Chapter 6 - THE TABLE
Nobody moved.
That was how Norah knew they were afraid.
Powerful people tended to become loud when insulted.
The truly frightened became still.
Michael Lombardi stared at his phone.
The retired judge beside him quietly removed his glasses.
A shipping executive whispered something to the woman on his left.
Dominic remained standing.
His smile did not return.
“What did you change?”
Norah folded her hands.
“The system Arthur Vale designed contains seventeen reconciliation dependencies.”
Lombardi interrupted.
“Fifteen.”
Norah looked at him.
“Thank you.”
His face fell.
Two board members turned toward him.
Norah smiled slightly.
“You just confirmed you know the architecture.”
Dominic’s eyes hardened.
Lombardi closed his mouth.
Norah continued.
“Arthur documented seventeen.”
She watched Lombardi.
“Which means two were removed after his death.”
He said nothing.
“You removed one.”
Still nothing.
“Who removed the other?”
Dominic leaned forward.
“This performance is unnecessary.”
“No.”
Norah looked around the table.
“This is an audit.”
The judge laughed bitterly.
“An audit?”
“Yes.”
She opened the ledger.
“Everybody here has spent years believing complicated structures make them safe.”
She pointed to the pages.
“They don’t.”
“Complicated systems fail because people get comfortable.”
“Comfortable people make patterns.”
“Patterns make evidence.”
Dominic’s voice turned cold.
“Enough.”
Norah looked at him.
“Afraid of the books?”
“I know what’s in them.”
“Do you?”
She opened to the first Dominic section.
“June 14, seventeen years ago.”
His expression changed.
Norah read.
“Payment to Assistant District Attorney Klein.”
The retired judge shifted.
“September 3.”
“Municipal zoning reversal.”
“November 19.”
“Witness relocation address purchased.”
A woman at the table stood.
“This is absurd.”
Norah looked toward her.
“Evelyn listed you too, Ms. Carrow.”
The woman stopped.
Norah flipped several pages.
“Campaign consultant.”
“Four shell committees.”
“Three judges.”
“One senator.”
The woman sat back down.
Dominic’s jaw tightened.
“You think reading dead allegations gives you leverage?”
“No.”
Norah tapped her bag.
“The copies do.”
There were no copies.
Not yet.
Dominic didn’t know that.
“Where?”
“Somewhere you can’t reach.”
“Everything can be reached.”
Gabriel’s voice sounded faintly through Norah’s hidden earpiece.
“Not her.”
She almost smiled.
Dominic stepped closer.
“You are Marco’s daughter.”
“So everyone keeps telling me.”
“You have his arrogance.”
“I was raised by an accountant.”
“That may be worse.”
Norah’s smile disappeared.
“You killed him.”
Dominic did not ask who.
Arthur.
He knew.
“You think everything has a simple answer.”
“You cut his brakes.”
“Arthur made choices.”
The exact phrase from the photograph.
Norah felt heat rise through her chest.
“What choice?”
Dominic looked around the table.
Then back at her.
“He chose Gabriel.”
Gabriel’s voice went silent in her ear.
Norah stared.
“What does that mean?”
“Arthur discovered Vittorio intended to make Gabriel the visible head while this Table retained actual control.”
“So?”
“Arthur could have destroyed the arrangement.”
“Why didn’t he?”
“Because Isabella begged him not to.”
Norah’s eyes shifted.
That wasn’t part of Isabella’s story.
Dominic saw it.
“Ah.”
He smiled again.
“She left that out.”
Norah kept her expression neutral.
“What else did she leave out?”
“Ask her why she disappeared.”
“Because you were hunting her.”
“Partly.”
“What’s the other part?”
Dominic sat at last.
“Because Isabella made a deal with me.”
Gabriel whispered in Norah’s ear.
“Don’t react.”
She didn’t.
“What deal?”
“Gabriel’s life for her silence.”
Norah felt something shift.
Dominic continued.
“Vittorio blamed Gabriel for Marco’s attempt to leave.”
Gabriel’s breathing changed faintly in her ear.
“After Marco died, Vittorio intended to punish the surviving son.”
“How?”
Dominic smiled without warmth.
“Permanently.”
Norah understood.
“He was going to kill Gabriel.”
“Yes.”
“And Isabella stopped him.”
“By surrendering the evidence Evelyn had gathered.”
Norah looked down at the ledger.
“This evidence?”
“A copy.”
Dominic leaned back.
“She gave me names, recordings, account keys.”
“In exchange for Gabriel.”
“Yes.”
“Then why fake her death?”
“Because Vittorio would never forgive her.”
Dominic’s smile sharpened.
“So I helped her disappear.”
Norah heard Gabriel breathe out once.
His entire understanding of his mother changed again.
Dominic continued.
“You see the problem with family history?”
“What?”
“Everyone edits themselves into the hero.”
Norah looked at him.
“Including you.”
“Especially me.”
At least he admitted it.
The board phones vibrated again.
Lombardi checked the transfer system.
His face darkened.
“She corrupted settlement groups three and five.”
Dominic looked at Norah.
“You can repair it.”
“Yes.”
“Will you?”
“No.”
“What do you want?”
“Truth.”
Several people laughed.
Norah didn’t.
“I want the original Marco trust amendment.”
Dominic’s expression became unreadable.
“And?”
“Arthur’s murder evidence.”
“And?”
“Every hidden board record.”
The judge leaned forward.
“You have no idea what you’re asking.”
“I know exactly what I’m asking.”
Dominic looked amused.
“You want to destroy the Table.”
“I want to see whether it deserves to survive.”
Gabriel’s voice came quietly through her earpiece.
