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“What are we living in here, Duke? An action-adventurefast on his feet

“One would wonder,” Duke replied “Why did you kill Annie?”

“I didn’t”

“I think you did,” Duke said

“That makes two of us,” Hank told him

“If you’re looking for a guilty party, you’d better have an appropriate place to aiht want to start with that old man you seem to trust with your lives”

“I trust Frank with more than my life,” Hank assured him “I’d trust him to the end of the earth with Julie’s as well”

Realizing he was fighting a losing battle, Sanawed on the inside of his jaw and decided to play devil’s advocate “Annie wasn’t anything but a couys know that”

When the brothers stared at hi to listen, he continued “Okay, I’ll come clean with you I killed her I didn’t want to do it, but fact was, I had to do it to save your Julie She put the word out There o hundred thousand on the table to anyone who pulled the trigger When she found out Carl Carlton took out a ten million dollar life insurance policy on Julie, why, she couldn’t see Julie dead fast enough”

Hank scrubbed the side of his face, raking his fingers over the two-day growth of beard “Truth is, you already collected a hundred grand from her She paid you the second you secured a job here with us”

“That’s a fact,” he adotta believe me, boys I never planned to hurt Julie I pursued and then accepted a position here because I wanted to protect her Why would I harm an innocent woman?”

“For the very reason you killed Annie,” Hank said, stepping forward and looking h to kill someone—probably him

“I didn’t want to hurt Annie If you can believe this, Annie was actually a friend of mine”

“With friends like you, who needs to go to hell and ht?” Duke asked

Saht I admit it She provoked me, and I lost my cool”