Chapter 10 - The Lawyer Who Buried a Living Man
Stephen Marr’s law office no longer existed.
It had closed four months earlier.
His listed home address belonged to an empty apartment.
His legal license had been suspended under another name.
Detectives found seven aliases connected to him.
Claire sat in stunned silence as Cole read the report.
Everything about Julian’s death had been manufactured.
The crash.
The French police report.
The burned vehicle.
The consular notice.
Even the grief counselor who called Claire three days afterward had been paid through a shell company.
Her mourning had been scheduled.
Budgeted.
Designed.
That realization hurt more than the affair.
Julian had not merely left her.
He had engineered her suffering.
Vanessa sat beside her.
“You don’t have to keep looking.”
Claire shook her head.
“Yes, I do.”
At 3:10 a.m., Cole received permission to question Julian again.
Claire asked to watch through the observation glass.
Julian sat alone at a metal table downtown.
His expensive suit looked strangely ordinary under fluorescent lights.
Cole entered.
He placed Richard’s photograph on the table.
“Where is he?”
Julian looked at it.
“No idea.”
Cole added Marcus’s photograph.
Then Stephen Marr’s.
Julian’s face remained calm.
“You’re running out of lies.”
“I haven’t lied.”
Cole leaned forward.
“Your legally dead status might disagree.”
Julian smiled faintly.
“That wasn’t my idea.”
Claire felt her body go rigid.
Cole asked, “Whose idea was it?”
Julian looked toward the observation window.
He could not see Claire.
But somehow it felt as though he knew she was there.
“Richard Hawthorne.”
Vanessa whispered, “No.”
Julian continued.
“Richard needed someone who could disappear.”
“For money laundering?”
“For more than that.”
Cole waited.
Julian rubbed his hands together.
“Richard has spent years moving money for people who do not use banks the way ordinary people do.”
“Criminal organizations?”
Julian smiled.
“You said it, not me.”
“And Claire?”
Julian’s jaw tightened.
“She was never supposed to be involved.”
Claire almost struck the glass.
Cole asked, “Then why destroy her financially?”
Julian’s eyes dropped.
For the first time, shame appeared.
Because there was no clever answer.
“No loose ends.”
Claire closed her eyes.
There it was.
Not love.
Not protection.
Not a misunderstanding.
She had been a loose end.
Cole placed the document about Claire’s death payment in front of Julian.
Julian read it.
His expression changed instantly.
“That wasn’t me.”
“You expect us to believe that?”
Julian looked genuinely frightened.
“Claire was supposed to lose everything.”
He swallowed.
“She was supposed to hate me.”
Another breath.
“But she was supposed to live.”
Claire opened her eyes.
May you like
Julian looked toward the glass again.
“Richard changed the plan.”
