Chapter 5 - The First Bride’s Lie
Norah did not return to Leo’s house immediately.
She sat in the parking garage beneath St. Vincent’s and stared at the photograph on her phone.
Rayburn.
Bianca DeLuca.
Standing outside Norah’s old apartment building like two people waiting for a bus.
Not enemies.
Not detective and protected witness.
Together.
Leo found her eleven minutes later.
Of course he did.
He did not approach closely.
That was new.
He stopped beside the concrete pillar twenty feet away.
“Matteo saw you didn’t leave.”
Norah looked at the photograph again.
“You track parking garages now?”
“No.”
“Good.”
She held up the phone.
“Explain.”
Leo looked at the image.
His face changed.
“Where did you get that?”
“Unknown number.”
“When?”
“Two minutes ago.”
He came closer.
Norah did not move.
“This was taken today.”
“Yes.”
“Bianca should still be with counsel.”
“She isn’t.”
Leo called Damon.
Put it on speaker.
Damon answered on the second ring.
“Leo.”
“Where is Bianca?”
Pause.
“Not with us.”
“Why?”
“She was released.”
“Released?”
“Her statement collapsed.”
Norah frowned.
“How?”
Damon heard her.
“Mrs. Castiglione.”
“Do not call me that.”
Another pause.
“Norah.”
“Better.”
Damon continued.
“Security footage from the hotel showed Bianca left before the shooting began. Her attorney argued she could not have coordinated the attack from police custody because messages attributed to her were scheduled from a device never in her possession.”
“So someone framed her.”
“Likely.”
“Rayburn?”
Damon hesitated.
“Possibly.”
Leo’s voice hardened.
“Why wasn’t I told?”
“Because you were at a hospital ballistics review and I assumed Matteo had—”
“Do not assume.”
Norah looked at Leo.
He looked back.
Interesting.
He noticed.
Damon continued.
“Bianca left District One with private counsel forty minutes ago.”
“Which counsel?”
“Not ours.”
“Name.”
“Samuel Vane.”
Leo swore.
Norah raised an eyebrow.
“Who?”
“Carlo DeLuca’s attorney.”
“So Bianca went back to her father.”
“Or was collected by him.”
Norah looked at the photograph.
“Then why is she standing beside Rayburn?”
Leo’s jaw tightened.
“Because Carlo works with Vescari more often than he admits.”
Everything nested inside something else.
Marriage treaty.
Rival families.
Corrupt police.
Federal informant.
Her old case.
Norah was tired of circles.
“I’m going there.”
Leo said:
“No.”
She stared.
He exhaled.
“Sorry.”
Progress required repetition.
“I am going there,” she said.
“I’ll come.”
“No.”
“Rayburn is there.”
“Exactly.”
“He beat you.”
Her body went cold.
The statement was too direct.
Too private.
“How do you know that?”
Leo’s face changed.
Rayburn’s words.
Cheap cologne.
Bruises.
Maybe Norah had said enough.
Maybe Elias.
Maybe Leo investigated.
“You had my past searched.”
Silence.
Wrong.
“Leo.”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“After the clinic.”
“That violates the rules.”
“I did not monitor your phone.”
“You investigated me.”
“I needed to know what Rayburn had done.”
“No.”
She stood.
“You wanted information because information makes you feel in control.”
His jaw tightened.
“Yes.”
The honesty made anger harder.
Not smaller.
Harder.
“What did you find?”
“Your case file. Photographs from your arrest. Hospital records. Rayburn’s disciplinary complaints.”
Norah felt exposed.
“You saw the photographs.”
“Yes.”
The bruises.
The split lip.
The wrist marks.
Evidence the newspapers called injuries sustained while resisting arrest.
Leo’s face became dangerous.
Norah stepped closer.
“Do not do anything.”
He stared.
“To Rayburn.”
“Why?”
“Because I do not need your revenge.”
His expression changed.
“What do you need?”
“The truth on record.”
“That may not punish him enough.”
“It is not your punishment to choose.”
Silence.
Then:
“Okay.”
She stopped.
“Okay?”
“Yes.”
He said it like it hurt.
Good.
Norah looked at the photo.
“Then we go together.”
They reached her old apartment building at 6:10 p.m.
Norah had not been back in two years.
The neighborhood looked smaller.
The brick stairs.
The pharmacy on the corner.
The laundromat where she once washed clothes after her accounts were frozen.
Her old apartment belonged to someone else now.
Rayburn and Bianca were gone.
A white envelope waited beneath the front entry buzzer.
NORAH.
Leo saw it.
“Don’t touch.”
She looked at him.
“You’re not my doctor.”
“Neither are you, currently.”
That hurt.
He knew immediately.
“Bad choice of words.”
“Yes.”
“Sorry.”
She put on gloves from her bag and opened the envelope.
One key card.
One address.
An old church in Pilsen.
And a note.
COME WITHOUT CASTIGLIONE IF YOU WANT THE REST OF YOUR LIFE BACK.
Norah laughed.
“That is almost insulting.”
Leo looked at her.
“You’re not going alone.”
“I know.”
His eyebrows lifted.
“I’m learning too.”
They parked two blocks from the church.
Matteo and two men stayed farther back at Norah’s insistence.
The church had been closed for renovation.
Dust.
Plastic sheets.
Scaffolding.
One candle burned near the front.
Bianca sat in the third pew.
Alone.
Norah stopped.
Leo did too.
Bianca turned.
She was twenty-nine.
Dark hair.
Green coat.
Beautiful in the way families like hers taught daughters to become.
She looked exhausted.
“Leo.”
He said nothing.
Bianca looked at Norah.
“You signed it.”
Norah folded her arms.
“Apparently.”
“I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“All of it.”
Leo’s voice hardened.
