Chapter 2

For a few days, a fragile peace settled over the house. Ms. Jenkins was the model nanny. She was quiet, efficient, and followed my instructions to the letter. She prepared Lily' s bottles exactly as I showed her, she changed her diapers on schedule, and she kept the nursery spotless.

She even started complimenting me.

"You' re a very smart woman, Chloe," she said one afternoon as I was heading out for a meeting. "It' s amazing how you can run a business and have such a beautiful home."

I felt a cautious sense of relief. Maybe I had overreacted. Maybe her initial behavior was just a clumsy attempt to find her place in our home. I told myself that hiring help was always an adjustment period. I needed to be more patient.

But the peace was short-lived. The moment she felt secure again, her old habits returned. It started subtly. She would hum old-fashioned lullabies about wives obeying their husbands while rocking Lily to sleep. Then, she started making comments again, but this time, they were directed at Mark.

"A woman' s career can make her hard," she told him one evening while I was upstairs. I overheard her from the baby monitor I had placed in the living room, a precaution I took after the sugar water incident. "She forgets how to be soft, how to be a wife. A man needs a woman who looks up to him."

"Chloe is just very driven," Mark replied, his voice sounding weak and apologetic.

"Driven is one thing," Ms. Jenkins countered smoothly. "But a man should be the head of his house. It' s the natural order of things."

I wanted to storm downstairs and fire her on the spot, but I held back. I wanted to see how Mark would handle it. He didn't. He just mumbled something noncommittal and changed the subject.

The next day, I confronted her directly.

"Ms. Jenkins, I pay you to care for my daughter, not to psychoanalyze my marriage. If I hear one more comment about how a man or a woman should behave, you will be looking for a new job. Do you understand?"

Her face hardened for a second, then relaxed into a practiced, gentle smile.

"Of course, Chloe. I apologize. I just worry about you both."

The insincerity was obvious, but her next move was more cunning. She started being incredibly warm and attentive to Mark. She would save him the best piece of chicken at dinner, praise his "strong presence" in the house, and listen with rapt attention as he complained about his students or the school administration.

"Oh, Mr. Peterson, you are such a patient man," she' d say, her voice full of admiration. "It must be so difficult dealing with those disrespectful children all day. You deserve to come home to a peaceful house where you are respected."

Mark, whose ego was as fragile as a robin's egg, soaked it up. He started seeing her as a sympathetic ally, a comforting presence in the house.

"You' re being too hard on her, Chloe," he told me one night in bed. "She' s just an old-fashioned country woman. She actually has a lot of good, traditional values. She really respects me."

"She respects the idea of a man she thinks owns this house, Mark," I snapped back. "She has no respect for me, the person who actually signs her paychecks."

He sighed, rolling over and turning his back to me. "You' re always so aggressive. Can' t you just try to get along with her? For my sake?"

His words were a gut punch. He wasn't on my side. He was being manipulated, and he was too weak or too willing to see it. The battle lines in my own home were being drawn, and I was standing on one side, completely alone.