Chapter 5 - A Dead Man Walks Out.
Before trying to sleep, Nora placed a dining chair beneath the apartment door handle even though Hargrove's security team was outside.
It was not logical.
It made her feel better.
She left one lamp on and kept her shoes beside the couch.
The guarded luxury apartment had become the least restful place she had ever spent a night.
The guarded apartment also gave Nora too much time to think.
She replayed Whitcomb's face when he saw her looking at his cuff.
He had not looked triumphant.
He had looked trapped.
That memory weakened the simplest theory that he had acted alone.
A mastermind would have hidden the wrapper.
A frightened participant might simply pull down his sleeve and hope nobody asked another question.
News of Lily's collapse reached local media before dawn.
The first reports were vague.
A child transported from a luxury restaurant.
Police activity at a private event.
A temporary closure.
By three in the morning, strangers online had already invented motives, suspects, and family secrets.
Nora saw none of it until Caleb mentioned the news.
She was grateful.
The real story was confusing enough without thousands of people adding fictional versions.
Hargrove warned everyone involved not to post, comment, or respond publicly.
Nora had no desire to.
She wanted sleep.
She wanted her own bed.
She wanted to wake up and discover the last several hours had been a stress dream caused by working too many double shifts.
Instead she found herself inside a guarded apartment owned by a man whose brother might have returned from the dead.
Normal had never felt farther away.
Detective Ruiz did not believe in ghosts.
She said so before anyone had time to build a theory around the photograph.
"Dead men don't walk through basement exits."
Hargrove kept staring at the grainy image.
"Then he wasn't dead."
Nora watched the man on the screen.
The face was only visible for less than a second.
It could have been Dominic Castellani.
It could have been someone who resembled him.
It could have been exactly what someone wanted Hargrove to believe.
Ruiz seemed to be thinking the same thing.
"How confident are you?"
Hargrove answered without hesitation.
"Eighty percent."
"Not enough."
"No."
"Do you have old photographs?"
"Plenty."
"Get them."
Hargrove called one of Enzo's assistants at the hospital.
Ten minutes later, photographs of Dominic Castellani began arriving on his phone.
Family dinners.
Charity events.
Business openings.
A picture on a sailboat six months before he vanished.
In each one, Dominic had the same deep-set eyes, the same scar near his temple, and the same square black-stone ring.
Nora compared the images side by side.
The resemblance was undeniable.
Ruiz still refused to call it proof.
"People can copy faces, scars, rings, posture."
Hargrove looked at her.
"Why would anyone copy a man who's been dead five years?"
"To scare your employer."
"Then it's working."
A message from Marcus Bell arrived on Hargrove's phone.
Lily was awake again.
Enzo wanted an update immediately.
Hargrove called him on a secure line.
Nora expected to be sent out.
Instead Hargrove put the call on speaker.
Enzo's voice sounded lower than before.
"Tell me."
Hargrove summarized the missing footage, the false security messages, the wrapper, Whitcomb's photograph of Nora, and the white-jacketed man.
He saved the name for last.
"We may have an identification."
"Who?"
Hargrove glanced at Ruiz.
"Dominic."
Silence.
Nora could hear hospital equipment faintly in the background.
Enzo did not speak for so long that she wondered if the call had disconnected.
Then he said, "Send me the image."
Hargrove did.
Another silence followed.
When Enzo spoke again, his voice had changed.
"Where was this taken?"
"Basement exit."
"Time?"
"Eight twelve."
"Before Lily collapsed."
"Yes."
Enzo breathed out slowly.
"That's him."
Ruiz stepped closer to the phone.
"Mr. Castellani, I need you to be careful with certainty."
"I know my brother."
"You haven't seen him in five years."
"I know my brother."
"Was his death ever conclusively proven?"
Another pause.
"No."
Ruiz's voice stayed even.
"Then I need everything about his disappearance."
"You'll have it."
Enzo's tone hardened.
"But Detective, if Dominic is alive, Lily wasn't the target because of a restaurant feud."
"What was she the target because of?"
"Me."
Nora felt the weight of the word.
Ruiz asked why.
Enzo answered carefully.
"Dominic believed I took something from him."
"Did you?"
"I took control of the family companies after he disappeared."
"That's not what I asked."
"It's the answer you're getting until I'm out of this hospital."
Ruiz looked irritated but did not push.
Enzo continued.
"Hargrove, move Nora somewhere secure."
Nora stared at the phone.
"Excuse me?"
Enzo heard her.
