Chapter 4 - Norah discovered within the first hour that choosing not to run was not the same thing as surrendering.
Roman appeared to believe otherwise.
The distinction became obvious when a woman Norah had never seen before entered the penthouse carrying six garment bags and two boxes from stores where a single sweater probably cost more than Norah’s monthly rent at the apartment above the dry cleaner.
The woman introduced herself as Celeste.
She was perhaps fifty, elegantly dressed, professionally expressionless, and apparently had been responsible for Norah’s wardrobe three years earlier.
“I brought several options in your current size,” Celeste said.
Norah looked at Roman.
He was seated at the dining table reviewing documents while drinking his second espresso.
“My current size?”
Roman did not look up.
“You lost weight.”
“You measured me while I was sleeping?”
“No.”
A pause.
“I estimated.”
Norah folded her arms over the cashmere robe.
“That is somehow worse.”
Tommy, standing near the elevator, suddenly became extremely interested in his phone.
Roman signed the bottom of a document.
“Celeste has dressed you before.”
“Three years ago.”
“And your taste has not improved since then.”
“My clothes cost twelve dollars because I was trying to pay rent.”
“You no longer need to pay rent.”
“I never needed to pay rent apparently. You owned the building.”
Roman finally looked up.
There it was.
The first crack in the peaceful morning.
Norah had slept, eaten, showered, and allowed herself several dangerous minutes of pretending that returning to the penthouse could be as simple as putting on a robe and drinking good coffee.
It was not.
Because Roman had watched her struggle.
He had known when the radiator stopped working.
He had known when she ate toast three nights in a row.
He had known when she worried about eviction.
He had possessed the ability to fix all of it with one phone call.
Instead, he had decided her suffering was educational.
That anger had not disappeared simply because the floor was warm.
“Celeste,” Norah said, “would you give us a minute?”
The woman immediately looked at Roman.
That irritated Norah more than it should have.
Roman gave a slight nod.
Celeste disappeared toward the guest dressing room.
Norah approached the dining table.
Roman leaned back.
“You’re angry.”
“You say that like it surprises you.”
“It doesn’t.”
“I’m staying.”
His expression remained unreadable.
Norah placed both hands against the polished wood.
“But I am not returning to the way things were.”
Roman’s jaw shifted slightly.
“What exactly does that mean?”
“It means you don’t decide what I wear. You don’t decide where I go. You don’t monitor every dollar I spend, every cup of coffee I buy, or every person I speak to.”
“You expect me to stop protecting you.”
“I expect you to understand the difference between protection and surveillance.”
“They are often the same thing.”
“To you.”
“To anyone who stays alive long enough.”
Norah straightened.
“This is what I mean. You turn everything into survival. Everything becomes an excuse for control.”
“Because control keeps people alive.”
“Control also makes people leave.”
That struck him.
Roman’s eyes hardened.
Norah did not retreat.
Three years ago, she would have.
She remembered arguments in this room when Roman’s silence had been more frightening than shouting. He could become motionless when angry, all emotion retreating behind the walls in his face.
Once, that stillness had made her apologize before she even understood what she had supposedly done wrong.
Not anymore.
“You asked if I was going to run today,” she continued. “I said no. That was a choice. My choice. Don’t turn it into captivity.”
Roman’s fingers tapped once against the table.
“What do you want?”
“My apartment.”
“No.”
Norah almost laughed.
“That lasted approximately seven seconds.”
“You are not sleeping there.”
“I didn’t say I was sleeping there. I want my things.”
“I can have people collect them.”
“I want to collect them.”
“Nora.”
“Roman.”
Tommy looked toward the windows.
Roman rose.
Even without his jacket, he seemed to fill the room.
“I spent three years making sure nothing touched you.”
“You spent three years pretending not to control my life while secretly controlling it.”
“Because if you knew I was there, you would have run farther.”
“Yes.”
“Exactly.”
“That is not the brilliant argument you think it is.”
For several seconds, neither moved.
Then Roman exhaled.
