front entrance.
Dominic paused, his polished shoe hovering an inch above the marble floor. Next to the boots sat a small pink backpack with a faded unicorn patch, and beside that, a plastic bucket filled with chalk and three skipping ropes.
He frowned, his dark eyes narrowing as he walked into the expansive formal foyer.
The house had rules. Isabella had set some of them when they first moved in—fresh flowers in the parlor, no shoes past the inner threshold, music allowed only in the sunroom. Dominic had added his own after her death—no unannounced visitors, no staff in the private west wing after eight o'clock, absolute silence in the corridors between the master suite and the children's quarters.
Shoes in the foyer violated rule number two of his post-isabella regime.
Before he could summon Marco or order the boots removed, a door down the east corridor clicked open.
Elena stepped out, balancing a stack of clean linen towels in one arm while holding a half-eaten piece of toast between her teeth. She was wearing a grey cotton sweater and a pair of faded denim jeans that looked like they had seen better days. Her hair was tied back in a messy ponytail, and she looked like she had been awake since four in the morning.
She stopped dead in her tracks when she saw Dominic standing by the front door like an ominous marble statue.
The toast slipped slightly from her mouth. She caught it with her free hand, cleared her throat, and adjusted the stack of towels.
“Good morning, Mr. Russo,” she said, her voice dry and entirely devoid of the deference he was accustomed to receiving from everyone on the eastern seaboard. “If you’re wondering about the boots, they belong to Valentina. Apparently, she decided that indoor flooring is too mainstream and prefers outdoor footwear for her morning inspection of the living room rug.”
Dominic didn’t smile. He didn’t even blink. “Whose idea was it to leave them in the main corridor?”
“Mine,” Elena said cheerfully, taking a step toward him. “I figured if you’re going to run a multi-million-dollar criminal enterprise out of a fortress, you should at least have to step over a pair of toddler boots to remind you that human children live here.”
Dominic’s jaw tightened. “This house is not a playground, Miss Vance.”
“Could have fooled me,” she shot back, gesturing vaguely toward the crystal chandelier overhead. “Given that the last time I checked, a playground doesn't usually come equipped with armed guards hiding behind the rosebushes and bulletproof glass on the pantry windows.”
She started to walk past him toward the linen closet near the back stairs, but Dominic’s voice stopped her cold.
“Stop.”
Elena paused, turning her head slightly. “Is there a problem, boss? Did I miss a spot of flour on the kitchen counter?”
“You overstepped yesterday,” Dominic said, his voice dropping into that low, flat register that usually signaled someone was about to spend a week in a hospital ward. “You encouraged the girls to speak. You disrupted the routine that the specialists spent a year establishing.”
Elena turned around completely, letting the stack of towels rest against her hip. The playful sarcasm vanished from her eyes, replaced by a cold, sharp fury that matched his own.
“The routine?” she repeated, her voice trembling slightly. “You call starving children of their own voices a routine? Mr. Russo, I’ve read the reports from the specialists you flew in from Boston and Zurich. They all said the exact same thing: ‘Give her time, create a stable environment, minimize emotional triggers.’ Do you know what minimization means in this house? It means silence. It means walking on eggshells so the great and powerful Dominic Russo doesn't have to listen to the sound of his daughters grieving.”
Dominic took a step toward her, his height and presence pressing down on the small space like a physical weight. “You don't know anything about my grief.”
“No,” Elena fired back, stepping right up to him, her chin tilted up so she could look him dead in the eye despite the height difference. “I don't. I don't know what it’s like to lose a wife in a hail of cartel bullets. I don't know what it’s like to rule New York from a leather chair while your heart rots in your chest. But I do know what it’s like to be four years old and terrified that the only parent you have left is going to disappear into the dark every time you make a sound.”
The words hit Dominic with the force of a wrecking ball.
He stared down at her—really looked at her—for the first time. Beneath the annoyance, beneath the exhaustion, beneath the chaotic mess she had brought into his sterile, perfectly controlled world, there was something else. A fierce, unbreakable loyalty to three little girls who didn't even know how to spell their own names yet.
Before Dominic could formulate a reply, a soft patter of bare feet echoed down the east corridor.
All three triplets appeared around the corner.
They were wearing matching pink pajamas decorated with little white clouds. Lucia was holding a stuffed rabbit by one ear; Valentina was rubbing her eyes with the back of her chubby hand; and Mia was clinging to the hem of Elena’s jeans as soon as she reached her side.
They stopped when they saw Dominic.
The familiar, terrible wall dropped back down between them. The brightness in their eyes dimmed, replaced by that hollow, untouchable glassiness that Dominic hated more than anything else in the world. They didn't run to him. They didn't say good morning. They retreated behind Elena’s legs like small animals sensing a predator in the brush.
Dominic felt a sharp, burning pain behind his ribs—a pain far worse than any bullet wound he had ever taken.
May you like
He looked down at his daughters, then up at Elena, who was kneeling down now, whispering something soothing into Mia’s ear while keeping one protective hand on Valentina’s shoulder.
Without another word, Dominic turned on his heel, grabbed his briefcase, and walked out the front door, pulling the heavy oak panels shut behind him with a finality that shook the glass in the frame.
