The last nanny came running down the marble steps of Crossmoor House with one shoe in her hand and rain streaming through her hair. She nearly collided with Mara Ellison beneath the stone portico, caught herself against a carved lion, and stared at Mara as though she were about to make a terrible mistake. “Don’t go in there,” the woman gasped. Mascara streaked her cheeks, and chocolate pudding marked her forehead. “I don’t care what they promised you. Those boys are—” Thunder cracked across the Louisiana sky before she finished. The nanny shook her head and ran toward the gates. Mara remained beneath the portico, her cheap black blazer damp at the shoulders and her last decent flats squeaking against marble. Through the mansion’s enormous windows, she could already see why the woman had fled. Orange juice ran across white counters. Cereal covered the floor. Silver trays lay overturned near the pantry. Four six-year-old boys in matching red pajamas moved through the kitchen with astonishing efficiency. At the far end, holding a glass of wine, stood Damon Cross. Newspapers called him one of the Gulf Coast’s most powerful businessmen. Rumors around Baton Rouge gave him a darker reputation. But that evening, Damon did not look intimidating. He looked exhausted. Mara’s phone buzzed. Custody hearing moved up. Two weeks from Friday. We need proof of stable income and housing. Call me tomorrow. Her stomach tightened. Two weeks to show a judge she could provide stability for her seven-year-old daughter, Lily. Two weeks to produce pay stubs, rent receipts, reliable electricity, food in the refrigerator, and something resembling a future. Mara had thirty-six dollars and twelve cents in her checking account. Her power bill was overdue. Her landlord had stopped being patient. And Lily still feared being left alone after a frightening night years earlier with Mara’s ex-husband, Bryce. Mara looked through the glass at the chaos again. Then she rang the bell. Ruth Bell, the longtime housekeeper, opened the door. She was tall, silver-haired, and carried the calm expression of someone who had survived decades of wealthy people making foolish decisions. “You the new one?” “Mara Ellison.” Ruth glanced toward the disappearing nanny. “Trial starts at supper. If you make it that far.” Something crashed inside. A child yelled, “Direct hit!” Ruth stepped aside. “Most don’t last until dessert.” “I don’t need dessert,” Mara said. “I need a job.” Ruth studied her, then led her through dark-paneled halls lined with portraits of severe Cross ancestors. “Keep your voice low. Keep your purse close. And don’t let the quiet one fool you. He sees everything.” The kitchen looked worse from inside. One boy stood on the center island pouring orange juice from shoulder height. Another had built a fortress from cereal boxes beneath the table. A third had discovered that butter made the lower cabinets dangerously slippery. The fourth sat apart on a step stool, knees against his chest, a folded dish towel in his lap. He was not participating. He was watching. Damon Cross stood near the island in a black shirt with his sleeves rolled up, dark hair silvering slightly at the temples. His expression carried more fatigue than any photograph Mara had ever seen of him. “You’re the new nanny.” “Mara Ellison.” “I didn’t ask.” A boy slid past in buttered socks and bumped into the pantry door. Damon barely reacted. “I don’t care about your résumé. I don’t care about parenting philosophies or whatever pretty language people use when they haven’t met my sons.” He gestured toward the kitchen. “The rules are simple. If all four boys are sitting at that table eating actual food before eight o’clock, you’re hired. Full salary. Health insurance. Private room if you want it. A car while you’re working.” Mara looked at the clock above the ovens. 6:47 p.m. Seventy-three minutes. She turned back to Damon. “And if I don’t?” 👇
Mara looked at Damon for a second, then at the four boys, then back at the clock.
“If I don’t,” she said, “you keep looking for somebody who will.”
One of the boys laughed from beneath the table.
Damon’s mouth tightened, as though he had expected pleading and did not know what to do with an answer that simple.
“Seventy-two minutes,” he said.
Mara set her purse on the highest pantry shelf, slipped off her damp blazer, and rolled up her sleeves.
She did not chase anyone.
That seemed to disappoint them.
The boy on the island tipped the orange juice carton farther. A bright stream hit the floor.
Mara opened the refrigerator, found a bowl of grapes, washed them, and sat at the table.
Nothing happened for ten seconds.
Then the boy in buttered socks stopped sliding.
“What are you doing?” he asked.
“Eating.”
“You’re supposed to stop us.”
Mara bit a grape in half. “Why?”
The cereal-fort boy appeared from beneath the table. “Because we’re making a mess.”
“I noticed.”
“Dad said we have to eat dinner.”
“He did.”
The boy on the island narrowed his eyes. “You’re the nanny.”
“Apparently.”
Damon remained near the far counter, watching with the suspicious expression of a man who had paid a lot of people to fail in increasingly creative ways.
The quiet boy on the stool did not move.
Mara looked at him.
“You hungry?”
He stared back.
“No.”
It was the first thing he had said.
