The Housemaid's Secret by Freida McFadden

 

Millie is in a bad place.  The love of her life, Enzo, has moved back to Italy to take care of his sick mother with no idea when and if he will return.  She has been dating Brock, a wealthy, handsome attorney but see can't see it working out long-term.  Then there is her employment problem.  It's hard for Millie to get a job that doesn't ask for references as her resume includes a prison stretch for murder when she was younger.  She works as a housemaid for wealthy people and depends on word of mouth to get jobs.

Her latest employers have something weird going on.  Douglas Garrick is a tech wizard and a billionaire from his inventions.  He hires Millie and gives her a written list of all she should do, including cooking dinner with specified meal plan.  His main requirement is that she does not bother his wife who is ill and recuperating in a guest bedroom.  He tells Millie that his wife needs constant rest.

But is that true?  When Millie has to interrupt the wife's rest for an emergency, she is shocked to find that the wife's face is covered in bruises as if she was just severely beaten.  She is much thinner than the pictures around the house, skeletal at best.  What exactly is going on?  After a few weeks, the wife confides in Millie that Douglas is abusing her and asks for Millie's help.  Millie has been helping women in her position for a long time and that word of mouth is going around as well.

Millie agrees and the two women get the wife away from New York and to a remote farm owned by a friend that Douglas knows nothing about.  But somehow he finds her and returns her to the city.  Before Millie can come up with another plan, Douglas is dead and Millie is the prime suspect.  Can she convince the police with her record that she's innocent?

Freida McFadden is known for her psychological thrillers.  She is a practicing physician so the medical storylines are accurate.  There are tons of twists and turns that the reader won't see coming.  Millie will win readers' hearts with her willingness to help others and her determination not to take second best when it comes to romance.  This is the second in the series but I read it without reading the first and didn't feel lost at all.  This book is recommended for mystery readers.