“Oh? I didn’t know that happened. I’ll bet he loved that car.”
“Yes, he does.” I hesitate for just a moment, but then commit fully. “Luckily the cops found it in a storage locker right away.”
There’s a short pause. “Well, that’s lucky.” Is it just me or has her voice risen an octave? I’m sure she’s weighing my words. Wondering if I have my own hidden purpose for telling her.
But I can play the same game that she does. “Yeah. I just wish they’d release it. I don’t know why they’re not. Being assholes, I guess.”
“Local police are lazy.”
“Must be it.”
There’s another long pause. “If there’s anything at all that we can do to help Luke during this time, please let us know. We’ll see you at the funeral.”
“Thanks, Elmira.” Now that my small trap is laid, I toss the phone back into the safe, leash the dogs up, and head back to Luke’s.
But not before I find myself standing in the rain, waiting for it to wash away the filthy feeling of my betrayal to my team.
Chapter 49
LUKE
Rain squeezes my hand.
It’s a warning squeeze, signaling that I’m getting too worked up.
I take a deep breath to calm myself. When Rust told me he was making me executor to his estate a few years ago, I didn’t spend too much time thinking about it. I definitely didn’t think that, at twenty-four years old, I’d be planning a closed-casket funeral for him. But now that the police have finished gathering evidence off of him—there’s no need for an extensive autopsy; it’s pretty clear that the bullet through the brain is what killed him—that’s exactly what I’m sitting here doing, with a very calm and collected Rain on my right side and the emotionally unstable duo—Mom and Ana—on my left, fighting me tooth-and-nail for a traditional Eastern Orthodox service.
“Rust didn’t want a service of any kind, or a wake. He made that very clear in his will. Which I spent all morning going through with the lawyer,” I say, tempering my tone. Rust never had much patience for the funeral process and he sure didn’t believe in God.
“But what about what we want? What his mother and father would want?” my mom cries, rubbing away the fresh tears streaming down her cheeks. “If we go by those stupid papers, well . . . why don’t we just toss his body into the family vault!”
Reading between the lines, he’s basically asking for just that. But I don’t say that now.
“Are you going to keep fighting me on this? Or can we just move on with the arrangements?” Because I just want this to be over with.
“We can arrange for a lovely—and quick—service at the burial site for you that may help serve everyone’s needs while respecting Mr. Markov’s wishes,” the funeral director offers with a sympathetic smile. It’s the same smile she’s worn for the past hour, relieving it only with well-timed frowns or closed-eye nods to convey her deepest understanding. I wonder if these people are born with funeral worker genes or if they take extensive schooling for it, because everyone we’ve walked past on our way into this office is the exact same.
Rain’s ringer is off but I can hear her phone vibrating in her pocket. It’s been vibrating nonstop since we sat down in here but she hasn’t so much as pulled it out. I lean over. “You can take that if you need to. It could be about your dad.” With everything else going on, I haven’t even asked her what’s happening with him and she hasn’t mentioned it.
She frowns. “Yeah, I probably should. If you’re okay here?”
“What else do we need to do?” I ask the funeral director.
She lays a catalogue out in front of us with utmost care. “Well, there is the matter of choosing a casket, writing the obituary . . .”
Her words drift off as I turn back to Rain. “We can handle this.”
She pats my leg and then stands. “Okay, I’ll just be outside.”
I watch her walk out, feeling immediately lonely. She’s been by my side—watching reruns of my stupid favorite shows, feeding me, walking the dogs with me, lying next to me while I fall asleep—since the cops first showed up at my door. I don’t know what I’d do without her.
Chapter 50
CLARA
“This is creepy. And disrespectful,” I mutter, glancing over my shoulder at the casket on the other side of the room, an elderly man lying peacefully within.
“Why? He doesn’t care. His visitation doesn’t start until tonight.” Warner holds a finger to his lip, checking for blood. I was halfway down the hall, passing a row of viewing rooms, when an arm shot out and grabbed me. I threw a fist out and connected with flesh before I realized it was my handler who was abducting me.
“You’re insane. Have you been waiting here all this time? I was just about to call you. Way safer than this.”
“Relax. I can explain my way out of anything,” he mutters. “And I honestly don’t know what’s safe anymore. I feel like there are more eyes on us than we know about.”
“Why do you say that?”
Warner reaches up, his hand grazing my chest as he grasps my necklace, switching the wire off. “Our decoy Porsche got dropped off on the side of the road last night. Wiped clean and abandoned.”
Last night. Only hours after my phone call with Elmira. A mix of satisfaction and guilt stir inside me with the proof that my hunch paid off. Aref set that car theft up and staged it to look like Vlad was behind it, should the thief get busted and questioned. I have my guesses as to why.