The Woman He Reached For

The guard caught Liana's wrist before she reached the baby.

"You need to step back."

Across the marble foyer, Matteo Varric shifted his screaming son against his shoulder. The child's face was scarlet. His cries had broken into small, breathless sounds that made Liana's own lungs tighten.

She had promised herself she could do this job.

Floors. Laundry. Other people's dirty dishes. Nothing that required her to think about the room she had locked before leaving her apartment.

Nobody had mentioned a baby.

"You're hurting her," Matteo said.

The guard released her immediately.

For a moment, she thought Matteo meant to help. Then he looked at her red uniform, the dropped linens behind her, and the hands she could not stop raising toward his child.

"Who are you?"

"Liana Graves. Mrs. Bell hired me yesterday."

"Then Mrs. Bell should have explained that the nursery is restricted."

The baby dragged in another breath. His little fists were knotted in Matteo's white shirt.

Liana knew the difference between an angry cry and a frightened one. She had learned it in the dark, sitting beside a crib she had bought secondhand and painted yellow because she hadn't known whether she was having a boy.

"Please let me try holding him."

Matteo's expression changed.

He was younger than the photographs in the newspapers had suggested, perhaps thirty-four, with dark hair and a mouth that looked accustomed to giving orders. His sleeves were rolled to different heights. A milk stain marked his shoulder.

"Three nurses couldn't settle him this morning," he said. "What makes you think you can?"

"I don't know if I can."

"That isn't much of a reason to hand you my son."

The answer hurt because it was reasonable.

She lowered her hands.

Twenty-two days earlier, she had stood beside a small white coffin. Since then, people had treated her grief as something that might spill onto them if they came too close. Now she had frightened a father by reaching for a child who wasn't hers.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I heard him, and I wasn't thinking."

She bent to gather the linens.

The crying stopped.

Not entirely. A thin, disbelieving hiccup escaped the baby. But the terrible, continuous sound was gone.

Liana looked up.

He was staring at her.

His lashes were stuck together with tears. One hand had opened against his father's chest.

"Hello, sweetheart," she whispered before she could stop herself.

The baby leaned toward her so suddenly Matteo had to catch him beneath the arms.

Liana rose.

The guard moved again, but Matteo lifted one finger.

Nobody spoke.

The child reached with both hands. His mouth trembled. When she took one cautious step closer, he made an urgent little sound that went through her more sharply than the screaming had.

Matteo searched her face.

She could have explained that she had been a mother. That her body still woke before dawn expecting to hear a cough from the next room. That she sometimes stood in the grocery store holding a jar of baby food until she remembered.

Instead, she waited.

"Stay where I can see you," he said at last.

He transferred the child carefully, reluctant even as he let go.

The baby's weight settled against her chest.

Liana almost dropped to her knees.

Not because he was heavy. Because he was warm.

She had forgotten how cruel warmth could be.

The child pushed his damp face into the hollow beneath her jaw. His fingers gripped her collar. She supported his bottom with one hand and laid the other across his back, feeling each uneven breath gradually lengthen.

"There you are," she murmured.

Matteo stood close enough that she could see the pulse beating beside his throat.

The baby sighed.

Behind them, someone set down a tray very carefully.

"How did you do that?" Matteo asked.

"I haven't done anything."

"He's been crying every time I put him down. He won't sleep unless I walk with him, and lately even that doesn't work."

She looked at the shadows beneath his eyes.

"How long has it been happening?"

"Three weeks."

Her hand slowed on the child's back.

Almost the same length of time she had been living in a world without Noah.

It was an ugly coincidence. Nothing more.

"Has his doctor seen him?"

"Several times."

"Has he been sick?"

Matteo glanced at the staff listening around them.

"Come upstairs."

The nursery was so large that the crib looked stranded in it. Pale blue walls, expensive animals on shelves, a rocking chair with no blanket thrown over its arm. Everything was clean. Nothing looked used without permission.

Liana noticed the cameras.

Matteo noticed her noticing.

"They aren't there for decoration."

"I didn't think they were."

He closed the door, leaving a guard outside.

The baby rubbed his cheek against her collar. She moved toward the window, where late afternoon sunlight warmed the carpet.

"What's his name?" she asked.

Matteo's eyebrows drew together.

"Nico."

She should have asked before picking him up. It seemed indecent that her arms already knew the shape of a child whose name she hadn't known.

"Hello, Nico."

He watched her mouth.

Then he smiled.

Liana looked away so quickly Matteo stepped closer.

"Are you all right?"

"I need a moment."

"Should I take him?"

Her arms tightened instinctively. Shame followed at once.

"Of course you can. He's your son."

Matteo held out his hands, then stopped when he saw her face.

"Sit down first."

She lowered herself into the rocking chair. He brought her a glass of water without calling anyone to do it.

That small courtesy almost undid her.

"Do you have children?" he asked.

She stared at the water.

"I had a son."

The words changed the room.

Matteo's hand dropped to his side.

"I'm sorry."

She nodded because she had learned that people needed some acknowledgment of their helplessness.

Nico squirmed, impatient with the stillness. His collar folded beneath his ear.

Liana smoothed it.

Then she stopped breathing.

Just behind his left ear, where the hair curled against the skin, was a small pale crescent.

Noah had cut himself on a broken plastic clasp at daycare. She had argued with the director, taken photographs, watched the little wound heal.

She had kissed that exact place every night.

The glass slipped in her hand.

Matteo caught it before it fell.

"Liana?"

The baby turned toward her voice, waiting.

She pressed her trembling fingers into the chair cushion.

There were other children with scars. Other babies with soft brown hair. Other mothers who saw their dead sons in strangers.

She knew all of that.

She could not make herself look away.