Chapter 4 - The Knock on the Door
4 - 15
The metal door handle turned back and forth with frantic, desperate jerks. Someone was throwing their weight against the heavy mahogany panels, kicking the baseboard with boots that sounded heavy and tactical.
Liana backed away into the deepest shadows of the nursery, sliding behind a massive, velvet-draped armoire that smelled of cedar and expensive men's cologne. She pulled Nico tighter against her body, patting his back with rhythmic, silent taps to keep him from waking up. If he cried now, the noise would betray their exact position to whoever had breached the inner sanctum of the second floor.
"Open up! Open the damn door!" a voice hissed from the hallway.
It wasn't Matteo. It wasn't Marco.
It was a voice strained with panic, coughing from the faint plume of acrid white smoke that was beginning to seep beneath the door frame from the hallway floor.
"I know you're in there!" the voice rasped, accompanied by the distinct metallic scrape of a skeleton key working the heavy deadbolt. "Matteo’s distracted in the courtyard. If we don't grab the package now, the clean-up crew will execute every single one of us!"
The package.
Liana’s blood turned to ice. They weren't just here to assassinate Matteo Varric or rob the estate. They were here for Nico. And the intruder had a key—or a master pick capable of bypassing the estate’s most secure locks. That meant there was a traitor inside the Varric inner circle. Someone had sold them out from the inside.
With a sharp click, the deadbolt gave way.
The heavy mahogany door swung open slowly, groaning on its brass hinges.
A silhouette stepped into the dim, smoke-hazy nursery. The intruder wore a dark tactical turtleneck, cargo pants, and a balaclava pulled down over their face, leaving only two cold, calculating eyes visible in the emergency floor strip illumination. In their right hand, they held a silenced submachine gun, sweeping the barrel methodically across the room—past the carved crib, past the rocking chair, moving steadily toward the armoire where Liana stood frozen in the dark.
Liana held her breath. Her lungs burned for oxygen, but she didn't dare inhale. She could feel the steady, rhythmic pulse of Nico’s heart against her ribs.
Please don't wake up, she chanted silently in her mind. Please, just stay asleep.
The intruder took three slow steps closer. Their boots crunched softly on the small piece of mahogany molding Matteo had pried out of the headboard earlier, which was lying discarded on the carpet.
The silhouette stopped.
They bent down, picking up the small piece of wood, turning it over in their gloved hand. A sharp, frustrated curse hissed through the intruder's teeth.
"Damn it," the intruder muttered under their breath. "He found the vault drop."
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The armed figure raised their head, their gaze locking directly onto the shadows behind the velvet armoire.
"I know you're hiding behind the drapery, little maid," the intruder sneered, leveling the silenced barrel straight at Liana’s chest. "Step out slowly, drop the brat on the floor, and maybe—just maybe—I’ll let you leave this mansion breathing."
