Chapter 5 - Why Nora Had Been in Alex’s Apartment
Nora and Alex had known each other long before the marriage became hostile.
They attended the same university and remained casual friends after I married Victor. Nora sometimes used Alex as the only person in our family orbit who did not treat every Hale argument like a loyalty contest.
Three nights before the assault, she had appeared at his apartment while I was there.
She claimed she wanted to warn me that Victor was furious about the lender certification.
I believed her.
She cried.
She said Helena had been pressuring Victor because the River North development was nearly out of cash.
She told me to sign nothing.
Then she hugged me before leaving.
The North Shore statement disappeared the same night.
I felt stupid.
Alex did not defend her.
He simply said, “We don’t know why she took it.”
Rebecca obtained the missing information another way.
The lender preserved its own transaction records.
North Shore Asset Recovery had received $141,000 from the construction account.
The company’s registered address belonged to an attorney in Wisconsin.
Its beneficial owner was not Victor.
It was Nora.
I expected betrayal.
Instead, Rebecca noticed something unusual.
North Shore had returned almost all the money three weeks later.
No interest.
No fees.
No apparent benefit.
“Why move it out and move it back?” Alex asked.
“To make another account look healthier temporarily,” I said.
That was an old cash-management trick.
Money could be shifted before a statement date, then returned after a lender or investor received a snapshot.
The family had not simply stolen construction money.
They were moving it among related companies to conceal which business was failing.
Victor’s father, Raul, had recently guaranteed a large private loan using his interest in Hale Urban Properties.
If the River North project appeared underfunded, the lender could demand additional collateral.
Helena’s house.
Nora’s business.
Possibly our apartment.
Victor had been trying to force my signature because a false certification might buy them another quarter.
Rebecca looked at the records.
“Who created North Shore?”
“Nora.”
“Then she knows why the money moved.”
I remembered her filming my humiliation without lowering the camera even once.
Maybe the recording was not entertainment.
Maybe she needed a different kind of protection.
May you like
That possibility did not make me trust her.
It made me want her phone even more.
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