Everyone Watched His Fiancée Slap the Disabled Mafia Boss, but the Nurse Who Stopped Her Had Already Found the Secret Meant to Destroy Him

"Three days for the chemical residue to clear your system entirely," Adeline said, stepping closer to the desk and pulling a clean medical notebook from her pocket. "Five days before your neural pathways begin firing without chemical interference. But you can't just stop taking them suddenly."

Nico’s brow furrowed. "Why not?"

"Because if you suddenly start showing rapid motor improvement, Dominic and Dr. Harrison will know their script has been compromised," Adeline explained, leaning over the desk and pointing to her notes. "They'll realize I found out, they'll change the dosage, or worse—they'll accelerate their timeline and move against you before the wedding."

Nico leaned back, his eyes narrowing thoughtfully. "You want me to keep playing the cripple."

"I want you to give an Oscar-worthy performance," Adeline corrected. "Every night, I will give you sugar tablets that match the appearance of the B-704 pills. You will continue to act lethargic, weak, and depressed whenever Dominic, Camille, or Marcus are in the room. In the mornings, during our private sessions in the gymnasium—behind locked doors—we will double your physical therapy."

Nico looked at her, a low rumble of appreciation vibrating in his chest. "You have a dark mind for a nurse, Adeline."

"I worked night shifts in a Chicago trauma center for five years, Mr. Alfieri," she said coolly. "I've seen plenty of people try to play games with other people's lives. They usually forget that the quiet ones are the ones taking notes."

Nico reached into his desk drawer, pulling out a heavy, black leather-bound ledger. He opened it, revealing a series of hand-written bank routing codes, property deeds, and internal shipping manifests.

"If I am going to destroy them," Nico said, his voice dropping into a businesslike register, "I need to know exactly who is holding the matches."

"Dominic is the primary actor within the house," Adeline offered, leaning over to look at the ledger. "He handles your daily schedules and coordinates with Harrison. But Camille's father—Arthur Ashcroft—is providing the legal framework. I saw his law firm's crest on the conservatorship papers Dominic had on his desk."

Nico nodded slowly. "Arthur Ashcroft owes sixteen million dollars to a cartel syndicate in Miami. He's using Camille to secure control of my cold-storage logistics network so he can use our shipping containers to clear his debt."

"And your security chief?"

"Marcus was hired by my father ten years ago," Nico said, his jaw tightening slightly. "I thought he was loyal. But everyone has a price when they think the man at the top is never going to stand up again."

He looked up at Adeline, his dark eyes locking onto hers with an intensity that made her breath catch in her throat.

"Starting tomorrow morning," Nico said, "we change the script. You are no longer just my nurse, Adeline. You are my eyes and ears inside this house."

"And my brother's surgery?" she asked softly.

Nico pulled a gold pen from his coat pocket, opened a desk drawer, and pulled out a personal cashier's checkbook linked to his private offshore account—one that Dominic had not yet managed to touch.

He wrote smoothly, the gold tip scratching across the heavy cream paper.

He tore the check from the book and slid it across the mahogany desk toward her.

Adeline looked down at the numbers written in dark blue ink.

One hundred and fifty thousand dollars.

"That covers the surgical deposit, the transport, and six months of post-operative care at Boston Children's," Nico said calmly. "It clears tomorrow morning at nine AM. Regardless of what happens in this house over the next seventeen days, your brother is safe."

Adeline stared at the check, her fingers trembling slightly as she touched the crisp paper.

For seven months, she had laid awake in her small apartment in Cicero, counting dollars, skipping meals, and begging insurance administrators for extensions while watching her little brother fold paper cranes by the radiator.

And with a single stroke of a pen, this feared, terrifying man had erased the dark cloud that had been threatening to destroy her family.

Tears welled up in her hazel eyes, but she refused to let them fall. She wiped her nose with the back of her sleeve and looked up at him.

"Thank you, Nico," she whispered, using his first name for the very first time.