Chapter 8: Kristina's Last Move
The DA's office moved faster than Roy had predicted.
Within four days of receiving the camera footage and Kristina's text, a detective named Paulson contacted Nora for a formal statement.
She gave it in Roy's presence, calmly, in sequence, without embellishment.
The footage spoke for itself.
Paulson watched it twice without expression, then thanked her and said they would be in touch.
They were in touch forty-eight hours later.
Kristina was arrested on a Thursday morning at the Paradise Valley house — Nora's house, where Kristina had been staying since Edgar had quietly moved into an extended-stay hotel.
A neighbor texted Nora a photo of the patrol cars in the driveway.
Nora was in a meeting with her operations team in Phoenix when it arrived.
She looked at it, put her phone face-down on the conference table, and finished the meeting.
That evening, her phone rang.
Edgar.
This time she answered.
"They arrested her," he said.
His voice was hollow.
"I know."
"Nora." A long pause.
"I didn't know about the snake.
You have to believe me."
"Roy Castillo will be in touch with your attorney," she said.
"If you want to cooperate, that conversation starts there."
"I'm not — I'm not trying to fight you on the divorce.
I just need you to know that I didn't—"
"Edgar." She kept her voice quiet.
"I believe you didn't know specifically about the snake.
I don't believe you didn't know something was planned.
Those are two different things and we both know it."
He said nothing.
"Talk to your attorney," she said.
"And tell him to call Roy."
She hung up.
Three days later, Kristina was released on bail.
That same afternoon, she appeared at the hotel where Nora was still staying — she had not yet returned to the house, preferring to let the legal process move before she did.
The front desk called up.
Nora told them to send her away.
Kristina called from the lobby.
Nora answered.
"You want to destroy this family," Kristina said.
Her voice had changed — the controlled surface was gone.
What was underneath was older and rawer.
"Everything I did, I did for my son."
"You put a snake in my bed," Nora said.
"You were never going to give him children.
You were never going to let him go.
You had him trapped in a marriage that was already over and you knew it."
"So your solution was to kjll me."
"My solution was to give my son his life back." Her voice cracked on the last word.
Just slightly.
"He was miserable.
You just refused to see it."
"Kristina." Nora sat down on the edge of the hotel bed.
"I saw it.
I saw it for two years and I kept trying to fix something he had already walked away from.
That is a grief I will carry.
But it does not make what you did something other than what it was."
Silence.
"If you drop the charges," Kristina said, "I will leave Phoenix.
I will never contact you again.
I will tell Edgar to give you whatever you ask for in the divorce."
"You can't deliver Edgar," Nora said.
"And the charges aren't mine to drop.
The DA filed them."
"Then talk to your attorney.
Tell him to recommend leniency."
"No."
"Nora—"
"No." She stood up.
"You whispered my name over a cloth bag in my own bedroom.
You are not someone I negotiate with."
Another silence.
Longer this time.
"Warren warned me you were like this," Kristina said finally.
"He said you'd never bend."
"He was right," Nora said.
"Goodbye, Kristina."
She ended the call.
Sat still for a moment.
Then she called Roy.
"She just attempted to negotiate," Nora said.
"From the hotel lobby.
She mentioned Warren Perkinson by name."
"Did she say anything specific about Perkinson's involvement?"
"She said he warned her about me.
That I wouldn't bend."
Roy was quiet for a moment.
"That's not enough on its own.
But it's consistent." A pause.
"How are you holding up?"
It was the first time anyone had asked her that directly since this began.
"I'm fine," she said.
Then, more honestly: "I'm tired.
I'm very tired."
"I know," Roy said.
"We're close."
But close, Nora was learning, was not the same as done.
Because the next morning, she arrived at her Phoenix office to find that someone had been inside.
Her desk had been searched.
Carefully — almost carefully enough.
May you like
But the files on her business contracts were not in the order she kept them.
And her secondary laptop, the one she used for supplier communications, was gone.
