Chapter 3 - The Audit of a Marriage
By noon, the Rinaldi intelligence network was operating at full capacity.
Every toll booth between Chicago and the Canadian border was being manually audited by corrupted state troopers and private investigators on Victor’s payroll. Every motel ledger, gas station security tape, and pharmacy receipt within a three-hundred-mile radius was being cross-referenced.
Victor sat in his second-floor study, a glass of warm whiskey untouched on the mahogany desk.
He opened Nora’s laptop. It was plugged into the charger, sitting neatly beside a stack of unopened mail.
He didn't need a password; her birthday was still his default passcode for everything, a lazy habit he had never broken. The machine woke up instantly.
There were no frantic browser searches for how to hide from a mobster or emergency shelter locations.
Instead, her desktop was organized with chilling precision. A folder titled Medical. Inside were pediatric vaccination schedules, discharge summaries from the NICU, and detailed notes from Dr. Hayes regarding Leo’s specialized formula. A folder titled Legal.
Victor’s breath caught. He clicked it.
Inside was a single PDF file prepared by a boutique family law firm in downtown Chicago—a firm specializing in high-net-worth asset protection and discreet marital dissolution.
Petition for Dissolution of Marriage. Emergency Motion for Sole Custody. Restraining Order regarding Rinaldi Enterprise assets.
The document had been signed, dated, and notarized three days ago. She hadn't filed it yet. She had kept it in reserve, waiting. For what? For him to slip up again? For the babies to grow strong enough to travel? Or was she simply giving him one last, silent chance that he had squandered while holding Sylvia in a downtown hotel bed?
He scrolled down to the financial disclosures. Nora had listed every property, every offshore holding, every corporate shell she knew about through her casual exposure to his business dinners. She wasn't asking for alimony. She wasn't asking for a division of his empire.
She was asking for zero dollars and a thousand miles of distance.
“To whom it may concern,” an attached personal declaration written by Nora read: “I am leaving because my husband’s world is built on a foundation of calculated terror, and I refuse to let my children grow up believing that fear is a substitute for love. If he finds us, it will not be because I wanted to negotiate. It will be because his pride refused to let a ghost go.”
Victor read the paragraph three times.
The words didn't make him angry. They made him feel hollow, as if someone had scooped out his ribs with a cold spoon.
The study door clicked open. Luca stepped inside, holding a damp manila envelope. “Boss. We found the Volvo.” Victor stood up so fast his chair rolled backward into the bookshelf. “Where?” “An abandoned logging depot outside of Kenosha, Wisconsin. Near the state line.” “Is she there?” “The car is empty, boss,” Luca said, his expression grim. “Keys in the ignition, heater still warm when the patrol unit found it. But there are tracks leading toward the lake. Footprints. Small ones, and adult boots.”
May you like
Victor grabbed his heavy wool coat from the rack.
“Get the chopper ready.” “The FAA grounded all private departures out of Midway an hour ago because of the whiteout, Victor. We can't fly.” Victor stopped, his hand gripping the wool fabric so tightly his knuckles turned white. “Then we drive,” he said.