“Tommy goes with you.”
“No.”
“Then you don’t go.”
“There it is again.”
“Two men tried to determine your work schedule during the past month.”
Norah stopped.
The anger inside her shifted.
“What?”
Roman’s face told her immediately that he regretted saying it.
“Who?”
“We don’t know yet.”
“You knew someone was looking for me?”
“They never reached you.”
“That is not what I asked.”
Roman looked toward Tommy.
Tommy remained silent.
Norah understood.
They had both known.
“How long?”
Roman’s answer came reluctantly.
“Twenty-six days.”
She stared at him.
“You let me continue walking home alone at midnight?”
“You were never alone.”
Her stomach tightened.
“What does that mean?”
“There was always someone within sight of you.”
“Every night?”
“Yes.”
“For three years?”
Roman did not answer.
He did not need to.
Norah stepped backward.
The penthouse suddenly felt smaller.
“You had men following me every day.”
“Watching the environment around you.”
“That is following me.”
“Call it whatever you want.”
“I call it insane.”
“I call it why you are still alive.”
Norah turned away.
The skyline stretched beyond the glass.
She had spent years believing she had created a tiny island of anonymity inside Chicago.
Now Roman was steadily showing her that the island had been surrounded by his ships.
She hated the violation.
She also could not ignore what he had just told her.
Someone else had been searching.
“Who were they?” she asked.
“We are working on it.”
“Moretti?”
The room changed.
It was subtle.
Tommy looked at Roman.
Roman’s expression became completely blank.
Norah slowly turned.
“Oh my God.”
“Nora.”
“It is Moretti.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“You didn’t have to.”
The Moretti crew.
The name that had destroyed their relationship.
Three years earlier, Norah had awakened at 4:00 in the morning because Roman was not in bed. She found him in the study with blood on his cuffs and Tommy standing beside the desk.
She had heard enough.
Seven men.
A warehouse.
Nobody left alive.
Until that morning, Norah had known Roman’s business involved crime.
She had deliberately kept the knowledge abstract.
Smuggling.
Gambling.
Protection.
Politicians paid to look away.
Words.
Safe words.
That morning made them people.
Seven dead men.
Roman had returned home, removed his stained shirt, and asked whether she wanted breakfast.
Something inside Norah had broken.
She had left two days later.
“Are they dead?” she asked now.
Roman studied her.
“The men involved that night are dead.”
“That was not my question.”
“No.”
The answer was quiet.
“The Moretti family is not dead.”
Cold moved across her skin despite the heated floor.
“Why are they looking for me?”
“We don’t know that they are.”
“You just admitted two men asked about my schedule.”
“That does not automatically make them Moretti.”
“Then why did Tommy look at you when I said the name?”
Tommy muttered something beneath his breath.
Roman gave him a sharp look.
Norah pointed toward the elevator.
“You can leave, Tommy.”
Tommy raised an eyebrow.
“This is technically his apartment.”
“I don’t care.”
To her surprise, Tommy almost smiled.
He looked at Roman.
Roman nodded.
Tommy left.
The elevator doors closed.
Norah faced Roman.
“No lies.”
“I don’t lie to you.”
“You selectively remove ninety percent of reality.”
“That is different.”
“It really isn’t.”
Roman walked toward the windows.
“There was a Moretti sighting six weeks ago.”
“Where?”
“Chicago.”
“Who?”
“Luca Moretti.”
Norah remembered the name vaguely.
“Vincent’s brother?”
“Younger brother.”
“I thought he was in Europe.”
“So did I.”
Roman placed one hand inside his trouser pocket.
“Luca was never part of Vincent’s crew in the traditional sense. He lived abroad. Legitimate businesses, mostly. Hotels. Shipping. Real estate.”
“Legitimate according to you?”
“Legitimate according to the federal government, which has considerably lower standards.”
Norah ignored that.
“Why would he care about me?”
Roman turned.
“Because three years ago, seven members of his family organization died.”
“You killed them.”
