The Babysitter Sang to His Son — The Mafia Boss Listened From the Door and Lost His Heart

Описание: The brownstone on East 73rd Street doesn't look like the kind of place where dangerous men live. It's elegant in that old Manhattan way—red brick with limestone trim, black iron railings, window boxes that someone actually tends. I stand on the sidewalk clutching my worn canvas bag, checking the address on my phone for the third time, certain I've made a mistake.
But the numbers match. This is it.
My name is Emma Clarke, I'm twenty-three years old, and I'm about to walk into a situation that will unravel every safe assumption I've made about my carefully reconstructed life. But I don't know that yet. Right now, I'm just grateful for the job.
The agency called me this morning—a last-minute placement for a family that had fired their previous nanny. Again. The fourth nanny in six months, the coordinator said with barely concealed exasperation. The pay was almost obscene: two hundred dollars an hour for evening care, three nights a week. I'd tried not to sound too desperate when I accepted, but we both knew I was.
Graduate school stipends don't cover much in New York, and my mother's treatment isn't getting any cheaper. The experimental trial in Boston costs three thousand dollars every two weeks, money my insurance laughably refuses to cover. I work three jobs already—research assistant by day, weekend barista, and now this. Babysitting for the kind of people who live in multimillion dollar brownstones and pay more per hour than I used to make in a day.
I climb the steps and press the buzzer. The door opens almost immediately, revealing a woman in her fifties with steel gray hair pulled into an immaculate bun. She wears a black dress that screams housekeeper, and her expression is pure assessment.
"Miss Clarke?" Her accent is European—Italian, maybe.
"Yes, that's me. I'm from the Premier Care Agency—"
"Come in." She steps aside, her eyes sweeping over my thrift store peacoat, my scuffed boots, my bag with its fraying strap. I see her judgment and feel my spine straighten instinctively. I've been judged by wealthier people before. I survived it then. I'll survive it now.
The interior steals my breath. Hardwood floors in a honey tone that only comes with age, crown molding that must be original to the building, artwork on the walls that looks museum quality. A chandelier hangs in the foyer, crystal catching the late afternoon light filtering through the transom window.