The Mafia Boss’s Innocent Prisoner Chapter 05
I followed Bastian into the west wing wearing his shirt.
Theo lay on the carpet beside the bed. His lips had
turned gray. Vivienne knelt nearby, crying too hard to be useful.
“His heart,” she sobbed. “He said it hurt, then he fell.”
I dropped beside him.
“Call an ambulance. Bring the emergency case from
the hall cabinet.”
One of the guards froze.
“Now!”
He moved.
I checked Theo’s pulse and breathing. Weak. Wrong. I
loosened his collar and turned his head.
“What did he take?” I asked.
Vivienne held out the brown bottle from dinner.
“One of these.”
I shook one tablet into my palm and examined it.
They looked right.
Something about the coating was wrong.
“These aren’t his pills.”
Vivienne stared at me. “Of course they are. You
checked them.”
“I checked the label.”
The guard returned with the sealed emergency case. I broke it open, found Theo’s rescue medication, and gave it to him.
“Come on,” I whispered. “Don’t make me save your stupid ass twice.”
His pulse began to steady before the ambulance arrived.
The medical team took over. Bastian stood by the wall, silent and pale.
As they carried Theo out, he caught my arm.
“Will he live?”
“I think so. He needs a hospital.”
For one moment, relief softened his face.
Then Malcolm entered the room holding a clear
evidence bag.
Inside it was another brown medicine bottle.
“We found this under the mattress in Tamsin’s room.”
My stomach dropped.
Vivienne covered her mouth.
“That’s Theo’s original bottle.”
Malcolm looked at Bastian.
“Her prints are on it.”
“Because she handed it to me at dinner,” I said. “She
made me check it.”
Vivienne’s tears stopped.
“I never entered your room.”
“You’re lying.”
“You tried to turn Bastian against his brother. When
that failed, you poisoned Theo.”
“I just saved him.”
“So everyone would watch you do it.”
Bastian said nothing.
That frightened me more than his anger.
“Look at me,” I said.
He did.
Last night, his eyes had held heat. Care. Maybe even wonder.
Now it held only suspicion.
“You knew where the emergency medication was,” he said.
?
“Because I cared for Theo for four years.”
“You had free access to this floor after dinner.”
“Because you left my door unlocked.”
“And you knew exactly how to get close to me.”
The accusation punched straight through me.
“Don’t do this.”
He looked at the shirt covering my body.
His shirt.
“Did you use my panic attack to get out of that room?”
The question hurt more than the knife.
“No.”
“Did you sleep with me so you could reach Theo?”
“You know I didn’t.”
“I know my brother nearly died before sunrise.”
Vivienne stepped beside him.
“Bastian, she has fooled us for years.”
I held his gaze.
“The photographs were fake. The account was fake.
The report that put me in your basement was fake.
How many lies does she get before you question her?”
“And how many chances do I give you with Theo’s life?”
“I saved him.”
“Because he was dying in front of witnesses.”
I could barely breathe.
“Last night, you said you believed me.”
His face closed.
“Last night meant nothing.”
Vivienne smiled behind his shoulder.
Bastian saw me notice.
For a second, doubt crossed his eyes.
Then fear for Theo crushed it.
“I confused pity with desire,” he said. “It won’t happen again.”
He took a pair of handcuffs from Malcolm.
The same man who had held me as if I mattered locked cold steel around my wrists.
“Bastian, please.”
His hands paused.
“My brother is fighting for his life,” he said. “I won’t
gamble it on your innocence.”
He sent me back to the basement before the sheets in
his bed had gone cold.