“It doesn’t.”
Dominic studied her.
“What if I give you control instead?”
Norah stared.
“There it is.”
“What?”
“The real reason.”
She leaned forward.
“You never needed me dead.”
“Not initially.”
“You needed me hidden.”
“Yes.”
“Then when I discovered the transfers, you changed the plan.”
Dominic’s expression gave nothing away.
Norah continued.
“Kill Gabriel.”
“Blame Declan.”
“Use me to validate Marco’s trust claim.”
“Then place my thirty-eight percent under your legal control.”
Several faces around the table shifted.
Dominic’s eyes sharpened.
Norah smiled.
“You didn’t tell them.”
The shipping executive turned.
“Dominic?”
Silence.
Norah saw it.
The crack.
She pushed.
“He planned to use Marco’s daughter to take Gabriel’s voting rights.”
The retired judge stared at Dominic.
“Is that true?”
Dominic ignored him.
Norah continued.
“And once he controlled my shares, none of you would matter.”
“Stop.”
The judge stood.
“You said the reversion clause had expired.”
Norah smiled.
“It didn’t.”
The room erupted.
Not loudly.
Worse.
Whispers.
Accusations.
Questions.
Dominic’s control fractured.
Exactly as Norah hoped.
Then Lombardi stood.
Gun in hand.
Pointed at Dominic.
Everything stopped.
Gabriel’s voice came instantly.
“Norah, down.”
She didn’t move.
Lombardi’s hand trembled.
“You told me Gabriel was the problem.”
Dominic looked almost bored.
“He is.”
“You never said she could take control.”
“She cannot.”
“Yes, she can.”
Lombardi looked at Norah.
“You read the trust?”
“Parts.”
“She gets thirty-eight?”
“Yes.”
“And Isabella?”
Norah frowned.
“What about Isabella?”
Lombardi laughed.
“Of course.”
He looked at Dominic.
“You didn’t tell her either.”
Dominic’s expression changed.
Norah felt danger.
“What?”
Lombardi looked at her.
“Your grandmother has twenty-one percent.”
Norah’s mind raced.
Thirty-eight plus twenty-one.
Fifty-nine.
A controlling majority.
Isabella and Norah together could legally seize the legitimate Moretti empire.
Gabriel whispered:
“That’s why she came back.”
Norah felt the sting in his voice.
Not certainty.
Pain.
Dominic moved.
Lombardi raised the gun.
A shot cracked.
The retired judge collapsed behind the table.
Chaos erupted.
Norah dropped.
Gabriel shouted in her ear.
“Stay down!”
Another shot.
Lombardi fired at Dominic.
Missed.
Board members scrambled.
Security rushed through the doors.
Then the windows shattered inward.
Gabriel’s team—
or what remained of it—
entered from the adjacent rooftop.
Gabriel came through first.
Despite his wound.
Despite every order Norah knew he had ignored to be there.
He reached her.
“Move.”
Dominic disappeared through a side door.
Isabella entered moments later.
Norah looked at her.
“Twenty-one percent.”
Isabella stopped.
Gabriel turned.
“What?”
Norah stood.
“You control twenty-one percent.”
Isabella said nothing.
Gabriel’s face hardened.
“Mother.”
“Not now.”
“That means yes.”
Gunfire sounded in the corridor.
Gabriel stared at her.
“You came back for control.”
“I came back to keep you alive.”
“Again?”
“Yes.”
“By lying?”
“By surviving.”
Norah interrupted.
“Later.”
She looked toward the side door.
“Dominic has the trust amendment.”
Gabriel turned.
“And Lombardi?”
Norah scanned the room.
Gone.
The CFO had escaped during the chaos.
With access to the settlement system.
That was worse.
Norah checked the time.
12:21 a.m.
The transfer window opened at 4:00 a.m.
Less than four hours.
Dominic still had one activation component.
Lombardi had system knowledge.
Someone had the stolen evidence box.
And now the Table had collapsed into factions.
Gabriel looked at the board members.
“Lock the building.”
One security man hesitated.
Gabriel turned.
The man obeyed.
Norah opened the ledger.
A page had been torn out.
She stared.
“What?”
Gabriel looked.
Page 113.
Gone.
It had been there at the storage unit.
Someone at the Table had taken it.
“What was on it?”
Norah tried to remember.
Names.
Dates.
A diagram.
Then she remembered one handwritten phrase.
“Project Orpheus.”
Isabella went pale.
Gabriel saw it.
“What is Orpheus?”
His mother whispered:
“The plan to replace you.”
Gabriel’s expression became glacial.
“With whom?”
Isabella looked at Norah.
Not because Norah was the replacement.
Because she knew.
“Declan.”
Gabriel frowned.
“But Declan is being framed.”
“Yes.”
Isabella’s voice trembled for the first time.
“Because he was never supposed to survive long enough to become boss.”
Norah understood.
Declan was a decoy successor.
A man installed to be blamed, promoted, then killed.
But who was the real replacement?
She looked at Isabella.
“Who?”
Isabella hesitated.
Gabriel stepped closer.
“Who was Project Orpheus?”
A voice came from the doorway.
“Me.”
Everyone turned.
Matteo Rinaldi entered slowly.
Unarmed.
Blood on his collar.
His hands raised.
Gabriel aimed at him.
Matteo smiled tiredly.
“You’ve been trying to find the traitor all night.”
He looked at Norah.
“You were looking in the wrong direction.”
Then he looked at Gabriel.
“I wasn’t sent to kill you.”
Gabriel’s gun remained steady.
“No?”
“No.”
May you like
Matteo’s smile disappeared.
“I was sent to become you.”
