Chapter 12 - THE WOMAN WHO HIRED JOANNE'S DAUGHTER
Mrs. Price did not run.
When Damian confronted her, she was polishing silver in the breakfast room.
She set down the cloth.
“I wondered when Joanne's recording would surface.”
Clara stared.
“You knew who I was.”
“Immediately.”
“Why hire me?”
“Because your mother asked me to.”
The answer made no sense.
“She died a year before I applied.”
“She mailed me a letter before she died.”
Mrs. Price opened a locked cabinet.
Inside was the envelope.
Joanne had written:
If Clara ever comes looking for the estate, let her in. Don't tell her why. Let her decide whether she wants the truth.
Clara's anger wavered.
“You helped Anthony.”
“Yes.”
Damian's voice went cold.
“For how long?”
“Twenty-two years.”
His hand moved toward his gun.
Clara noticed.
So did Mrs. Price.
She remained calm.
“But not in the way you think.”
Evelyn Price had been feeding Anthony information.
Mostly false information.
She had convinced him Joanne destroyed certain documents.
Warned him whenever innocent employees were being targeted.
Redirected suspicion.
She had worked with Elena.
Then Joanne.
Then Gerard.
“You were all running your own network inside my house,” Damian said.
Mrs. Price almost smiled.
“We learned from the Costellos.”
“Why didn't anyone trust me?”
“You were Vincent's son.”
The words hurt.
Mrs. Price continued.
“And then you became exactly what everyone feared you would become.”
Damian's expression hardened.
Clara stepped in.
“That doesn't mean he can't change.”
Mrs. Price looked at her.
“No. It doesn't.”
She revealed Anthony's current location.
An abandoned Costello shipping office near Red Hook.
He had contacted her that morning.
He wanted Joanne's trunk.
Mrs. Price had promised to deliver it.
Instead, Damian planned to use the meeting to end everything.
Clara hated the word “end.”
“Police?”
“Federal investigators,” Damian said.
“No execution?”
His eyes met hers.
“You think so little of me?”
“I think you spent your adult life in a violent organization.”
“Fair.”
He looked away.
“I'm trying to become someone who doesn't solve every problem with a grave.”
That mattered.
More than Clara wanted it to.
The operation began after sunset.
Mrs. Price carried an empty duplicate trunk into the warehouse.
Agents waited nearby.
Damian insisted Clara remain in the surveillance vehicle.
She agreed.
For six minutes.
Then everything went wrong.
A gunshot.
Radio silence.
Damian's tracker stopped moving.
Clara looked toward the warehouse.
The investigator grabbed her arm.
“Stay here.”
Then the vehicle's rear door opened.
Anthony Costello climbed inside.
A gun in his hand.
May you like
He smiled at Clara.
“You really do look like your mother.”
