CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR MOLLY
CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR
MOLLY
The rest of the story was pieced together.
Sloane filled in the initial blanks.
“You killed Kelly. Didn’t you?” Jess said rather than asked.
Sloane nodded. She’d been void of emotion by then, sitting in a separate room at the compound. Nicolai’s and Nea’s bodies were both—well, I didn’t know. I didn’t ask. I didn’t want to know, but now it was later, and it took time to learn the truth.
Everyone just wanted to know the truth.
“I did. I thought I was protecting her, but now I realized that Kelly was trying to protect herself. I came in at the wrong time. I—I’m so sorry, Jess. I’m so sorry.”
“Why did Nea kill Justin?” Trace moved to Jess’s side, his hand on her back.
Sloane raised her chin up. “She was dating Nicolai. They met a month after.” She looked Ashton’s way and at me.
“I think that’s what she was saying earlier.
She was hurting after.” She glanced in Ashton’s direction.
“Then Nicolai came in asking questions. I don’t know what drew him to her, but she was beautiful.
She meant well, in the beginning. I don’t think she went this way because of Ashton.
It was Nicolai. She talked to me a little bit about it, but that was after she was already dating him.
I knew who he was, but he was different.
He wasn’t a Trace or an Ashton. There’s a difference.
They might do the same work, but he wasn’t like them.
Ashton, Trace, they’re good men who do bad things.
I don’t like what they do, or didn’t, but I wasn’t scared of them as people.
Well, except that one time.” She directed that statement to Ashton.
“She was hurting because of you. He used that. He exploited that. He made her change, in ways that people sometimes do that, molding them or whatnot. He did that to her, but I thought she’d turned a new leaf over.
She promised she had, said she wanted to make things right.
It’s why we both came today. It’s the only reason.
Jess, I ...” The haunted expression hung over her like a dark cloud.
“I can’t say I would’ve told you what I did, but I can say that I’m sorry.
I liked Kelly. I am so sorry, for everything. I—”
“Three men were given orders from Jake Worthing’s phone to attack me.
One put a gun to Molly’s head. Do you know anything about that?
The GPS said it came from his phone at the hospital.
” Ashton was standing behind me, his arms crossed over in front of me, and I was holding on to his arms, leaning back against him.
I loved standing like this, in his arms.
Nurse Sloane’s face shuddered before she nodded. “Nea did it. Said they’d do what he said, if it came from his phone. It was her plan, trying to turn one family against the other. Or that’s what she said to me ...” She trailed off. “Now I’m not so certain.”
“None of that has anything to do with why she killed Justin.” Trace moved toward her. “She must’ve said something. Anything.”
She flinched away from him but shook her head. “She only said that he attacked her. That’s all. I couldn’t keep asking, or she would’ve turned on me. I—I’m so sorry. I should’ve pushed harder on her.”
“She killed him because Nicolai asked her to.”
A new voice, a new presence.
I tensed, looking for and then seeing Detective Jake Worthing in the doorway. He yanked someone else forward. My dad.
“Dad!” I started for him, but Ashton held me back.
That’s when I saw that Jake had a gun on my dad, pointed into his back.
“Worthing.” Jess’s tone was like ice.
He barely gave her a look, finding Trace and then Ashton. “This fucking piece of ferret asshole almost got himself killed tonight.” He shoved my dad farther inside, releasing him.
My dad ran forward, coming my way until Ashton growled in warning.
He reined it in, pausing but holding up his hands. “You okay, Mols?”
I nodded, looking him over because I couldn’t help it. He was still my dad. Moron.
“Get over there.” Ashton pointed to the corner where no one was standing.
My dad went over but glared as he did. Then he saw a pot of coffee and poured himself a cup, adding half the sugar bottle to the Styrofoam cup.
“What are you doing here, Detective Worthing?” Trace was asking, his tone as cold as Jess’s.
Jake ignored them, looking at me first and then focusing on Ashton. “You remember my theory?”
Ashton’s jaw clenched, but he nodded, just barely. So stiff.
“I was right. And that weasel has the proof.” He motioned to my dad, who was making a face after tasting the coffee.
