Page 23 of Buried Too Deep

“You can’t know that,” Cora sobbed.

“I can,” Burke said firmly. “Joy’s gun was missing from its holster. Our camera footage showed the intruder fighting her for her gun after she shot him. But either she missed or he was wearing a vest because it didn’t slow him down. He took her gun and shot her with it. What happened when you ran?”

“I ducked into the kitchen of a diner and thought I’d lost him, but when I came out, he was across the street, so I kept running until I got to Tandy’s art gallery. I didn’t know she’d been shot. I think the pots and pans covered the sound. If I’d heard the shots, I would have gone back, but he was following me, so I thought Joy was okay. Will Joy be all right?”

“Yes,” Phin, Burke, and Antoine said together.

“She’s tough,” Burke added. “And she’d want us to use our time trying to piece together who shot her, not crying over her. She’d be real mad about that, Miss Winslow.”

Cora’s laugh was soft and watery. “She would. And you can call me Cora.”

“Burke,” Burke said. “Antoine, Phin, Stone, and Delores,” he continued, pointing at each of them in turn. “You were a little scared when we introduced ourselves there on the street.”

Cora’s smile was tentative. “Thank you.”

“Where did you go after we talked this morning?” Tandy asked, giving Cora a packet of tissues from her handbag.

“To the police station. I knew I had to tell them what happened. I talked to Detective Clancy. He said he’d check into it. He swabbed my hands for gunshot residue and took my fingerprints.”

Antoine’s eyes widened. “You allowed him to do that?”

“I did. My lawyer told me not to, but I wanted them looking for Joy’s shooter, not wasting time investigating me. My lawyer asked them to give me protection, and Detective Clancy straight-up said that wasn’t happening.”

At least she’d called her lawyer, Phin thought. Cooperating with the cops was usually a good thing, but Phin had seen it go the other way. Lawyers added a layer of safety.

“Who did you call?” Tandy asked.

“Harry.”

“Harry Fulton?” Tandy squeaked, disbelieving. “Cora Jane, he deals with wills. Not arrests. What were you thinking?”

Cora sighed. “I was…rattled. Don’t yell at me, Tandy Sue.”

Tandy winced. “Don’t call me that.”

“Then don’t call me Cora Jane,” Cora snapped.

“Fine,” Tandy grumbled. “You should have let me know you were all right. I was rattled, too.”

“I know,” Cora said, softening. “I’m sorry.”

Phin was turning Cora’s disclosures over in his head, and a number of things didn’t fit. He tackled the biggest one first. “Cora, you said your father had been dead for twenty-three years. But detectives only just told you he was dead two weeks ago. Where did you think he was?”

Cora’s gaze sharpened, a mixture of respect and appreciation. She threw her arms wide. “Thank you!” she said with heat. “The cops wouldn’t pay attention to that fact.” She drew a breath. “I didn’t think he was dead. In fact, I was positive that he was alive.”

“It would be hard to admit your father was dead,” Delores said. “You must have only been a child when he disappeared.”

“It was a month before my fifth birthday. He left one night to meet with a client and he never came home. But he sent letters nearly every single year on my birthday and other holidays. I received the last letter on my birthday a month ago, two weeks after his body was discovered but before he was ID’d.”

The room went silent.

“Well, shit,” Burke muttered. “Not what I was expecting at all.”

The Warehouse District, New Orleans, Louisiana

TUESDAY, DECEMBER 13, 12:10 P.M.

Sage slammed his car door once he’d pulled into the parking garage of his condo. He was still seething and his ribs fucking hurt.

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