Chapter 3 - The Empty Grave
3
At sunrise, Liana stood beside Gabriel’s grave.
The cemetery was gray and wet from overnight rain.
Matteo stood several feet behind her.
Marco and two men waited farther away.
Nobody spoke.
Liana stared at the small stone.
GABRIEL EVAN GRAVES.
BELOVED SON.
Eight months of life reduced to two dates and three words.
For twenty-two days, Liana had come here believing her child was beneath the ground.
She had spoken to him.
Apologized to him.
Told him she wished she had protected him.
Now she no longer knew what she had been mourning.
Matteo had obtained an emergency exhumation through a judge whose name Liana did not ask about.
The cemetery workers arrived shortly after seven.
When the small coffin finally emerged from the earth, Liana almost collapsed.
Matteo caught her elbow.
She pulled away.
“I’m fine.”
“You’re not.”
“I need to see.”
The coffin was moved beneath a temporary canopy.
An investigator Matteo trusted opened it.
Inside were blankets.
Hospital blankets.
A weighted medical bag.
No body.
Liana screamed once.
Not loudly.
It was a broken sound that seemed to come from somewhere beneath language.
Matteo turned away.
Marco lowered his head.
Liana reached into the coffin and touched the blanket.
“Gabriel.”
There was no answer.
Of course there wasn’t.
But for the first time since his supposed death, silence did not mean death.
It meant uncertainty.
And uncertainty was suddenly the most precious thing she possessed.
Matteo crouched beside her.
“We’ll find him.”
Liana looked at him.
“You don’t know that.”
“No.”
“Don’t promise things you can’t control.”
“I control more than most.”
“But not this.”
“No.”
His honesty hurt less than false comfort.
Matteo looked at the empty coffin.
“But whoever did this made mistakes.”
“What mistakes?”
“They left records. Witnesses. Codes.”
“That could still lead nowhere.”
“It won’t.”
“How can you be sure?”
“Because someone has been running from us since last night.”
Liana stared at him.
“Who?”
“Dr. Vale.”
He had disappeared from his Manhattan townhouse at 4:12 a.m.
His phone was off.
His bank accounts untouched.
His hospital credentials deactivated.
A man with nothing to hide did not vanish before sunrise.
When they returned to the Varric estate, Nico was waiting with Teresa.
The moment Liana entered the nursery, he began reaching toward her.
Matteo watched from the doorway.
Something about it bothered him.
Not jealousy.
Fear.
Liana noticed.
“What?”
“He knows you.”
“He’s a baby.”
“He knew you before you touched him.”
“So?”
“He reached for you across the foyer.”
“Babies do that.”
“Nico doesn’t.”
Matteo entered.
“He barely tolerates strangers.”
Liana lifted Nico.
Again, immediate calm.
She looked at his face.
“Maybe I remind him of someone.”
Matteo thought about Sofia.
Her hair had been lighter.
Her eyes green.
Her face nothing like Liana’s.
Then he remembered the photograph in Sofia’s safe.
Gabriel.
Why would Sofia possess it?
Matteo turned toward Marco.
“Bring Sofia’s private files.”
Twenty minutes later, sealed storage boxes covered the library table.
Matteo had not opened them since his wife’s death.
He had ordered everything from her office boxed and stored because walking past her handwriting had become intolerable.
Liana sat nearby with Nico.
Matteo opened the first box.
Financial statements.
Hospital correspondence.
Charity records.
The second contained photographs.
The third contained notebooks.
Sofia had written constantly.
Matteo found one marked PERSONAL.
He hesitated.
Then opened it.
Most entries concerned ordinary things.
Pregnancy discomfort.
Nico’s nursery.
Names she considered.
Arguments with Matteo about security.
Then, four months before Nico’s birth, the tone changed.
“I think Elias is lying.”
Matteo read aloud.
Liana looked up.
He continued.
“He says the blood tests are routine, but he asked for Matteo’s family history twice.”
Matteo turned the page.
“Today I saw a file marked VARRIC LINEAGE.”
Liana’s pulse quickened.
Another page.
“I confronted Elias. He laughed. Said wealthy families become paranoid when babies are involved.”
Another.
“I found three names. Gabriel Graves. Noah Mercer. Isabella Reed.”
Liana stood so quickly Nico startled.
“My son?”
Matteo looked at her.
“Sofia knew his name months before he entered St. Augustine.”
“How?”
Matteo kept reading.
“Gabriel has a marker they need. Elias said he would be moved once stable.”
Liana nearly dropped Nico.
Matteo took the child before she could object.
“What marker?”
“I don’t know.”
“Keep reading.”
He turned the page.
Sofia had written in darker ink.
“Elias knows I copied the ledger.”
Matteo’s jaw tightened.
“I hid it where Matteo will eventually find it.”
He stopped.
Liana waited.
“Where?”
“There’s no location.”
“Next page.”
He turned it.
Blank.
The following page had been torn out.
Matteo closed the notebook.
Someone had removed information.
But who had access after Sofia died?
Household staff.
Hospital representatives.
Family.
Matteo’s own people.
That was worse.
Marco entered with another report.
“We checked Vale’s properties.”
“Nothing?”
“One apartment was cleaned out recently.”
“Recently?”
