Chapter 2: The Name Beneath the Mattress
“You checked the top,” Liana said.
“Did you check inside the seam?”
Matteo pulled back the sheet while Nico clung to her collar.
Along the mattress edge, one row of stitching looked newer than the rest.
“That wasn’t there before,” Matteo murmured.
He tore the loose thread.
A small plastic hospital band slipped onto the floor.
Liana stared at it, then suddenly stopped breathing.
Matteo picked it up.
“What is this?”
“Give it to me.”
“Why?”
Her hand shook as she pointed to the faded writing.
BABY GRAVES.
Matteo’s face hardened.
“That’s your name.”
“It was my son’s band.”
“That’s impossible.”
“I watched a nurse place it around his wrist.”
Nico reached toward the band and made the same relieved sound he had made in Liana’s arms.
Then someone knocked sharply.
“Sir,” a guard called through the door.
“We checked the new maid’s records.”
Matteo kept his eyes on Liana.
“And?”
A long pause followed.
“There is no Liana Graves on the staff list.
And the woman who approved her badge disappeared three weeks ago.”
The nursery door slowly opened.
The head of security entered, saw the hospital band in Matteo’s hand, and turned pale.
“You found it,” he whispered.
Matteo stepped toward him.
“You knew it was there?”
The man looked at Nico, then at Liana.
“No, sir.
But I know who put it there.”
May you like
Who connected Liana’s baby to Nico—and why was security hiding the truth?
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