Chapter 19 - A Kiss in Front of Everyone
Eli was missing when Nora got back to the diner. On the table sat his phone and a smear of blood. Tessa wanted to charge the hotel with a baseball bat. Vale wanted a tactical team. Nora wanted the truth, loud enough that nobody could bury it.
The crowd had known Nora as Grant's quiet, grateful fiancée, a woman whose story fit neatly into a gala program. As she spoke, she watched that version of herself disappear from their faces. Some looked ashamed. Others looked annoyed, as if she'd ruined a perfectly good luncheon. The reporters, at least, kept recording. Nora wasn't sure whether anyone in that room believed her yet. But the documents were on the screens, the stream was public, and every witness had heard her say it. For once the truth would not depend on one person being brave enough to remember it.
At noon the ballroom filled with reporters, donors, executives, and guests who had attended the disastrous rehearsal dinner. Grant stepped onstage wearing the same charming smile he'd used the day he proposed.
"Our family has always believed in integrity," he began.
"Then this should be easy," Nora said from the back of the room.
Heads turned. Camera shutters erupted. She walked down the aisle holding June's music box. Grant's smile tightened.
"Nora, honey. You're not well."
"Stop calling me honey."
Olivia's live stream began on three major local outlets. Screens around the room switched from Grant's corporate logo to documents: forged deeds, payoff records, a predated death certificate, footage of Grant admitting he wanted Eli dead.
People stood. Someone shouted for the police. Grant grabbed Nora by the arm and tried to pull her behind the stage. She twisted free and faced the cameras.
"My mother gathered this evidence," she said. "She was killed for it. My father helped cover it up. And the man I was going to marry knew."
Grant's face lost all color. "You don't understand what you've done."
"I understand exactly."
A side door opened. Eli staggered in, one hand pressed to his ribs, Ruiz just behind him. A Black Harbor guard had tried to move him through the hotel's service garage; federal agents intercepted them.
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For one second Nora forgot every camera and ran to Eli. He cupped her cheek. She kissed him because he was alive and because this time she wanted everyone to see her choose for herself.
Then a shot cracked from the balcony.
