Chapter 3 - AN ORDERLY, AN ATTORNEY, AND A TRAP
Detective Nora Hale arrived wearing plain clothes and no patience.
She was in her early forties, with tired eyes and a voice that made people tell the truth faster than they intended. Daniel trusted her. That was enough for me.
She didn’t waste time.
“I need everything she said, in your own words.”
So I told her.
The Malibu house. The daily supplements. Raymond’s name. The way she said the funeral should be brief. The way she smiled while telling me the money would soon be hers.
Nora took notes without interrupting.
Then she asked, “How certain are you that she wasn’t performing? Some people confess things just to frighten a spouse.”
“She knew the drug,” I said. “And she knew I’d heard the doctor say five days.”
That made Nora glance up.
“You heard the doctor?”
“Yes.”
“Who was the doctor?”
“Dr. Alan Whitmore. My attending cardiologist.”
She wrote that down too.
By noon, my room had become the center of a silent operation.
Daniel handled the legal side. Nora arranged preservation orders for my medical chart, medication logs, and room access records. Lucas became the human shield between me and everyone I no longer trusted.
Even then, the hospital routine had to go on.
Nurses changed IV bags. Techs checked vitals. Administrators drifted in and out pretending not to be curious.
At 3:15 that afternoon, Victoria returned carrying white orchids and a look of tragic devotion.
The transformation was almost impressive.
She came in with damp eyes, touched my forehead, and whispered, “How are you feeling, sweetheart?”
Lucas stood near the sink with his back turned, though I knew he was listening.
“I’m tired,” I said.
“That’s okay.” She brushed my hand with her fingertips. “You just need rest.”
Then she reached into her purse.
I almost smiled.
She had brought me another “supplement.”
A small clear capsule in a folding plastic pill box.
“Your vitamins,” she said softly. “The ones that always help.”
I coughed weakly. “Later.”
Her smile barely held.
“I can help you take them.”
Before I could answer, Lucas stepped forward. “I’m sorry, ma’am. Per hospital policy, all medications or supplements brought from outside have to be cleared by pharmacy first.”
Victoria turned slowly. “Since when?”
“Since now,” he said.
The silence that followed was tiny but sharp.
Then she smiled again, all graciousness. “Of course. I didn’t realize.”
She slipped the pill box back into her purse.
Clue number one.
That evening, Nora got a warrant for the supplement box.
Clue number two came an hour later, when Daniel called from my company headquarters in Milwaukee. Raymond Crane had authorized a series of unusually aggressive transfers over the previous six weeks through shell entities Daniel didn’t recognize.
One of them had already placed a deposit on a property in Malibu.
I lay in the hospital bed listening to the machinery breathe beside me and realized something chilling.
May you like
Victoria wasn’t fantasizing.
She and Raymond had already started spending my money before I was dead.
