He waved his hand dismissively. “Thought it was a pile of shit. But he respected it, too, kinda, ’cause he said they were like his dad—always scamming. He said they had lots of money—boatloads of the shit—they couldn’t report to no IRS.”

“Desiree knew all this, didn’t she?”

He shrugged. “Not so’s she told me or nothing.”

“Come on, Donald.”

He looked up at me. “I don’t know. Tony was a talker. Okay? So, yeah, he probably told Desiree everything about himself from the womb on. I mean, not long before he died, Tony told me he’d met this dude was going to take off the Church for some serious cash, and I’m like, ‘Tony, don’t be telling me these kinda things.’ You know? But Tony was a talker. He was a talker.”

Angie and I locked eyes. She’d been right a minute ago. Desiree had calculated every single move she’d made. She’d targeted Grief Release and the Church of Truth and Revelation. Not the other way around. She’d zeroed in on Price. And Jay. And everyone else, probably, who’d ever thought they were zeroing in on her.

I whistled softly under my breath. You almost had to hand it to the woman. She was a piece of work, unlike any other.

“So, Donald, you didn’t know the cigarettes were laced?” I said.

“No,” he said. “No way.”

I nodded. “You just thought she was being nice, giving her ex-boyfriend a free pack of smokes.”

“No, look, it’s like, I didn’t know know. I just, see, Desiree, she’s, well, she gets what she wants. Always.”

“And she wanted your best friend dead,” Angie said.

“And you made sure she got it,” I said.

“No, man, no. I loved Tony. I did. But Desiree—”

“Was a great fuck,” Angie said.

He closed his mouth, looked at his bare feet.

“I hope she was the greatest of all time,” I said. “Because you helped her kill your best friend. And you gotta live with that for the rest of your life. Take it easy.”

We walked to his door, opened it.

“She’ll kill you, too,” he said.

We looked back at him. He leaned forward, packed weed into the bong with trembling fingers. “You get in her way—anything gets in her way—she’ll wipe it out. She knows I won’t say anything to any real cops, because I’m…nothing. You know?” He looked up at us. “See, Desiree? I don’t think she cares about screwing. Good as she is at it, I get the feeling she could take it or leave it. But destroying people? Man, I bet that gets her off like a bottle rocket on the Fourth of July.”

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