“Yes.”
No hesitation.
No remorse offered for her comfort.
Norah appreciated the honesty and hated the answer.
“Why?”
“You already know.”
“I know what I overheard.”
“You heard enough.”
“No. I heard Tommy say the warehouse had been cleaned. I heard you ask whether Vincent suffered. Tommy said yes. You said good.”
Roman’s eyes remained on hers.
“You didn’t hear what happened before.”
“Then tell me.”
He was silent.
Norah waited.
Finally Roman said, “Vincent Moretti had been moving against me for nearly a year. I tolerated it because wars are expensive and bad for business. Then he changed targets.”
“Targets?”
“You.”
The word removed the air from the room.
Norah stared at him.
“That’s convenient.”
“It isn’t meant to be convenient.”
“You waited three years to mention that the people you killed were threatening me?”
“You were already terrified.”
“I deserved the truth.”
“You wanted distance from the truth.”
“I wanted distance from you.”
Roman accepted the blow without reacting.
“Vincent had photographs of you.”
Norah’s anger weakened.
“Photographs?”
“Leaving this building. Going to the gallery. Having lunch with your sister.”
Her face changed.
“My sister?”
“She was never touched.”
“You told me nobody knew about her.”
“Nobody did after that.”
Roman’s voice became colder.
“Vincent intended to take you. Not because he cared about you. Because he knew what you were to me.”
Norah’s heart began beating harder.
“What stopped him?”
“I did.”
The simplicity of the answer frightened her more than a detailed explanation would have.
“So you killed seven men.”
“Yes.”
“And you came home covered in blood.”
“Yes.”
“And instead of telling me someone had planned to use me against you, you let me believe you murdered them over territory.”
“I would have killed them over territory.”
She closed her eyes.
There was Roman.
Always destroying any comforting interpretation before it could grow.
“But that night was about you,” he added.
Norah opened her eyes again.
Roman stood perhaps ten feet away.
He looked exactly as he had three years ago.
Controlled.
Expensive.
Dangerous.
But for the first time she could see another layer beneath the memory.
Fear.
Not hers.
His.
“What happened to Luca?” she asked.
“He disappeared after Vincent died.”
“And now he is back.”
“Yes.”
“And someone has been asking about me.”
“Yes.”
Norah looked toward the elevator.
“I’m still going to my apartment.”
Roman stared at her in disbelief.
“Did you hear anything I just said?”
“Yes.”
“Apparently not.”
“I spent three years being protected without knowing it. I am done not knowing.”
“Nora—”
“If Luca Moretti is looking for me, I want to understand why. And if someone has been inside my life without me noticing, I want to see what they might have touched.”
Roman’s eyes narrowed.
“That is not your job.”
“It became my job when you brought me back here.”
He stepped closer.
“I brought you here to keep you away from this.”
“You brought me into this the day you walked into my life.”
That stopped him.
Norah continued quietly.
“You don’t get to call me yours and then treat me like a child whenever being yours becomes dangerous.”
Something changed in Roman’s face.
Not anger.
Recognition.
He moved closer until only inches separated them.
“You are going to make this very difficult.”
“I survived three years on twelve-dollar shoes and toast.”
A faint, unwilling smile appeared at one corner of his mouth.
“So I’ve noticed.”
“Then give me my phone.”
Roman reached into his pocket.
Norah stared.
“You had it?”
“I had Tommy retrieve it from your locker at Lombardi’s.”
“Of course you did.”
He placed the phone in her palm.
The battery had been charged.
Norah unlocked it.
There were seventeen missed calls.
Three from Jess.
Four from an unknown number.
The others were mostly coworkers.
Her stomach tightened when she opened Jess’s messages.
ARE YOU OKAY?
SADIE CALL ME.
WHO WAS THAT MAN?
Then, twenty-three minutes earlier:
Someone came to the restaurant asking about you.
Norah looked up.
Roman had seen her expression.
“What?”
She showed him the screen.
His face went flat.
“When?”
