The Paralyzed Mafia Boss Hadn’t Smiled in Years—Until He Woke to Find His Exhausted Maid Sleeping Beside Him

The following week, the weather turned bitter cold, painting the estate's grounds in frost and ice.

Diamond found himself doing something he hadn't done since the sniper's bullet destroyed his life: he waited for eight o'clock.

He sat in his study with the doors propped open three inches, listening for the squeak of her cheap sneakers on the floorboards, the click of her bucket handle, the rhythmic swish-swish of her mop against the baseboards.

He began testing her. Leaving small, deliberate disruptions in her path just to measure her reactions.

On Monday, he intentionally knocked a heavy, leather-bound volume of Roman history off his desk onto the rug near the doorway.

When Caprice entered with her vacuum, she didn't ask him why the book was on the floor. She didn't offer a pitying look, assuming his dead legs had caused an awkward movement. She simply knelt down, picked up the heavy book, wiped a speck of dust off its cover with her apron, set it neatly on the corner of his desk, and started vacuuming.

On Wednesday, he deliberately tipped over a glass of water onto the mahogany side table in the hall.

Caprice walked past, saw the puddle, pulled a microfiber cloth from her pocket, wiped the wood dry, wrung the cloth out into her bucket, and kept moving. No sigh. No eye roll. No dramatic display of annoyance.

It maddened him. It fascinated him.

By Friday, the physical toll on her was becoming undeniable. The dark circles under her eyes had turned a deep, bruised shade of blackish-purple. Her face looked thinner, her cheekbones sharp and hollow beneath her pale skin. Twice, while wiping down the doorframes in the hallway, Diamond watched her forehead rest against the wood for ten seconds as if her neck could no longer support the weight of her head.

At 1:30 a.m., Diamond rolled his chair out of his study into the main hall.

Caprice was standing on a low, wooden step stool, reaching up to dust the delicate crystal drops of a wall sconce. Her arms were trembling visibly.

"You're going to fall off that thing and break your neck," Diamond said, his loud voice cutting through the quiet hallway.

Caprice flinched slightly, but didn't drop her duster. She slowly stepped down from the stool, her knees visibly locking to keep her upright.

"I won't fall," she said softly, her voice raspy with fatigue.

"You look like a corpse that escaped a morgue," he spat, rolling his chair closer. He reached into his pocket, pulled out a thick wad of hundred-dollar bills from his personal stash, and tossed it onto her cleaning cart. "Take it. Go home. You're making the hallway look pathetic."

Caprice stared at the stack of cash resting on top of her spray bottles. There had to be at least three thousand dollars sitting there—enough to pay off two months of her mother's care facility fees.

She reached out, picked up the stack of money, and walked over to his chair.

She held the money out to him.

"I don't take charity," she said.

Diamond’s dark brows pulled together into a thunderous scowl. "It's not charity, you stupid girl. It's a advance. You're inefficient when you're half-dead on your feet."

"I get paid by the hour for the work I complete," Caprice replied, her gray eyes locking onto his with a quiet, immovable strength. "If I take money I didn't earn, I owe you. And I already owe too many people in this city."

She placed the money back onto the armrest of his wheelchair.

"Now, if you'll excuse me, I have four more sconces to dust before my shift ends."

She turned her back on him, stepped back onto the wooden stool, and raised her trembling arms toward the crystal sconce.

Diamond sat motionless in his chair, staring at the thick wad of green bills resting beside his wrist. In his world, money bought everything. It bought loyalty, silence, lives, and souls. Men had killed their own brothers for a fraction of the stack sitting on his armrest.