Chapter 4 - THE SECRET HER MOTHER TOOK TO THE GRAVE
Nora had been eight years old when her mother died.
For eighteen years, she had believed the official story.
A car accident.
A wet highway.
A driver who lost control.
But the photograph inside Victor Romano's supposedly empty family grave suggested that everything Nora knew about her childhood was a lie.
She stood beside the SUV, staring at the image.
“Why would someone put my mother's photograph in your father's coffin?”
Victor didn't answer immediately.
Rain collected on his dark overcoat.
Finally, he said, “Your mother worked for my family.”
Nora shook her head.
“She was a teacher.”
“Before that.”
He opened the car door.
“Get inside.”
She didn't move.
“Tell me.”
Victor looked toward the street.
A black sedan rolled slowly past the restaurant.
His security team immediately moved closer.
“Nora, we need to go.”
She stepped back.
“Not until you tell me what you know.”
For several seconds, neither spoke.
Then Victor said something she never expected.
“Your mother saved my life.”
Nora stared.
“When I was fourteen, someone tried to poison me at a family celebration. Your mother discovered it before I drank.”
“What happened to her?”
“She disappeared three weeks later.”
“She died when I was eight.”
Victor's jaw tightened.
“That's what my father told me.”
Nora climbed into the SUV.
During the drive, Victor explained what little he remembered.
Evelyn Hastings had worked as a records specialist for his father's company.
She had discovered irregularities involving politicians, shipping contracts, and money moving through charitable foundations.
Shortly afterward, she vanished from the Romano family's employment records.
Victor had assumed she simply left Chicago.
Nora looked down at her necklace.
“My father always told me she was brave.”
“He was right.”
Her phone vibrated again.
A new message.
NO POLICE. NO SECURITY. THE GIRL COMES ALONE.
Attached was a short video.
Thomas Hastings sat beneath a flickering light.
A man behind the camera told him to speak.
Thomas looked directly into the lens.
“Nora, sweetheart, don't trust the senator.”
He coughed painfully.
“And whatever Victor tells you, ask him about the winter of 2004.”
The video ended.
Victor stopped breathing for a moment.
Nora turned toward him.
“What happened in 2004?”
He stared out the window.
“That's the year my brother disappeared.”
“I thought you were an only child.”
Victor closed his eyes briefly.
“So did everyone else.”
Nora's phone lit up once more.
This time, the message contained a single photograph.
Two teenage boys stood beside a younger Evelyn Hastings.
One was Victor.
The other looked almost identical to him.
May you like
Across the bottom, someone had written:
YOUR MOTHER DIDN'T BETRAY VICTOR. SHE HID HIS BROTHER FROM HIM.
