Chapter 8 - The Morning Edition
The early edition of the Chicago Tribune was already sitting on the front step of the Astor Street townhouse when Miller retrieved it at 5:30 a.m. on Wednesday.
Dante stood by the kitchen island, a cup of black coffee cooling in front of him, while Miller dropped the heavy broadsheet onto the marble surface.
The headline across the front page wasn't about the municipal water bond vote.
It wasn't about Raymond Cole’s construction contracts.
PROMINENT DEVELOPER’S DAUGHTER LINKED TO MULTIMILLION-DOLLAR EMBEZZLEMENT SCHEME.
Beneath the bold black letters was a photograph of Elena stepping out of the LaSalle Street financial building with Dante two days earlier, her face caught half-turned in the grey morning light.
Dante didn't read the article. He already knew what it said.
"They're framing her," Miller said quietly, standing near the pantry door with his hands clasped behind his back. "Vance’s firm filed an amended affidavit late last night claiming the Delaware shell companies holding the municipal debt were actually controlled by a secret trust registered in Elena’s maiden name."
"My father’s lawyers," Dante said, his voice dangerously calm.
"Your father’s lawyers and Raymond Cole’s public relations team," Miller corrected. "They’re trying to discredit the contents of Arthur’s box before you can release them. If the press believes the documents were stolen as part of an internal family financial dispute, any federal investigator will write the whole thing off as a smear campaign."
The kitchen door swung open softly.
Elena walked in wearing a simple black turtleneck and dark trousers. She looked tired, the shadows under her dark eyes deeper than they had been the night before, but her posture was rigid, unyielding.
She walked straight to the island, picked up the newspaper, and looked at her own face staring back from the newsprint.
"They didn't waste any time," she said, her voice completely level.
"They're trying to isolate you," Dante said, pushing his coffee cup toward her. "If the city believes you're a criminal, anything you or your uncle recorded in that box becomes legally inadmissible as partisan retaliation."
Elena set the paper down slowly. She looked at Dante, her eyes searching his face for any sign of doubt, hesitation, or the old suspicion that had poisoned their marriage for three years.
"Do you believe them?" she asked.
Dante stood up from the stool. He walked around the marble island, stopping so close she could feel the heat radiating from his chest. He reached out, his large, calloused hand cupping the back of her neck, his thumb brushing gently against her jawline.
"I spent three years thinking you were my enemy because I was too blind to see what you were protecting me from," Dante said, his voice steady and low. "I’m not about to start believing a press release written by my father's lawyers."
Elena let out a long, shaky breath, her eyes closing for a fraction of a second as she leaned instinctively into his touch.
"They're going to try to serve an arrest warrant by noon," she whispered. "My father signed the affidavit himself. He’s claiming I stole three million dollars from the family trust to fund private offshore accounts."
Dante’s hand dropped from her neck, his fingers curling into a tight fist at his side.
"Let them try," Dante said, turning to Miller. "Get the car ready. We're going to the municipal courthouse."
Miller blinked. "The courthouse, Boss? The judges on the zoning committee are all in Cole’s pocket."
"We're not seeing a judge," Dante said, his grey eyes flashing with cold resolve. "We're filing a counter-suit under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, naming Salvatore Moretti, Raymond Cole, and Willem Vance as co-conspirators in a thirty-year municipal fraud scheme."
Miller stared at him for a beat, then a slow, grim smile spread across his weathered face.
May you like
"I'll call the firm on Michigan Avenue," Miller said, turning toward the hallway. "The one lawyer in the city who hasn't been bought by your father is currently waiting in our lobby."
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