“I don’t know where he has it, or what he has, but I followed the trail enough to know it’s true.
Nicolai had Justin killed because Justin found out my cousin was working on behalf of the DEA. ”
Ashton went completely still, his arm like cement on my waist.
Trace’s voice was eerily low as well, saying, “You want to say that again?”
Jake barely flicked him a glance, only focusing on Ashton.
“He was approached and backed heavily to go up in power in my family. DEA wanted to get a player in the mix, in the city, to help maintain control over the drug trade. They pushed Nicolai to get in our city, thinking a player from NYC would have more power than from where we were from in Maine. They were the backer, and when the fight went too public, hitting a hospital, they pulled out. Nicolai came here as a last effort to maintain control. It wouldn’t have worked. ”
“What does that fit in with Nea being the one to pull the trigger on Justin?”
“She overheard him and Kelly calling to say goodbye to that one.” He indicated Nurse Sloane.
“She was on the phone with Nicolai and mentioned it to him. He asked her then and there to stop him, by any means necessary. He told her Justin was planning to go to the authorities, but Nicolai would be killed. He wouldn’t just get arrested.
He convinced her that someone had cops on the payroll, and they’d go after him. She killed Justin to save Nicolai.”
“How do you know that?”
“Anonlinediary.”
We all turned to my father, who was drinking his coffee, and now he was munching on a donut.
Where he got the donut, I had no clue, but he waved it in the air, now at center stage, and swallowed his coffee in one big gulp.
“A diary. Online too. She logged in every night and added to it. I got everything in there up until today. It was her failsafe, I guess. In case something went wrong. She’d have something to plea her way out.
She was thorough.” He frowned at me, narrowing his eyes at Ashton.
“She talked a whole lot about you two. That’s how I knew the both of you were doing what you’re obviously still doing, unless I’m taking that hold in a different way than it’s intended? ”
Ashton growled, low in his throat. I felt it through my back, vibrating.
I snapped at my dad. “How did you get ahold of her diary?”
He grinned at me, taking another bite of his donut. “There she is, so spunky. I love you, Mollykins.” He leaned around me as if to talk to Ashton. “You know she’s got this thing called a switch—”
“Dad!”
He swallowed before taking a sip of coffee. “Right. Right. I broke into her place and holed up.”
I was dumbfounded. “You what?”
“I needed a place to stay, and I’d been asking around to find out who killed Justin.
Paulie over on Fifth said the shot happened at the hospital, that’s the word on the street, so that’s where I headed over.
Asked around and saw the doctor acting weird around me.
So”—he shrugged—“I broke into her place. Course I thought she’d be heading home that night, so I was quick, looking around, and then she came home, but she didn’t even notice.
I ransacked her place, and she only rushed in, packed a bag, and was gone.
Heard her on the phone with that one, I’m guessing.
She was saying a guy with my description was asking questions about who killed Justin Worthing.
After that, I got comfortable, but she never came home, so I took my time snooping. ”
I wanted to hit him in the forehead. “You’ve been at the doctor’s apartment the whole time ?”
He nodded, then cocked his head to the side.
“Mostly. She came back one other time, but it was the same thing. Rummaged around looking for something and went crazy when she couldn’t find it.
” He grinned. “Good thing I’d already found it.
Her laptop and diary. Got it all there. She changed her password, logging in from somewhere else, but I already had access to all her accounts. ”
“ When did you find all that out?”
Another one of those shivers went down my spine at Ashton’s tone.
My dad noticed, too, going still and looking a little more wary. “It might’ve been a bit ago.”
“How long ago?!” Ashton barked.
My dad’s face went slack. “A few weeks.”
A few weeks ... I surged forward. “How long?!”
His eyebrows dipped low, and he began edging backward. “I don’t know. Why’s it matter?”
“Why’s it matter?” I taunted him, still going at him but going slowly. “Oh, I don’t know, because maybe an entire war might not have happened? Maybe that’s why it might’ve mattered. How long?”
“I don’t know. A while, okay?” he shouted back at me, before tossing the last of his donut on the desk. “I came through! That’s all that matters. I came through.” He held up his coffee. “For you.”
“You said you couldn’t find who killed Justin. That’s a lie.”