Chapter 3 - THE WOMAN WITH THE WATERPROOF NOTEBOOK|
Nadia had never considered herself brave.
Bravery, she believed, was what people called a decision after the fear had stopped being useful. What she had was stubbornness, a brother’s unfinished work, and a habit of making plans that left very little room for comfort.
At 2:17 a.m., she entered her Wicker Park apartment through the back stairwell.
The alterations shop beneath it had closed years earlier. Its faded sign still promised repairs, tailoring, and same-day service. The landlord had never asked why Nadia paid in cash or why she preferred a lease under a different surname.
That suited her.
She locked the door, checked the windows, and removed a loose floorboard beneath the bathroom sink.
Inside lay a waterproof case.
The case contained photographs, transaction records, a flash drive, and a notebook written in Cristian’s compact handwriting. She had spent eight months organizing its contents, separating confirmed evidence from theories and theories from grief.
Cristian had warned her not to trust a single document.
“Paper can be forged,” he had once told her over dinner. “People can be bought. But patterns are harder to fake.”
She had remembered those words when she discovered the same shell companies appearing in Isabel’s charity records, Vega Maritime’s shipping manifests, and the financial reports of a company linked to the Manta Group.
Three organizations. One set of hidden transactions.
The folder Isabel had placed before Marcos was the latest piece.
Nadia had photographed the document three days earlier, when Isabel left her attaché case unattended in the restaurant’s coatroom. The account restructuring proposal contained a transfer that would make Marcos appear to have authorized payments to a federal informant network.
Once signed, the document could be used to portray him as a cooperating source—or as the man secretly funding one.
Either interpretation would make him vulnerable.
And the Manta Group would receive enough information to attack his shipping operation.
Nadia packed the case into a small travel bag.
Then she found the three letters Cristian had left for emergencies.
The first contained instructions for a lawyer.
The second named a federal investigator who had disappeared from public duty after the operation failed.
The third was sealed.
Across its front, Cristian had written: Open only if Isabel Carrera knows your name.
Nadia’s fingers went cold.
She opened it.
Inside was a single page.
If Isabel has identified you, then the people who protected her have already found the investigation. Do not trust anyone who offers you safety without asking what you know. And if Marcos Vega contacts you, make him prove he is not part of the arrangement.
Below the message was a phone number.
Nadia memorized it, then burned the paper in a metal bowl.
Her prepaid phone vibrated.
An unfamiliar number.
“Ms. Reyes,” a man said when she answered. “My name is Gabriel Shaw. I work for Marcos Vega.”
“That’s unfortunate.”
“We need to speak.”
“No, you need to find me. There’s a difference.”
“He wants to know why you warned him.”
“Tell him to read the folder.”
“He hasn’t signed it.”
“Good.”
Gabriel’s voice sharpened.
“You’re in danger.”
“I noticed.”
“Then let us help.”
Nadia looked at the packed bag.
“Does your employer know what Isabel is doing?”
A pause followed.
“I don’t know.”
“Then you can’t help me yet.”
She ended the call.
Before leaving, Nadia placed a folded napkin on the kitchen counter. Inside it was a number and a message for Marcos:
Locker 317, Millennium Station. Do not go there. The key is a test. They are watching to see who you send.
She had hoped to deliver the warning in person.
Instead, she was leaving a trail she could only pray he understood.
At the door, she turned off the lights.
Her brother’s notebook remained empty of one thing: the identity of the person who had ordered the betrayal.
May you like
Nadia had suspected Isabel for months.
Now she feared Isabel was only the beginning.