“She sent it twenty-three minutes ago.”
Roman took out his phone.
Norah grabbed his wrist.
“No.”
His gaze dropped to her hand.
“What do you mean, no?”
“I’m calling her first.”
“This is not the time to prove independence.”
“It isn’t about independence. She trusts me.”
Roman looked at her for several long seconds.
Then he lowered his phone.
Norah called.
Jess answered on the first ring.
“Sadie?”
“I’m okay.”
“Oh my God. Where are you? Arthur fired you and then you disappeared with that—”
“Jess. Listen to me. Who came to the restaurant?”
Silence.
“A guy.”
“What guy?”
“I don’t know. Maybe thirty-five. Expensive coat. Dark hair. He asked if you were working tonight.”
Norah looked at Roman.
Roman mouthed one word.
Name.
“Did he give you a name?”
“No. Arthur told him you didn’t work there anymore. Then he asked where you lived.”
Norah’s grip tightened around the phone.
“Did Arthur tell him?”
“No. Arthur told him to get out.”
That surprised her.
“Jess, go home.”
“I’m at school.”
“Stay there. Don’t go to the restaurant tonight.”
“Sadie, what is happening?”
Norah looked at Roman.
His expression had changed completely.
The man who had bathed her the previous night was gone.
In his place stood the man who controlled ports and terrified entire dining rooms into silence.
“I’ll explain later,” Norah said. “Just stay somewhere public.”
She ended the call.
Roman was already speaking to Tommy.
“Lombardi’s. Now. Get the cameras before anyone else does.”
He ended the call and reached for his jacket.
Norah’s heart accelerated.
“Roman.”
“Change clothes.”
“Where are we going?”
“Your apartment.”
She blinked.
“You changed your mind?”
“No.”
Roman picked up a black pistol from the drawer beside the espresso machine and concealed it beneath his jacket.
Norah’s stomach tightened.
“I realized you were right about one thing.”
“What?”
“If Luca is looking for you, I want to know what he thinks you have.”
Thirty minutes later, the armored SUV stopped across from the narrow brick building above the dry cleaner.
Norah stared through tinted glass at the place she had called home.
Everything looked ordinary.
The faded green awning.
The fire escape.
The cracked window on the second floor.
The bodega sign flickering at the corner.
For three years, ordinary had been the entire point.
Roman reached for the door.
Tommy’s voice came through the front speaker.
“Boss.”
Roman stopped.
“What?”
Tommy had arrived separately.
He stood on the sidewalk looking upward.
“The door to her apartment is open.”
Norah’s blood went cold.
“I locked it.”
Roman’s hand closed around hers.
“Stay in the car.”
“No.”
“Nora.”
“No.”
His eyes met hers.
This time, perhaps because of their argument, perhaps because he finally understood that physically restraining her would only create another prison, Roman did not repeat the command.
He stepped out.
Norah followed.
Two of Roman’s men entered first.
The staircase smelled exactly as she remembered: detergent from the dry cleaner, old plaster, someone’s overcooked onions.
Her apartment door was damaged near the lock.
Inside, everything had been overturned.
Her mattress leaned against the wall.
Drawers had been emptied.
The shoebox containing $3,200 lay ripped open on the floor.
The money remained untouched.
Norah stared at it.
“They weren’t robbing me.”
Roman moved through the room without touching anything.
“No.”
Norah entered the kitchenette.
Cabinets were open.
Coffee grounds covered the floor.
Someone had removed the vent covers.
They had searched everything.
Then Norah saw the mirror.
Three words had been written across it in red lipstick.
She stopped.
Roman came up behind her.
The message read:
HE LIED, NORA.
Roman became completely still.
Norah looked at their reflection.
Her pale face.
His dark figure behind her.
For the first time since returning to him, Norah felt the instinct to run.
Not from Luca Moretti.
From the possibility that Roman had still not told her everything.
She met his eyes in the mirror.
“What else did you lie about?”
May you like
Roman did not answer.
And that silence frightened her more than the message.
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