Chapter 5 - The Night Elena Marlowe Died
Nora did not cry.
Adrian almost wished she would.
He had seen people receive devastating news in dozens of ways.
Some shouted.
Some broke things.
Some became irrational.
Nora became quieter.
That concerned him most.
She sat alone in the back seat as the car moved through downtown Chicago, the photograph of Thomas Marlowe held between both hands.
Adrian watched her reflection in the glass.
“Say something.”
She didn’t look at him.
“What would you like?”
“Anything.”
“My father is alive.”
“Yes.”
“Maybe.”
“Yes.”
“Vincent knows where he is.”
“Possibly.”
She finally turned.
“And you want me to say something meaningful?”
“No.”
“Good.”
She returned to the window.
Ten minutes passed.
Then she whispered, “I hated him before he died.”
Adrian said nothing.
“The last conversation I had with my father ended with me hanging up.”
Nora rubbed one thumb over the edge of the photograph.
“He wanted me to leave Chicago.”
“Why?”
“He wouldn’t tell me.”
Adrian understood immediately.
“And you refused.”
“I told him I was twenty-seven years old and didn’t need permission to live in my own city.”
A broken smile touched her mouth.
“He said being stubborn was genetic.”
“What happened next?”
“Three days later, police told me he was dead.”
Adrian waited.
Nora continued.
“The night my car went into the river, I had been drinking coffee at my apartment when someone knocked.”
Her voice changed.
It became distant.
Not weak.
Detached.
The voice of someone describing another person’s nightmare.
“It was Owen Mercer.”
“Who?”
“My fiancé.”
Adrian’s head turned sharply.
Nora noticed.
“You look surprised.”
“You never mentioned a fiancé.”
“You didn’t ask.”
“He died?”
“No.”
“Then where is he?”
“I don’t know.”
Adrian disliked the answer immediately.
Nora looked back at the photograph.
“Owen worked for Carrow Logistics. Compliance attorney. We met at a company Christmas party.”
“Did your father trust him?”
“No.”
“That seems useful information.”
“I thought my father disliked everyone I dated.”
“Did he?”
“Yes.”
“Then it wasn’t useful.”
Despite herself, Nora smiled briefly.
Then it vanished.
“Owen came to my apartment around eleven. He said someone had broken into his office and that Vincent believed I had stolen confidential documents.”
“Had you?”
“No.”
“Not even accidentally?”
Nora gave him a look.
“People rarely accidentally steal documents.”
“You’d be surprised.”
“Owen told me we needed to leave.”
“You trusted him.”
“I loved him.”
Adrian looked toward the windshield.
For reasons he did not examine closely, he disliked hearing that sentence.
Nora continued.
“He drove behind me. Said we’d take separate cars so we wouldn’t attract attention.”
Adrian’s jaw tightened.
“That makes no sense.”
“I know that now.”
“What happened?”
“Near Lower Wacker, another vehicle appeared behind me.”
Her fingers tightened.
“It hit me once.”
Adrian said nothing.
“Then again.”
She swallowed.
“Owen’s car disappeared.”
“Convenient.”
“I called him.”
“No answer?”
“No.”
“The other vehicle forced you toward the river.”
“Yes.”
Nora closed her eyes.
“I remember the barrier breaking.”
Adrian remained perfectly still.
“I remember the windshield cracking when the car hit the water.”
Her breathing shortened.
“I couldn’t get the door open.”
Adrian watched her hands.
They had begun shaking.
He moved slightly closer.
Not touching.
Just there.
Nora opened her eyes.
“I kicked the passenger window until it broke.”
“You escaped?”
“I think someone helped me.”
“You think?”
“I remember a hand.”
“Whose?”
“I don’t know.”
“I woke two days later in a farmhouse outside Kenosha.”
“Who owned it?”
“Henry Abbott. My father’s oldest friend.”
“Did he explain?”
“He told me my father had arranged everything before his death.”
“Meaning Thomas expected someone to come after you.”
“Yes.”
“And Henry gave you the Nora Hayes identity.”
“Yes.”
“What happened to him?”
“Cancer. Eleven months later.”
Adrian sat back.
Another dead witness.
Convenient.
Too convenient.
“What did Henry tell you about your father?”
“Almost nothing. Said the less I knew, the longer I’d live.”
Adrian’s expression hardened.
“Your father had a remarkable talent for deciding what everyone else could handle.”
Nora looked at him.
“You’re angry.”
“I dislike dead men who leave disasters for the living.”
“Your brother included?”
Adrian’s gaze moved to hers.
For a second, neither spoke.
Then he answered.
“Especially my brother.”
They arrived at Vale Tower.
The photograph was scanned.
Adrian’s security team identified the train station within twenty minutes.
