Chapter 4 - The Woman Arthur Couldn’t Protect
Arthur moved Norah upstairs that night.
She refused his bedroom.
She refused the guest suite beside it.
Eventually she accepted a room near the kitchen because Maria and Rosa slept across the hall.
Arthur stationed two guards downstairs without telling her.
Norah noticed anyway.
“You said normal,” she told him.
“Normal stopped being an option when someone searched your room.”
“Your solution is making me look important?”
“My solution is making you difficult to reach.”
Their arguments became a strange ritual.
He ordered.
She refused.
He adjusted.
She accused him of pretending compromise was generosity.
For a man accustomed to obedience, Arthur was remarkably bad at dealing with one maid who simply said no.
Three days later, Norah found the key.
Not the original.
A duplicate.
Her father had hidden it inside the frame of an old photograph she kept in her suitcase.
A number was engraved into the brass.
Arthur recognized it.
Union Station.
Old storage lockers.
They went after midnight with two trusted guards.
Locker 317 contained a battered leather briefcase.
Inside were financial records, photographs, and a flash drive.
There was also a letter addressed to Norah.
Her hands shook as she opened it.
Daniel had discovered that someone inside the Costello organization was laundering money through shell charities and quietly selling information to rival crews.
He had feared Arthur would not believe him.
So he gathered proof.
One sentence devastated Norah.
Arthur Costello may be dangerous, but he is not the man I fear.
The letter named Vincent Rizzo.
Arthur read it twice.
Then a gunshot shattered the station window.
Arthur threw Norah down.
The second bullet struck the locker.
His men returned fire.
Arthur covered her body with his.
She felt his heartbeat against her shoulder.
Fast.
Human.
Terrified.
Not for himself.
For her.
They escaped through a service corridor.
In the car, Norah discovered blood on Arthur’s shirt.
“Are you hit?”
“No.”
“Arthur.”
“It grazed me.”
“You’re bleeding.”
“I’ve had worse.”
“So have your carpets. I still clean them.”
Despite everything, Arthur laughed.
It was the first genuine laugh she had heard from him.
Then Norah realized she was pressing both hands against his chest.
Their eyes met.
The laughter vanished.
Something quieter replaced it.
Arthur lifted one hand toward her face.
Stopped before touching her.
“May I?”
The question surprised her.
Norah nodded.
His thumb brushed a streak of dust from her cheek.
Nothing more.
But the restraint mattered.
Then Arthur’s phone rang.
He answered.
His expression changed.
Paulie had been found.
Alive.
Barely.
And before losing consciousness, he had given Arthur’s men a message.
Vincent was not the person at the top.
Someone else was giving the orders.
May you like
Someone Arthur trusted even more.
His own mother.
