Page 112 of NYPD Red 7: The Murder Sorority

“It wasn’t an accident,” Kylie said. “The FBI has been interviewing Sonia for the past eight hours. Our team and theirs have been keeping each other posted with key discoveries. Warren paid Curtis’s drivertwenty-fivethousand to switch the insulin vials. The man’s been arrested and he confessed.”

“Oh my God,” Brooke said. “Warren sat with me at Curtis’s bedside when he was in a coma. He held his brother’s hand. We prayed together.”

“I doubt if he was praying,” I said. “More likely, he was thinking about how to get it right the next time. And then a few months later, Theo Wilkins pitched the Murder Sorority, and Warren had his answer. He contacted his friends in the mob, and they pointed him to the Kappa Omega Delta website. He wired histwo-hundred-and-fifty-thousand-

dollar deposit, and then paid the other seven hundred and fifty thousand after Curtis was killed.”

“Wait,” Brooke said. “How is that possible? Warren was dead before they killed Curtis.”

“That’s the brilliance of Sonia Blakely. Warren’s bank was authorized to release theseven-fiftythat evening at six o’clock. If Curtis hadn’t been killed by two p.m., all Warren had to do was put a stop on the payment. Eight hours after he was dead, Warren paid in full for his brother’s murder.”

Brooke’s hands were trembling. We’d given her a lot to process. And we weren’t done.

“I always assumed that one person had them both murdered,” she said.

“So did we,” I said, omitting the part that she was our number one suspect.

“But if Warren had Curtis killed, who paid to kill Warren?” she said. “Do you know? Because I’d like to send them athank-youcard when they get to prison.”

“You can’t,” I said. “It was Curtis.”

“Impossible! If Megan Rollins told you that, she’s lying. Curtis had blowouts with Warren all the time, but he would never want to see him harmed.”

“Brooke,” Kylie said, “I think that all changed when Curtis found out that Warren had tried to kill him. About a month after his insulin overdose, the FDA suspected that the insulin had been tampered with. They asked for Curtis’s help in the investigation, but he refused.”

“He knew?” Brooke said. “He never said a word to me.”

“He never said a word to anyone, but I could imagine he lost a lot of sleep thinking Warren might try it again. And then both brothers learned about the Sorority. They both saw it as the answer to their problems.”

“Curtis paid a million dollars to have Warren killed?”

“The FBI has access to Sonia’s banking information. They’ve already verified the transaction.”

“I don’t understand. Sonia didn’t only represent Curtis and Warren. She was on the inside. They let her invest in projects that they knew would pay off. She made a fortune. Why would she end all that for two million dollars?”

“Because it put her a heartbeat away from owning the company,” Kylie said.

“I’m afraid you’re going to have to check your facts, Detective,” Brooke said. “Hellman Productions is a private company. Curtis and Warren were the only two shareholders. If either of them died, the company would go to the surviving brother. Warren had no heirs, but Curtis’s will is crystal clear. In the event of his death, everything he owns goes to me. And now that I own the company outright, if I die, it goes to my sister Pat in Denver.”

“No, it won’t,” I said. “The DA’s Office has waded through alltwenty-threepages of the company’s shareholder agreement, which Sonia had revised two months ago. You’re correct—you now own the company. But there’s a paragraph buried on page sixteen that says in the event of your death, the company and all its assets go to Sonia.”

“Curtis would never sign that!”

“But he did,” Kylie said. “So did Warren. They trusted Sonia. She slid contracts across their desks all the time. I doubt if they ever did anything more than flip to the last page and sign. I know you don’t want to hear this, but Sonia Blakely had a team of assassins at her disposal. She had them kill Warren, she had them kill Curtis...”

Kylie stopped short. It was a sentence she didn’t have to finish.

“And I was next,” Brooke said.

Kylie put her hand on Brooke’s shoulder. “Yes. But now you’re safe.”

And with that, the tower of strength that had gone fromcoat-checkgirl to successful investor, to film company executive, crumbled.

She fell into Kylie’s arms and wept.

“Thank you,” she said when she finally regained her composure. “I apologize for treating you so badly in the past. Thank you for coming. I’m sorry to have kept you so long. I’m sure you have a million other things to do.”

“Not tonight,” Kylie said. “It’s been a long day. Zach and I are ready to clock out and get a drink.” She flashed a warm smile. “Is that Chardonnay still an option?”

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