Chapter 3: Everything She Never Said
Matteo set the photograph on the changing table.
He did not look away from it.
"Start from the beginning," he said.
"All of it."
Liana lowered herself into the nursing chair near the window, Nico still warm against her chest.
The baby's breathing had slowed to something deep and steady.
She kept her voice low to match it.
"My son's name was Daniel.
He was born eleven weeks premature.
The hospital said he was stable.
They said he was gaining weight." She stopped.
"Three weeks ago, a nurse called me at two in the morning and said he had stopped breathing.
By the time I got there, he was g*ne."
Matteo turned from the photograph.
"What was the cause?"
"They said cardiac event.
Rare but not unheard of in premature infants." Her jaw tightened.
"I believed them.
I had no reason not to."
"But now you do."
"That cloth in the photograph." She nodded toward it.
"I brought it to the hospital on Daniel's third day.
I never took it home.
It should still be in his bassinet." Her voice didn't break.
It went flat instead, which was worse.
"Someone removed it.
Someone who was in that ward."
Matteo picked up the photograph again.
"The woman's face is hidden."
"I know."
"You said you don't know who she is."
"I said I don't know her name."
He looked up.
"That's not the same thing."
"No," Liana said.
"It isn't."
Nico stirred.
She shifted him gently and he settled again, one fist curled beneath his chin.
She watched him for a moment before continuing.
"Two days before Daniel d*ed, a woman came to the ward.
She told the nurse she was my sister.
I don't have a sister.
The nurse didn't know that.
She let her in." Liana's hand moved in slow circles on Nico's back.
"I only found out because one of the other mothers mentioned it afterward.
Said a woman had been standing over Daniel's bassinet for a long time.
Said she looked like she was memorizing him."
The room was very quiet.
"Did you report it?" Matteo asked.
"To who?
The hospital said there was no record of the visit.
The nurse who let her in had already transferred to another ward.
The security footage from that corridor—" She stopped.
"What?"
"Corrupted.
A four-hour window, gone."
Matteo set the photograph down slowly.
"Someone arranged that."
"Yes."
"That takes resources."
"Yes."
He crossed his arms.
"Why would anyone want your son d*ad, Liana?"
The question sat between them like something physical.
She met his eyes.
"I don't know yet.
But whoever left that photograph under your son's mattress wanted you to find it.
And they wanted you to find it through me." She glanced down at Nico.
"Which means they knew I would end up here.
Which means they've been watching me for longer than three weeks."
Matteo's expression did not change.
That stillness, she was beginning to understand, was not calm.
It was the thing that came before a decision.
"Who hired you?" he said.
"The housekeeper.
Mrs.
Ferrante."
"Did you approach her or did she approach you?"
Liana paused.
"She approached me.
At the hospital.
The day after the funeral." She felt the shape of it landing differently now that she said it aloud.
"She said she'd heard I needed work.
I didn't ask how."
Matteo walked to the door and opened it.
One of the guards looked in.
"Bring me Ferrante," Matteo said.
"Now."
The guard's footsteps moved quickly down the corridor.
Matteo closed the door and turned back.
His voice was quieter now, which made it more careful.
"While we wait.
The yellow cloth.
Is there any chance it's a different one?"
Liana shook her head.
"I embroidered his initial on the corner.
A small D.
Bottom left." She looked at the photograph.
"It's there.
You'd need a magnifying glass, but it's there."
Matteo picked up the photograph and held it closer to the light.
A long moment passed.
Then he set it down without a word.
That was answer enough.
A knock came at the nursery door.
Not the guard's knock.
Lighter.
More hesitant.
Matteo opened it.
Mrs.
Ferrante stood in the doorway in her dark housekeeper's uniform, her hands folded in front of her.
She was a compact woman in her sixties, silver-haired and precise.
She had run the Varric household for eleven years.
Her expression was composed.
But her eyes went immediately to Liana.
Not to Matteo.
To Liana.
And in that single flicker of a look, Liana saw something she recognized.
Not guilt.
Something older than guilt.
Fear.
"You wanted to see me, Mr.
Varric," Mrs.
Ferrante said.
"Close the door," Matteo said.
She did.
"Why did you hire her?" He didn't gesture toward Liana.
He didn't need to.
Mrs.
Ferrante's hands tightened against each other.
"We needed staff.
She came with a reference."
"From whom?"
A pause.
Half a second too long.
"An agency," she said.
"Which one?"
Another pause.
Matteo took one step toward her and the woman's composure cracked at the edges — not dramatically, just enough.
A slight tremor in the chin.
A blink that lasted a fraction too long.
"Mrs.
Ferrante," Liana said quietly.
"You came to me at the hospital.
There was no agency.
You knew my name before I told you."
The housekeeper's eyes filled.
She pressed her lips together hard.
"Who sent you to find me?" Liana asked.
The old woman looked at Nico sleeping against Liana's chest.
Something moved across her face — grief, or something shaped like it.
"She said you would keep him safe," Mrs.
Ferrante whispered.
"She said you were the only one who could."
Matteo's voice dropped to almost nothing.
"Who said that?"
Mrs.
Ferrante reached into the pocket of her uniform.
Her hand was shaking.
She withdrew a small envelope, sealed, and held it out.
Written on the front in careful handwriting was a single name.
Matteo.
He took it.
He did not open it yet.
He looked at Mrs.
Ferrante.
"Who gave you this?"
The housekeeper's chin trembled.
May you like
"Your wife," she said.
"Three days before she d*ed."
