Page 174 of Buried Too Deep

Cora didn’t, either. “ ‘It turned out he’d killed his grandfather himself and the family was trying to find him to turn him in. They’d reported his disappearance to the local police and there was a manhunt underway. TR found out and had a fit. He was angry that PN hadn’t done due diligence. PN was very sorry, or so he said.’ ”

“Until it happened again,” Stone said quietly.

Antoine nodded. “Exactly.”

“How could they have just accepted what this PN said?” Delores asked.

“It was the nineties,” Phin said. “It was easier to fake a story back then. Identities got harder to fake after 9/11 and the growth of the internet.”

“He’s right,” Antoine said. “Things are very different now. Finish it up, Cora.”

She didn’t want to, but she would. “ ‘TR and I felt that PN should have been more careful. But then it happened again. PN was devastated once again, but TR didn’t believe him. Neither did I. TR and I had planned to confront PN, but then TR was shot in his own home. He was working undercover vice in Houma, and that’s a dangerous job. But he wasn’t killed in his cover house, it was in his own house and there had been no evidence of breaking and entering. PN and I both knew his address, and I know that I did not kill him. So I straight-up told PN that I wanted out. We had two more jobs scheduled and I told PN that I’d finish those, because I’d personally vetted both clients. PN wasn’t happy with me leaving, but even he agreed the job was becoming too dangerous. I did one of the jobs and, like I said earlier, an abusive husband shot at me. I would have quit right then, but this last job is delicate and everyone involved is trying to do the right thing.

“I don’t believe it’s dangerous, but I’m scared, Priss. Scared I’ll die like TR did. If that happens, I don’t want you trying to find PN. If I’m dead and he’s responsible, he will kill you if you make trouble for him. I’ve included information on this drive that you can use to leverage your safety if PN ever threatens you. Please know that I love you and always have. I love our babies and always will. Your husband, Jack Elliot.’ ”

Cora thought she’d be sick. Patrick and her father had been partners with one other man. Her father had been killed doing that final “delicate” job, and now Patrick was the only one left standing. How could you, Patrick?

That he’d done such an awful thing and then cozied up to her family? Rage battled with betrayal, making her swallow back bile.

“Wait.” Delores held up one hand. “Cora’s mom was a physical therapist, not a computer guru. How was she supposed to put all these pieces together? I knew that encryptions existed, but I’d have no idea how to actually use one. How did Jack expect her to get this letter?”

Antoine grinned at her. “That is an excellent question, Delores.”

“It really is,” Val said with a frown. “I wish I’d thought of it. Working with Antoine makes all this stuff seem like it’s easy-peasy, but it’s really not.”

Delores looked pleased with herself.

“There’s another letter somewhere that we haven’t found,” Antoine said. “At the beginning of this one, Jack tells her that he’s glad she found the ‘first’ letter and ‘the rest of the puzzle pieces.’ ”

“Mama loved games and puzzles. We used to have races to see who could do the Sunday crossword fastest. Mama would come up with these amazing games, like a scavenger hunt crossed with a trivia game.” The memory had once been a sweet one. Now all Cora would remember was this intricate puzzle that Jack had left for his wife. “But there was no such letter in his desk drawer. Mama would have said something. She would have done something.”

Cora’s mama wouldn’t have cried for the husband who’d left her. She would have cried for the husband who’d been murdered. And then she’d have tried to get justice.

“Maybe it’ll turn up,” Antoine said but didn’t sound like he meant it.

“Or maybe PN found it when he was searching our house while we were at church,” Cora said bitterly.

“Maybe,” Antoine acknowledged. “We might never know that. So there were three files on the partitioned drive, like I said. The first was this letter. The second was a ledger of the money he’d taken from the clients and how it was spent. He was very meticulous. Every penny was accounted for, with the initials of the client. Some of the cases they did for free. Some, like the killer who paid them to get him out of the country, paid a lot.”

“Did Jack or the cop report this killer to the authorities and tell them where they’d stashed him?” Molly interrupted.

“Jack made a note in the third file that they did—anonymously—but the police never found him. He wasn’t where TR had left him.” Antoine shrugged. “The same thing happened with the second bad guy they helped, which was what triggered TR to blame PN. Jack just wanted to get out after TR was killed.”

At least her father’s goal had been to truly help people. Strangers, yes, but his heart had been in the right place.

Cora figured that would have to be enough.

“What is this third file?” she asked.

Antoine’s eyes gleamed. “The client list. It’s only initials, no names. But there are addresses. For example, Alice’s says AB for Alice Bergeron and gives her address in Twin Falls, Idaho. Most of the homes at the addresses on this list have been sold over the years, but we can get some information from the property records in each of their locations. The few I looked at had one or both owners simply disappear, and the house went into foreclosure. But.” He rubbed his hands together in excitement. “Jack’s last job was in Merrydale, Louisiana. That’s a suburb of Baton Rouge. The client was TC. Timothy Caulfield has owned that home for more than thirty years. He still lives there with his wife and daughter Ashley. She’s twenty-three years old. Her birthday is the fifteenth of October.”

Cora felt the room spin and clutched Phin’s arm for support, grateful when he wrapped his arms around her. The girl had been born the day before her father died—or at least the day before the concrete had been poured. “Did Caulfield kill my father?”

Because Patrick had been his partner. Not necessarily his killer.

But Patrick had been the partner who’d had a personal agenda. The partner who might have killed the cop. TR.

She cursed the hope that rose every time she learned something that could exonerate Patrick. But she loved the man.

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