Chương 10
Celeste remained near the door.
“You came,” he said.
“Detective Vega asked me to review the exposure timeline.”
“I asked you.”
“She has a badge.”
“I have better parking.”
She did not smile.
Elias looked at her bare hands. “No gloves.”
“I’m not working.”
He nodded once. “I doubted you.”
“Yes.”
“I doubt everyone.”
“That doesn’t make it less insulting.”
“No.”
He glanced toward the water bottle on his table. The seal remained intact.
“I shouldn’t have let Gabriel speak before I did.”
“But you did.”
“I thought the evidence might be true.”
“So did I.”
That surprised him.
Celeste crossed her arms. “For ten minutes, I wondered whether I had somehow missed the vial when I repaired the bag. I wondered whether I had touched something years ago, forgotten it, carried it into your house. That is what good evidence does. It forces doubt.”
“Then why blame me for doubting?”
“Because you knew someone had entered my apartment before the police told me.”
His eyes narrowed.
Silence answered for him.
“Your people were watching my building,” she said. “They saw the break-in.”
“To protect you.”
“They let it happen.”
“They were told not to intervene unless you were in danger.”
“My records were stolen.”
“I know.”
“And you didn’t call me.”
“I was trying to find who took them.”
“You were investigating me.”
“Yes.”
The honesty struck harder than denial would have.
Elias shifted against the pillows. Pain moved through his face, briefly unguarded.
“My men found a car used by one of Neri’s assistants,” he said. “It was near your apartment.”
“Did you tell Vega?”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“This morning.”
“After searching it yourself.”
He did not answer.
Celeste exhaled through her nose. “You contaminate everything you touch.”
“I’ve been told.”
“Usually by people before or after you threaten them?”
“Both.”
He reached for the water bottle, but his hand trembled too badly to break the seal.
Celeste watched him struggle.
She hated that pity arrived before judgment had finished.
She took the bottle, opened it, and poured water into a clean paper cup.
He did not drink immediately.
“You trust this?” he asked.
“I opened it.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
Celeste set the cup within reach. “I trust what I can verify.”
“So do I.”
“Then verify me properly.”
She told him about the stolen notebook and Neri’s undocumented medication change. Elias called Detective Vega into the room and authorized access to his private medical billing records, including accounts previously withheld by family attorneys.
The records showed that Neri had ordered specialized laboratory testing through three different private companies. The results sent to Elias’s electronic portal appeared normal.
The original laboratory files did not.
Two tests from seven months earlier showed elevated arsenic levels.
Neri had replaced the reports.
That evidence transformed him from missing physician to primary suspect.
But it did not explain who paid him, who altered the tray, who planted the vial, or why the latest dose had been large enough to kill Elias before a planned board meeting.
Police found Neri three days later in the basement of an unfinished Cade condominium project.
He was alive.
Both hands were broken.
He had been restrained to a pipe, given water, and left with enough food to survive.
Whoever placed him there wanted him silent but discoverable.
At the hospital, Neri requested an attorney and refused to speak.
Then he saw Celeste through the interview-room window.
He asked to speak with her alone.
Vega refused.
Neri agreed to the detective’s presence as long as Elias was not told before the conversation.
Celeste entered the interview room carrying her black notebook.
Neri stared at it.
“You ruined your career with those,” he said.
“No. Other people ruined my career. The notebooks made it inconvenient.”
His lower lip was split. Both hands were wrapped in temporary casts.
He looked smaller without his scarf and physician’s coat.
“You poisoned Elias,” Celeste said.
Neri’s gaze dropped to the table.
“I treated him.”
“You hid laboratory results.”
“I was instructed to.”
“By whom?”
He looked toward Vega.
“My attorney—”
“Your attorney isn’t here yet,” Vega said. “You asked for this conversation.”
Neri swallowed. “I did not intend to kill him.”
“Eight months of arsenic says otherwise,” Celeste replied.
“The doses were controlled.”
“No dose was controlled. He developed nerve damage, cardiac instability, confusion, and severe weight loss.”
“I monitored him.”
“You falsified the monitoring.”
His face tightened. “You don’t understand the arrangement.”
“Then explain it.”
Neri looked at his wrapped hands.
“Elias was supposed to step down temporarily,” he said. “His brother believed illness was the only thing he would respect. A public challenge would have caused bloodshed. A gradual decline would force him to delegate.”
“Gabriel paid you.”
Neri closed his eyes.
Vega leaned forward. “Say it.”
“He used the family medical foundation. Consulting fees. Research grants. Nothing direct.”
“How much?”
“Three hundred thousand.”
Celeste stared at him.
Neri looked up defensively. “It was not only money.”
“Of course not.”
“Elias had become unstable. He refused advice. He threatened partners, judges, his own executives. Gabriel believed the organization would fracture if he remained in control.”
“So you poisoned him for corporate governance.”
Neri flinched.
“The plan was weakness, not death,” he said. “Small doses. Symptoms that would resemble an autoimmune process. He would step back for treatment.”
“He didn’t.”
“No.”
“Then you continued.”
“Gabriel said stopping suddenly would reveal the pattern.”
“And the large dose?”
Neri’s eyes moved toward the observation glass.
“I did not prepare it.”
“Who did?”
“I don’t know.”
“Who had the amber vials?”
“They came from a veterinary compounding supplier used by the Cade stables. Gabriel arranged the account.”
Celeste wrote each word.
“The second vial in my medical case?”
Neri hesitated.
“I placed it.”
Her pen stopped.
“When?”
“At St. Vincent’s.”
The room became very quiet.
May you like
Neri looked at the casts covering his hands rather than at her.
“After the medication review,” he said. “The committee expected the missing drugs to be found. They weren’t. One of the administrators wanted physical evidence connecting you to unauthorized storage. The vial originally contained a sedative from a research kit. I put it in the hidden compartment of your bag.”
