The cords of Connor’s neck grew taut. “Do it. I’ll testify.”
Mr. Dover opened his mouth but closed it again without speaking. He must have known this was the best deal his client was going to get.
Joe released a breath. “You’re doing the right thing. She’ll be safe, Connor.”
“Once you’ve served your time,” Radcliffe added, “we’ll make sure you get to your aunt if that’s what you want.”
“By the time I’m out, she’ll either be very old or will have passed into glory already,” Connor said. “I don’t want her to be alone in the meantime. She went to school with someone who married young and moved out of state decades ago. We heard she was widowed. Aunt Doreen would like to see her again, but they lost touch over the years.”
“All the better,” Mr. Radcliffe inserted. “She’ll be harder for the Morettis to track that way.”
“I’ll find her, Connor,” Joe promised. “I’ll take care of everything.”
“All I need is your autograph agreeing to our bargain.” Mr. Radcliffe slid papers across the table. Mr. Dover read them, and Connor signed and passed them back again.
As Radcliffe secured them in his briefcase, a spark entered Connor’s eyes. “I want to say something to Joe.”
Mr. Dover sighed. “I suppose the risk of incriminating yourself is a moot point anyway.”
Connor laughed darkly. “Now that I’m pleading guilty to murder? I’ll say.” He turned to Joe. “You still have no idea what any of this has to do with that oyster shell Wade Martin was holding the night I shot him.”
Metal scraped the floor as Joe shifted his chair closer to the table. “I’m listening.”
“You deserve to know, so here it is as I understand it. Ray got wise about Wade. Wade sensed a shift in their relationship and was anxious to get back in his good graces.”
Joe held up a hand to interrupt him. “How do you know all this?”
“Ray told me.” Connor continued to share the story.
Wade had known Ray was a collector. He picked up the oyster shell at Rosenberg’s and gave it to Ray as a good luck token he hoped would curry favor. It didn’t. Once Ray decided Wade was too big aliability, he sent the shell through Connor to be delivered along with the message “Your luck ran out” moments before Connor killed him.
Forgery had nothing to do with it.
And yet, the pursuit of forgeries had led to this chance of nailing the Morettis.
Well, that and the murders of two men in his custody.
Joe hated that Lawrence Westlake and Fred Klein had been killed today. He hated the trauma Lauren had suffered, from Fred threatening her life to her father abandoning her to Lawrence being shot and wasting his dying breath on excusing himself rather than begging for her forgiveness. He wished he could have found a path to justice without any of this.
All Joe could do now was trust the legal system to make sure the killers didn’t get away with it.
Mr. Dover thumbed through the copy of the agreement Connor had signed. “Will that be all, Detective? Mr. Radcliffe?”
This wasn’t all, in fact. For Connor and Doreen, the Morettis, and Lauren, this was the end of one chapter and the start of the next.
CHAPTER
37
Lauren could not get warm.
Hours had passed since she’d watched Lawrence die, and yet her pulse still pounded. Her blood rushed to her heart, as if that could help put the pieces back together. All it did was leave the rest of her cold.
“Here. Hold this.” Greta bustled into the bedroom and handed her a hot water bottle wrapped in a flannel pillowcase. Curled onto her side beneath the covers, Lauren hugged it to her chest. The older woman slid another one between the sheets to warm her feet. “Better?”
“Thank you.”
Voices swirled outside the bedroom. Ivy fielded telephone calls, and Elsa hosted her parents in the living room. Aunt Beryl and Uncle Julian had come with a huge vase of flowers but had little to say to Lauren. No wonder. They’d despised Lawrence even before they’d learned the depth of his deception. Their embraces and stricken expressions, however, proved their concern for their niece sincere. Sal had also arrived, and by the smell permeating the apartment, he’d brought an Italian feast to share with all gathered.
