“Am I?” Trevor said. And he explained to Jay exactly what Adam Kohl had been doing with the 401(k)s, municipal funds, and stock options Jay had so blindly entrusted to him. “Your Mr. Kohl invested heavily, and on margin I might add, in stocks I advised him on recently. Unfortunately, those stocks didn’t perform as well as expected. And then there’s Mr. Kohl’s unfortunate and well-documented gambling addiction.”

Jay sat stunned as Trevor Stone detailed Adam Kohl’s long history of playing fast and loose with the stock and dividends of Hamlyn and Kohl employees.

“In fact,” Trevor said, “you won’t have to concern yourself with leaving Hamlyn and Kohl because they’ll be filing for Chapter Eleven within six weeks.”

“You ruined them,” Jay said.

“Did I?” Trevor moved his wheelchair over by Jay’s chair. “I’m sure I didn’t. Your dear Mr. Kohl overextended himself as he’s been doing for years. This time, however, he put too many of his eggs into one basket—a basket I advised him on, I admit, but without malice.” He placed his hand on Jay’s back. “Several of those investments are in your name, Mr. Becker. Seventy-five thousand six hundred forty-four dollars and twelve cents’ worth, to be exact.”

Trevor stroked the back of Jay’s neck with his palm. “So let’s talk truthfully, shall we?”

“He had me,” Jay told us. “And it wasn’t just the debt. I was shell-shocked when I realized that Adam, and maybe Everett, too, had actually betrayed me.”

“Did you talk to them?” Angie asked.

He nodded. “I called Everett and he confirmed it. He said he hadn’t known it himself. I mean, he’d known Kohl had a gambling problem, but he never thought he’d stoop to wiping out a fifty-three-year-old company in about seven weeks. Kohl had even pilfered the pension fund on Trevor Stone’s advice. Everett was devastated. You know his big thing about honor, Patrick.”

I nodded, remembering how Everett had spoken to Angie and me about honor in its twilight, about how hard it was to be an honorable man surrounded by dishonorable ones. How he’d stared at the view out his window as if it were the last time he’d ever see it.

“So,” Jay said, “I told Trevor Stone I’d do whatever he wanted. And he gave me two hundred and thirty thousand dollars to kill Jeff Price and Desiree.”