Nobody could calm Matteo Varric’s baby, but the moment a new maid took him in her arms, she noticed something that could reopen a buried case.

A sheet of torrential rain swept across the tarmac of the private airfield in Teterboro, New Jersey. The sky was a bruised, dark purple, signaling the approach of dawn. Rows of sleek private jets sat parked beneath high-intensity floodlights, their wet fuselages reflecting the harsh glare.

A matte-black SUV slid silently through the rear service gate of the airfield, its headlights turned off. The vehicle came to a smooth stop behind a row of rusted cargo containers, three hundred yards from a small, isolated hanger near the edge of the runway.

Inside the SUV, Matteo sat in the front passenger seat, staring through high-powered night-vision binoculars at a twin-engine private jet parked outside Hangar 4.

"Is she in there?" Liana asked from the backseat, her hand resting inside her coat pocket on the grip of the pistol.

"There's a black sedan parked near the landing gear," Matteo murmured, adjusting the focus. "Two men in suit jackets standing near the stairs. And a woman sitting in the back of the car."

He lowered the binoculars and turned to Frank, who was driving. "Who owns the charter jet?"

"Registered to a shell corporation out of Delaware, Boss," Frank replied, holding a tablet displaying corporate records. "Which leads back to a medical holdings firm called Aegis Biopharma."

Liana gasped softly. "Aegis? That was the name on the research wing at Saint Jude’s Memorial! The wing that funded the pediatric clinical trials!"

Matteo’s eyes narrowed into terrifying slits. "Aegis Biopharma is owned by the Moretti family."

The temperature inside the SUV seemed to drop below zero.

"The Morettis?" Frank whispered, his hands tightening on the steering wheel. "Boss... if Don Moretti is involved in this, it means..."

"It means my rival family didn't just want to fight a turf war over the docks," Matteo said, his voice dropping into a chilling, hushed tone. "They wanted to eradicate the Varric bloodline entirely. They wanted me broken, distracted by a dying child, while they systematically seized my assets."

He turned back to Liana. "Mrs. Gable wasn't just a bitter employee. She was a paid asset for Don Moretti."

Before Liana could process the revelation, the passenger door of the black sedan near the jet opened.

A tall, elderly woman stepped out under a large black umbrella held by one of the guards. She was dressed in an expensive camel-hair coat, carrying a designer leather handbag—a far cry from the modest, plain clothes she wore while managing the Varric estate.

It was Mrs. Gable.

"She’s moving toward the stairs," Frank warned.

"Take the tires out," Matteo ordered coldly. "Silent."

Frank raised a specialized pneumatic rifle out the driver's side window. A faint, low hiss echoed through the rain.

Two hundred yards away, both rear tires of the black sedan blew out simultaneously, the vehicle dropping heavily onto its rims with a metallic crunch.

The two guards outside the plane immediately drew their weapons, looking around wildly in the rain. "Ambush! Get inside!" one of them shouted.

Mrs. Gable shrieked, dropping her umbrella and scrambling up the metal air-stairs toward the open door of the private jet.

"Move!" Matteo roared.

The SUV slammed into gear, its engine roaring like a wounded beast as it tore across the tarmac, kicking up a massive spray of water.

The two Moretti guards raised their pistols and opened fire. Bullets slammed into the reinforced, bulletproof windshield of the SUV, spider-webbing the heavy glass but failing to penetrate.

"Hold on!" Frank yelled, crashing the heavy SUV straight into the landing gear of the jet, disabling the aircraft with a violent, crushing impact.

The force of the collision threw the two guards off their feet, sending them sliding across the wet asphalt.

Before the smoke could clear, Matteo kicked his door open and stepped out into the pouring rain, his heavy handgun raised. Two deafening shots echoed through the night air. The guards on the ground went rigid, then still.

Matteo marched up the metal stairs of the jet, Liana right behind him, her shoes splashing through the water.

Inside the luxurious cabin of the private plane, Mrs. Gable was cowering against the leather seats, frantically trying to lock the door to the cockpit.

Matteo kicked the wooden interior door off its hinges with a single, furious strike.

Mrs. Gable screamed, throwing her hands up in front of her face. "Matteo! Please! My God, Matteo, don't kill me!"

Matteo stepped into the cabin, his suit soaked with rain, looking like a vengeful demon rising from the underworld. He reached out, grabbed Mrs. Gable by her silver hair, and dragged her violently out of the cabin onto the top platform of the air-stairs.

She fell onto her knees in the pouring rain, sobbing hysterically at Matteo’s feet.

"Twenty years, Mrs. Gable," Matteo said, his voice echoing over the roar of the rain and the distant hum of airport sirens. "Twenty years you ate at my table. Twenty years I protected your family."

"They forced me! They forced me!" Mrs. Gable wailed, holding her hands up in prayer. "Don Moretti... he found out about my son's gambling debts in Atlantic City! They were going to kill my boy, Matteo! They threatened to cut him into pieces!"

Liana stepped forward, rain streaming down her face, her eyes fixed on the trembling old woman. She pulled the nine-millimeter pistol from her pocket and pointed it directly at Mrs. Gable's forehead.

"And what about my baby?" Liana screamed over the sound of the storm, her voice filled with twenty-two days of pure, agonizing grief. "What about my little girl Maya? Was she part of your son's gambling debts too?!"

Mrs. Gable stared up at Liana, her eyes widening in absolute horror as she recognized the maid's face. "You... you're the woman from the hospital..."

"Answer her!" Matteo roared, pressing the hot barrel of his gun against the side of Mrs. Gable's neck.

"It was... it was a clinical testing protocol!" Mrs. Gable confessed, choking on her tears and rain. "Aegis Biopharma was testing the delivery matrix on infants at Saint Jude's first... to adjust the dosage! They needed to refine the chemical compound so it would kill Nico slowly without leaving a trace in standard blood tests! Your baby... your baby was just a control trial!"

Liana felt the world spin around her. Her sweet, innocent little Maya hadn't just been collateral damage. She had been used as a lab rat—a disposable test subject to perfect a poison designed to murder Matteo Varric's heir.

A cold, absolute stillness settled deep within Liana’s soul. The hesitation, the fear, the helplessness she had felt at her daughter's gravesite vanished entirely.

She lowered the gun from Mrs. Gable’s forehead and looked at Matteo.

"She gave them the location of the trial data," Liana said, her voice dropping into a terrifyingly calm register. "Who directed the testing at Saint Jude's?"

Mrs. Gable shook uncontrollably, looking between the two of them. "Dr. Victor Vance... Dr. Julian Vance’s brother! He’s the Head of Pediatrics at Saint Jude’s! He manages the Aegis Biopharma trial records in the basement vault of the hospital!"

Matteo looked at Liana, seeing the absolute, lethal determination glowing in her eyes.

"Frank," Matteo called out quietly.