The Maid Drank the Poisoned Wine Meant for Her Millionaire Boss—Then a Note Fell From Her Bloody Sleeve, and His Fiancée Turned Pale...

"Nobody touches the glass," Elias ordered.

Rafe already had one hand on the tablecloth. He stopped when three guests raised their phones. Elias bent over me, his expensive black jacket soaking up the blood near my shoulder.

"Stay with me," he said. "Tell me what you swallowed."

I couldn't answer. The room tilted sideways, and I could hear Mara speaking with the careful patience of a woman rehearsing for a jury.

"She attacked me in the pantry. She took some medication from my bag. I think she's trying to blackmail us."

"Then why was she warning me?" Elias asked.

"Because she wants attention."

A woman at the end of the table, a retired nurse named Mrs. Bell, pushed back her chair. "Sir, arguing won't clear her airway. Move."

Mrs. Bell rolled me onto my side. One of the caterers called emergency services and described my symptoms. Elias took his phone off speaker only long enough to tell the dispatcher our address.

Then Rafe said the one thing that woke something inside me.

"I should check her room. We may have a thief in the house."

My fingers closed around Elias's wrist. "Don't," I managed.

He leaned closer. "Don't what?"

"My room. They planted..."

I was gone before I finished.

When I opened my eyes again, fluorescent panels moved above my head. A paramedic wheeled me through a hospital entrance. Behind him, Elias argued with somebody on the phone.

"No, Dad. This is a poisoning investigation. I am not telling the police it was an accident."

The name Dad jolted me harder than the hospital lights. Everett Wren built the flood-control systems that were supposed to protect our county. Six years ago, one of those systems failed, and fourteen people died. My father had been blamed for signing off on its maintenance.

He was also one of the dead.

I grabbed the paramedic's sleeve. "My brother. Ben."

"Do you want us to call him?"

"No. Find him."

The paramedic asked for his number, but all I could think about was the message he'd sent an hour before the dinner.

Someone's outside our apartment. They know my name.

I tried to sit up. The room pitched. My hand struck the rail, and my phone, still in its cracked protective case, fell from my apron.