Chương 4
The security team continued searching the nursery.
Every object was examined.
Every hidden space was checked.
Then another officer called out.
“Sir.”
Matteo walked over.
Inside a small compartment beneath the crib frame was a second item.
A photograph.
The image was old.
The edges were worn.
Matteo took it carefully.
The photograph showed Elena holding newborn Nico.
She was smiling.
But there was something written on the back.
Matteo turned it over.
His breathing stopped.
Liana noticed his reaction.
“What is it?”
He did not answer immediately.
The words on the back were written by Elena.
“Find the woman who can calm him.”
Liana stared at the message.
A strange feeling passed between them.
Neither of them spoke.
Because both understood the same thing.
Elena had known someone like Liana would exist.
Matteo looked at her.
For the first time since she entered the mansion, he did not see her as a maid.
He saw someone connected to a mystery that had started before they ever met.
“Why you?” he whispered.
Liana shook her head.
“I don’t know.”
“But he recognized you.”
She looked away.
“I have never met him before.”
Matteo studied her expression.
He believed she was telling the truth.
But there was another possibility.
Maybe she did not know the connection.
Maybe someone else had hidden it from her too.
The following hours passed slowly.
The mansion remained awake through the night.
Security searched every entrance.
Every employee was questioned.
Every movement inside the house was reviewed.
But Matteo stayed in the nursery.
He refused to leave Nico alone.
Liana remained nearby.
She knew she should return to her room.
She knew she was only an employee.
But every time she looked at the baby, she felt an overwhelming need to stay.
Near dawn, Nico woke quietly.
Unlike before, there was no crying.
His eyes opened slowly.
He looked around the room.
Then he reached toward Liana.
She froze.
Matteo noticed.
The baby’s small hand reached for her again.
Liana carefully stepped closer.
She took his hand.
Nico immediately relaxed.
Matteo watched in silence.
There was something about the moment that disturbed him.
Not because it was dangerous.
Because it felt familiar.
Like a memory he had forgotten.
“Have you ever been here before?” he asked.
Liana looked surprised.
“No.”
“Have you ever seen Elena?”
Her expression changed.
“No.”
Matteo believed her.
But he still needed answers.
He walked toward the desk where old family documents were stored.
“There is something I need to show you.”
Liana followed him carefully.
He opened a locked drawer and removed a small folder.
Inside were medical records from Nico’s birth.
Matteo had read them countless times.
But now he searched for something he had ignored before.
A name.
A note.
A connection.
His fingers stopped on one page.
Liana saw his face change.
“What did you find?”
Matteo slowly turned the document toward her.
At the bottom of the page was a handwritten note from Elena’s doctor.
The note mentioned a woman who had visited the hospital the night Nico was born.
A woman who stayed beside Elena during a difficult moment.
A woman whose name had been removed from the official record.
Matteo stared at the blank space where the name should have been.
Someone had erased it.
Liana stepped closer.
“Why would someone remove her name?”
Matteo looked at the damaged document.
“Because they did not want me to find her.”
The answer hung between them.
Outside, the first light of morning entered the mansion windows.
But inside the nursery, the mystery only grew deeper.
Someone had watched Nico.
Someone had hidden Elena’s message.
Someone had erased a name.
And somehow, the grieving maid who had never met the child was the only person who could bring him peace.
Matteo looked at Liana with a new question in his eyes.
A question he was afraid to ask.
“What if you were never a stranger to my son?” he whispered.
Liana looked at Nico.
The baby held onto her finger.
And for the first time, she wondered if the connection she felt was not new at all.
Maybe it had been waiting for her to discover it.
Maybe it had been waiting for her to discover it.
The thought frightened Liana more than she wanted to admit.
She had spent months trying to accept that some parts of her past would remain unanswered.
She had convinced herself that grief was something she had to carry alone.
But standing inside Matteo Varric’s nursery, with Nico holding her finger as if he had known her forever, she felt the walls around her old memories beginning to move.
Matteo closed the folder carefully.
His expression was controlled again, but Liana could see the storm behind his eyes.
He was searching for answers.
Not as a powerful man protecting his empire.
As a father who needed to understand his son.
“I need to know who that woman was,” Matteo said.
Liana looked at the damaged document.
“And you think I might know?”
“I think someone wanted you here.”
She looked at him quietly.
“That does not mean I understand why.”
Matteo nodded.
For once, he did not demand an answer.
He knew some truths could not be forced.
The rest of the morning passed with a strange silence inside the mansion.
The servants moved carefully.
The security team spoke in low voices.
Everyone could feel that something important had changed.
Matteo had always controlled every detail of his world.
But now there was a mystery he could not command into disappearing.
Later that afternoon, he asked Liana to meet him in his private office.
The room was different from the rest of the mansion.
There were no signs of luxury meant to impress visitors.
Only dark wooden shelves, old photographs, and documents collected over years.
Liana stood near the doorway, unsure why she had been brought there.
Matteo placed a small box on the desk.
May you like
“I found this after Elena died.”
Liana looked at it.