Milwaukee Intermodal.
Timestamp: August 2.
Six weeks earlier.
Nora enlarged the image.
Something bothered her.
“My father knew surveillance.”
“Apparently.”
“He would never stand where a camera could get this clear a photograph.”
Adrian understood.
“So he wanted to be photographed.”
“Yes.”
“For whom?”
Nora zoomed in.
Thomas stood beside a timetable.
His left hand rested casually against the board.
One finger pointed toward a departure listing.
Chicago.
Train 338.
Nora stared.
“Three thirty-eight.”
Adrian looked at the brass key tag.
B-317.
Numbers.
Her father had always loved numbers.
Maybe they were messages.
Nora searched Amtrak archives.
Train 338 on August 2 departed Milwaukee at 6:15 p.m. and arrived Chicago at 7:44.
Passenger list unavailable.
Adrian made one call.
Seven minutes later, it was available.
Thomas Marlowe’s name was not on it.
But a passenger named Henry Abbott Jr. was.
Nora froze.
Henry Abbott had no son.
“That was my father.”
“Probably.”
They checked arrival security footage.
At 7:46 p.m., an older man in a baseball cap left Union Station.
His face appeared for half a second.
Thomas.
Nora leaned toward the screen.
“He came back.”
“To Chicago.”
“Why?”
They tracked him through traffic cameras until he entered a taxi.
Destination?
South Branch.
The same part of the city where Michael Vale had planned to meet him three years ago.
The same district where Nora had discovered fake waste-management invoices.
The same place Carrow’s shell companies operated.
“This whole thing begins there,” Nora whispered.
Adrian nodded.
“So tomorrow we go.”
“No.”
He looked at her.
“You’re doing that again.”
“What?”
“Telling me no.”
“I’m improving.”
“You are.”
Nora turned toward him.
“I go alone.”
“No.”
“You’re doing it too.”
“Yes.”
“Vincent wants me.”
“Exactly.”
“He doesn’t want you.”
“That makes me feel left out.”
“Adrian.”
His expression turned serious.
“You nearly died once because you trusted the wrong person. You disappeared for three years. Your father may be alive. Someone inside my organization is helping Carrow.”
He stepped closer.
“You don’t go anywhere alone.”
Nora looked at him.
“Is that an order?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t work after midnight.”
“It’s nine thirty.”
“Then I have two and a half hours to resign.”
Adrian stared at her.
Nora held his gaze.
Then, unbelievably, he laughed.
A real laugh this time.
Low.
Brief.
Warm enough to change his entire face.
Nora’s heart performed a strange, inconvenient movement.
She immediately disliked it.
Adrian noticed something in her expression.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“You’re terrible at that word too.”
Before she could respond, Lucas entered.
His face was pale.
“Adrian.”
“What?”
“We found Rebecca.”
Nora stood.
“Where?”
“Northwestern Memorial.”
Adrian’s expression changed.
“What happened?”
“Car accident.”
Nora’s stomach dropped.
Lucas continued.
“She’s conscious.”
“And?”
“She keeps asking for Nora.”
Twenty-five minutes later, Nora entered Rebecca Carrow’s hospital room.
Rebecca lay against white pillows, bruised but awake.
When she saw Nora, fear filled her eyes.
“You found the key.”
Nora stopped beside the bed.
“Yes.”
Rebecca looked toward the door.
“Is Adrian here?”
“Outside.”
“Good.”
“Rebecca, who did this?”
Her lips trembled.
“My uncle thinks I helped you.”
“Did you?”
Rebecca gave a weak laugh.
“You don’t even know.”
“Know what?”
Rebecca reached beneath the blanket.
A nurse had apparently missed the folded paper hidden there.
She pushed it into Nora’s hand.
“Your father gave me that six weeks ago.”
Nora unfolded it.
A map.
South Branch.
One building circled.
An abandoned waste-transfer facility.
Written beside it were five words.
THE LEDGER IS NOT MONEY.
Nora looked up.
“What does that mean?”
Rebecca’s eyes filled with tears.
“I don’t know.”
“Where is my father?”
Rebecca gripped Nora’s wrist.
“He said if you ever came back, tell you one thing.”
“What?”
Rebecca pulled her closer.
“Don’t trust the man who saved you from the river.”
Nora stopped breathing.
A memory flashed.
Cold water.
Broken glass.
A hand reaching through darkness.
Someone pulling her upward.
Someone whispering her name.
She had never remembered the voice.
Until now.
Owen Mercer.
Her fiancé had not disappeared that night.
He had pulled her from the river.
May you like
And if Rebecca was telling the truth, the man Nora had believed abandoned her was somehow connected to everything that happened afterward.
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