“Within forty-eight hours.”
Matteo looked toward Liana.
Someone knew she was coming.
Someone knew Gabriel’s case might reconnect with Nico.
Matteo asked, “Who hired Liana?”
“Mrs. Bell.”
The housekeeper.
“Who referred her?”
Marco checked.
“Employment agency.”
“Which?”
“Golden Domestic.”
Liana interrupted.
“No.”
They looked at her.
“I didn’t use an agency.”
Marco frowned.
“The paperwork says you did.”
“I walked in.”
“When?”
“Three days ago.”
Matteo approached.
“You applied directly?”
“Yes.”
“Why this house?”
“The listing was outside the staff entrance.”
Matteo turned to Marco.
“There was no listing.”
Marco’s face changed.
Liana’s skin went cold.
“What?”
“We haven’t hired through signs in twelve years.”
“But I saw one.”
“Who interviewed you?”
“Mrs. Bell.”
“Who sent you to her?”
“A man outside the gate.”
“What man?”
“I don’t know. Older. Gray coat.”
Matteo exchanged a look with Marco.
Liana realized the implication.
Someone had directed her here.
Not accidentally.
Someone wanted the grieving mother of Gabriel Graves inside the Varric estate.
“Why?”
Liana whispered.
Matteo looked at Nico.
“To see what would happen.”
Her blood went cold.
“What happened?”
“You held him.”
“And?”
“He stopped crying.”
Matteo turned toward Marco.
“Get blood tests.”
Liana stiffened.
“For whom?”
“Everyone.”
Matteo pointed toward Nico.
“Him.”
Then Liana.
“You.”
Then himself.
“No hospital.”
Marco nodded.
“My doctor.”
Liana understood immediately.
“You think Nico could be…”
She could not finish.
Matteo did not either.
Blood was drawn privately.
Results would take hours.
While they waited, Matteo continued searching Sofia’s belongings.
Inside a jewelry box, Liana found a folded photograph.
Gabriel.
The same picture from her pendant.
On the back, someone had written:
THE FIRST MATCH.
Liana began trembling.
“What does that mean?”
Matteo took it.
The handwriting was not Sofia’s.
Marco photographed it.
Then Nico began crying upstairs.
Liana moved automatically.
By the time she reached the nursery, Teresa was holding him.
“It started suddenly.”
Liana took Nico.
He quieted.
His tiny hand reached toward her neck.
Toward Gabriel’s pendant.
Liana froze.
Nico grabbed it.
Then he did something he had never done before.
He smiled.
Not vaguely.
Not randomly.
He touched the angel pendant and made a sound.
“Ma.”
Liana’s heart stopped.
Teresa covered her mouth.
Matteo stood in the doorway.
Nobody moved.
Nine-month-old babies babbled.
Everyone knew that.
But Liana remembered something else.
Gabriel’s first repeated sound.
Not Mama.
Not Dada.
“Ma.”
He had made it whenever he touched that pendant while nursing.
Liana stared at Nico.
“No.”
She held the pendant away.
Nico reached for it desperately.
“Ma. Ma.”
Liana began crying.
Matteo approached slowly.
“Liana.”
“No.”
“You don’t know yet.”
“He knows this.”
“Maybe.”
“He knows this.”
Nico grabbed the pendant again.
Then turned it over with his fingers.
There was a tiny dent on the back.
Gabriel had caused it months earlier by banging it against his wooden crib rail.
Liana had laughed.
Every night afterward, Gabriel rubbed his thumb over that dent.
Nico’s thumb moved to the same place.
Once.
Twice.
Then in a slow circle.
Exactly as Gabriel had done.
Liana’s knees collapsed.
Matteo caught both her and the baby.
“This is Gabriel.”
“Wait for the test.”
“This is my son.”
Matteo looked at Nico.
The child he had loved for nine months.
The child he believed was his.
And for the first time, fear became something worse.
If Nico was Gabriel Graves—
where was the real Nico Varric?
The laboratory called at 4:16 p.m.
Matteo answered.
He listened.
His face turned pale.
Then he looked at Liana.
“What?”
Her voice barely worked.
“What did they say?”
Matteo lowered the phone.
“Nico is not biologically related to me.”
Liana closed her eyes.
Tears spilled down her cheeks.
Matteo continued.
“But he is related to you.”
She opened them.
“How certain?”
“99.999 percent.”
The room disappeared around her.
Liana looked at Nico.
Gabriel.
Her baby.
Alive.
In her arms.
She made a sound somewhere between a laugh and a sob and pressed her forehead against his.
“My baby.”
Matteo turned away.
Because her miracle had just confirmed his nightmare.
His son was missing.
And someone had hidden Gabriel Graves inside his home for months.
Then Marco’s phone rang.
He answered.
His expression changed immediately.
“Boss.”
Matteo looked at him.
“We found Dr. Vale’s car.”
“Where?”
“Near the river.”
“Vale?”
“Not there.”
“Anything inside?”
Marco swallowed.
“A child’s hospital bracelet.”
Matteo’s eyes narrowed.
Marco held up a photograph.
The bracelet was old.
Faded.
But one name remained readable.
NICOLAS VARRIC.
May you like
And underneath it, written by hand:
SUBJECT 14 - ALIVE.