"You were photographed outside your home before this happened."
"I can stay with my brother."
"No."
Nora's temper finally broke through her fear.
"You don't get to decide where I live."
There was a brief silence.
Hargrove looked away, perhaps hiding amusement.
Enzo's reply came quieter.
"You're right."
Nora blinked.
She had expected an argument.
"But someone planned to frame you and threatened you after you noticed the evidence," he continued.
"Going home tonight would be reckless."
Nora hated that he was right.
"One night," she said.
"Until we know more."
"One night."
Enzo did not argue again.
"Fine."
The call ended.
Ruiz looked at Nora.
"You have somewhere besides your apartment?"
"My brother's place."
"The person who photographed you may know about him too."
Nora's anger faded.
Her brother, Caleb, was twenty-three and finishing a nursing program.
He had nothing to do with the Aurelian, the Castellanis, or any of this madness.
She would not drag danger to his door just to prove she could make her own decisions.
"All right," she said.
"One night."
Hargrove arranged a room in a private residential building owned by one of Enzo's companies.
Two security officers were stationed in the lobby.
Another guarded the elevator.
Nora arrived shortly after two in the morning carrying her apron in a grocery bag because she had not been allowed back to the employee locker room.
The apartment on the twenty-second floor looked like something from a furniture catalog.
White walls.
Pale wood.
A kitchen no one seemed to have cooked in.
The windows looked over the Chicago River.
Nora hated it immediately.
It did not feel safe.
It felt borrowed.
She locked the door behind Hargrove and stood alone in the silence.
Her phone had been returned after police copied the threatening messages.
There were fourteen missed calls from Caleb.
She called him first.
"Nora?"
His voice was sharp with worry.
"I'm okay."
"The news says something happened at your restaurant."
"Something did."
"Are you hurt?"
"No."
"Then why aren't you home?"
She looked at the city lights.
"Police are still sorting things out."
"That is not an answer."
"It's the answer I can give you right now."
He groaned.
"You sound like Mom."
Nora smiled despite everything.
"That was unnecessarily cruel."
"Come stay here."
"Not tonight."
"Why?"
She closed her eyes.
"Because I don't want to bring work problems to your apartment."
Caleb went quiet.
He knew her too well.
"What kind of work problem follows you home?"
Nora did not answer.
"Nora."
"I'm safe."
"Promise?"
"I promise I'm somewhere guarded."
"That is somehow worse."
"Go to sleep, Cal."
"Text me in the morning."
"I will."
She ended the call and finally removed her shoes.
Her feet ached.
Her head hurt.
She was too tired to sleep.
Nora opened the refrigerator and found only bottled water.
She took one and sat at the kitchen island.
Her phone buzzed.
Unknown number.
Her hand froze.
A new message appeared.
DOMINIC IS A DISTRACTION.
Before Nora could move, another arrived.
ASK WHO BENEFITS IF ENZO BELIEVES HIS BROTHER CAME BACK.
She stared at the words.
The number vanished from the message details almost immediately, as though routed through a disposable service.
Nora took screenshots and called Hargrove.
He answered on the first ring.
"What happened?"
She read both messages aloud.
Silence.
"Do not leave the apartment," he said.
"I wasn't planning to."
"Send me the screenshots."
She did.
"Who else knows I'm here?"
Nora asked.
Hargrove took a moment before answering.
"Me. Enzo. Marcus. Two security officers."
"That's all?"
"That's all."
Nora stared at the locked front door.
"Then one of those people told them."
"Or your phone is compromised."
"Can you check it?"
"Yes. Don't turn it off. I'll send someone up with a clean device."
Nora stood and walked toward the window.
Below, the city seemed calm.
Traffic lights changed.
A train crossed the river.
People were going home from bars, night shifts, dates, and ordinary Friday nights.
Her own night had split open because of a straw.
A knock sounded at the apartment door.
Three slow taps.
Nora stopped.
Hargrove was still on the phone.
"Did you send someone already?"
"No."
The knock came again.
Three taps.
Then a man's voice from the hallway.
"Ms. Hayes, security."
Hargrove's voice turned hard in her ear.
"Do not open that door."
Nora backed away.
The handle moved once.
Slowly.
Testing the lock.
Then a white envelope slid underneath the door.
Footsteps retreated down the hall.
Hargrove was already shouting instructions to the lobby team.
Nora did not touch the envelope.
She stared at it from across the room.
On the front, her name was handwritten in black ink.
May you like
Beneath it were three words.
ASK MARCUS FIRST.