“Why were you with Rayburn?”
Bianca looked toward the altar.
“Because he found Marco.”
Silence.
Norah watched Leo.
His face went blank.
“Alive?”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
“I don’t know now.”
“Bianca.”
“He was alive six days ago.”
The day before the wedding.
She continued.
“Marco contacted me last year.”
“Why you?”
“My father.”
Leo’s jaw tightened.
“What about Carlo?”
“Marco believed my father was moving money for Vescari through city contracts.”
“Believed?”
“He proved it.”
Norah sat across the aisle.
“Why did Marco contact you?”
Bianca looked at her.
“Because I handle compliance for DeLuca Construction.”
Norah almost smiled.
Of course.
The mafia bride was an accountant.
Nobody was allowed one identity in Chicago.
Bianca continued.
“I gave Marco records.”
Leo stared.
“You helped him investigate your father.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because children buried under city concrete do not care who my father is.”
That silenced him.
Norah looked at her differently.
“Then why agree to marry Leo?”
“To get access.”
Leo’s face hardened.
“To my organization.”
“Yes.”
“You were going to spy on me.”
“Yes.”
“Excellent.”
Bianca almost smiled.
“Now you know how I felt about the arrangement.”
Norah raised a hand.
“Continue.”
Bianca looked at her gratefully.
“Marco believed Rayburn was the bridge between Vescari, my father, and several police units. The wedding would place me near Leo long enough to compare records.”
“Then someone discovered you.”
“Yes.”
“Rayburn.”
“Maybe.”
“What happened the night of the gala?”
“Marco texted me one hour before the ceremony.”
Her voice tightened.
“He said leave.”
“Why?”
“He said my father knew.”
Leo stepped closer.
“Then?”
“I left.”
“And the attack?”
“I heard shots from the parking garage.”
“You didn’t arrange it.”
“No.”
“Why confess?”
Bianca’s face changed.
“Rayburn had Marco.”
Norah understood.
“He threatened him.”
“Yes.”
“Then released you.”
“After I gave the statement.”
“And now you’re back with Rayburn.”
“He told me Marco escaped.”
Leo laughed without humor.
“You believed him.”
“No.”
Bianca looked at Norah.
“I went because Rayburn said he had proof Norah Collins was alive.”
Norah’s body went cold.
“Why do you care?”
“Marco knew your name.”
Silence.
“What?”
Bianca reached into her coat.
Leo moved.
She raised both hands.
“Phone.”
She opened an audio file.
Marco’s voice.
Rough.
Older.
“If anything happens to me, find Norah Collins. She is the only civilian witness Rayburn never fully controlled.”
Norah sat down.
Civilian witness.
Not disgraced doctor.
Not collateral.
Witness.
The recording continued.
“The bullet she documented proves Rayburn staged Mahoney’s shooting. The hospital chart proves he tampered with evidence. And if she is alive, Rayburn’s entire story about why she disappeared collapses.”
Leo looked at Norah.
She could barely breathe.
Bianca stopped the recording.
“There’s more.”
“Play it.”
“Marco said Norah was never supposed to survive the frame.”
Norah felt the church move around her.
“What does that mean?”
Bianca looked at her.
“Rayburn was supposed to kill you after your arrest.”
Leo went cold.
Norah’s hands began shaking.
Bianca continued.
“Someone stopped him.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
Leo’s expression changed.
He knew.
Norah saw.
“Leo.”
He looked away.
“Who stopped Rayburn?”
Silence.
“Leo.”
“My father.”
Everything stopped.
Vittorio Castiglione.
Dead three years.
Leo’s father.
Norah had never met him.
“Why?”
Leo looked at Bianca’s phone.
“Marco told him about you.”
“When?”
“After Mahoney was shot.”
“You knew this?”
“No.”
“Do not curate.”
His face hardened.
“I learned six months ago that my father interfered with a police case involving a doctor. I did not know your name until last night.”
That sounded possible.
Norah hated that trust had become an evidence problem.
“Why did Vittorio save me?”
Leo’s answer came quietly.
“Because Marco asked him to.”
Bianca looked between them.
“Marco said Vittorio made Rayburn let you leave custody alive.”
Norah remembered.
The night after Rayburn beat her.
He left the interrogation room.
Returned furious.
Then suddenly transferred her to county processing.
She posted bond.
Ran two days later.
Someone had changed the plan.
A dead mafia boss saved her life for reasons she never knew.
The irony was obscene.
Leo’s phone rang.
Matteo.
He answered.
His expression changed.
“What?”
Pause.
“Where?”
He looked at Bianca.
Then Norah.
“Marco just called our emergency line.”
Bianca stood.
“Alive?”
“Yes.”
“What did he say?”
Leo put the phone on speaker.
Matteo repeated the message.
“Rayburn has Elias Moretti.”
Norah’s blood turned cold.
The doctor who kept the bullet.
The man who could testify the chart was falsified.
Matteo continued.
“He wants an exchange.”
“For what?” Leo asked.
“Norah.”
Silence.
Norah almost laughed.
Of course.
After two years hiding in a laundry room, she had finally become important enough for men to trade.
Leo’s voice became cold.
“No.”
Norah looked at him.
“You do not decide.”
His eyes met hers.
“Then decide.”
She thought of Elias.
His guilt.
His daughter.
The bullet.
The truth.
Then she said:
“We don’t trade me.”
Leo’s shoulders loosened.
“But we make Rayburn believe we will.”
Bianca smiled faintly.
For the first time, the woman who was supposed to marry Leo looked at the woman who had.
“I think I understand why he kept you.”
Norah’s face hardened.
“He didn’t keep me.”
Bianca nodded.
“Right.”
Leo looked almost offended.
Good.
May you like
Norah stood.
“Now let’s go get my witness.”
