She said it in a nice, soothing psychologist voice, but her tone still brokered no argument.
It took some tense discussion with her, and then among ourselves to decide that Alex would go in with Mrs. Zeller to talk with Lily.
Only after the door shut behind them did we heed Balogun’s fifth request to claim our seats.
“And you’re sure,” I pressed. “You’re certain he was taking those pills because of...that...and not a bad case of heartburn?”
“You can get heartburn pills from any pharmacy,” Balogun said. “You don’t need to steal or commit fraud for them. But when you have the kind of photos hidden on your laptop that Mr. Layton did—”
A low, furious growl ripped from Rhodes’s throat.
“—it becomes clear Layton was more interested in the side effects, not the main purpose of those pills,” she finished.
“So he was a fucking pedophile and he got stabbed in the back for it,” Rhodes barked. “Good riddance.”
Kaplan inclined his head. “We understand your feelings, but as we said, more has come to light as we’ve dug further into the matter. As Mr. Layton, Mr. Agassi, and Madame Kim are no longer with us, we may never know the full details, but this is what we believe happened.”
“Mr. Agassi was being blackmailed into providing Mr. Layton with those pills,” Balogun said, picking up the trail. “Seeing as there were no monetary transactions between them, or large withdrawals from Mr. Layton’s bank account—blackmail seems most likely.
“At some point, this arrangement was discovered by your mother, Mrs. Kim,” she said, blowing me back. “Likely after the death of Mrs. Prado.”
“Mrs. Prado?”
She nodded. “To understand how this medical fraud went on for so long, we contacted your family’s lawyer. We don’t believe he had any knowledge of Mr. Agassi’s criminal activity, but he did say something that made everything clear,” she told us. “He said that none of this would’ve happened if Mrs. Prado was still running the household. When we pressed him, he explained that invoices, expenses, and even medical bills went through her first. She oversaw every single penny, and never submitted a charge to him that she didn’t verify five ways to Sunday.”
Rhodes, Micah, and I exchanged incredulous looks. “So that’s why—!”
“Yes,” Kaplan stated, voice hard. “That’s why Mrs. Prado couldn’t be rehired. That’s why she had to go.”
“Oh my goodness,” I breathed, horror stamping my spine. “This is all my fault. If I hadn’t rehired her— If I hadn’t—”
“No.” Balogun shot forward and did something I wouldn’t have expected from her. She held my hand. “You cannot blame yourself, Mrs. Kim. You were trying to help and protect your family and your household. You had no idea there were those within your own home who were trying to do the opposite.”
“But— But what does that mean?” Rhodes burst out. “Did Layton kill Mrs. Prado, or did Agassi?”
“We believe it was Mr. Layton,” Balogun confirmed. “She was killed on Sunday morning. He didn’t have class, or anything scheduled as far as we could dig up. He could’ve been anywhere, including skulking around on your property.”
“And the murder of Mrs. Prado was the first domino to fall,” Kaplan continued. “Agassi and Layton must’ve fallen out over her death. No doubt Agassi had been justifying his actions up to that point. He was keeping children safe by supplying Layton with those pills. He was a good man—a hero even. But no hero can call himself that after causing the death of an innocent woman.
“It’s possible the two of them got into an argument that was overheard—”
“By my mother,” I whispered through numb lips.
Kaplan just nodded. “Why kill a dying woman?” he asked softly. “That’s what we continually came back to, but the answer turned out to be simple. You’d do it if she discovered something you needed her to take to the grave immediately. A secret that simply couldn’t wait forany day now.”
I was hollow and numb. It felt like my soul was scraped out with a rusty spoon. “Layton was afraid that in her moments of lucidity, my mother would tell me there was a murderer and pedophile in our house,” I rasped. “So he killed her too.”
Micah put his arm around my shoulders, squeezing me tight. “But how?” he asked. “How did he get to her? He told my wife he was in the library on the third floor. Your cops were up there too. If he skipped downstairs to the east wing second floor, surely he should’ve been your top suspect from the start if you... knew...”
Balogun’s headshaking made him trail off. “The tenacious Officer Davis couldn’t let go of the idea of secret rooms, halls, and entrances in your manor. They are, as he told you, era-appropriate. Especially for manors along the coast,” she said. “So he dug up the old blueprints in city hall. There weren’t any secret cellars for moonshine, but he did find a network of old servant staircases. One such staircase goes straight to the third floor to the hallway leading to your mother’s room.”
Rhodes frowned. “But those aren’t a secret. We know about that staircase. We could’ve told you that ourselves.”
“Sure,” Kaplan agreed, “but what we didn’t know until we lined up the officers’ positions with the blueprints, is that the entrances to those staircases are both in a blind spot. Blind spots perfectly placed to stop all nineofficers from seeing someone slip out of the library, go down a floor, kill Madame Kim, and then return to the library without being seen.”
“It also explains why he skulked around the second floor first,” Balogun put in. “Most of the officers on the second floor reported spotting Layton wandering aroundexploringthe mansion.”
“Why the fuck would he need to explore?” Micah snapped. “He’d been there a thousand times before.”
