Will Trent seems to close the door on Rafael Wexford in the 14th episode of Season 3. At the end of last season, Will seemed to have destroyed his life in Atlanta beyond repair. However, like some strange modern version of Mary Poppins, Rafael’s demand to have his old friend handle his case seems to have brought Will back to his center in many ways. So it feels a little sad to think that Rafael may be out of his life forever now, but hopefully we will see him again someday. Here’s a recap.
Season 3, Episode 14 – “A Funeral Fit for a Quartermaine” – Written by Daniel Thomsen
Through flashbacks to 2004, we see how Will Trent (Andres Velez) came to know Rafael Wexford (Yannick Haynes). A young adult living on his own, Will responded to a room rental at Rafael’s grandmother’s house, Ms. Pearl (Roxzane T. Mims).
Rafael was against his grandma taking Will on as a boarder, in part because he smelled and hadn’t been able to hold a steady job. But Ms. Pearl was impressed by Will’s ability to fix her cuckoo clock. Right off the bat, Will and Rafael had a brotherly, quarrelsome dynamic.
When Will’s dyslexia cost him his fast food job, Rafael let him in on a secret side hustle – stolen rugs. Will recognized the value of the rugs, having once had a foster parent who forced him to work in their home goods warehouse. With Will’s knowledge of Turkish handmade rugs, Rafael saw potential for Will as a salesman, revealing that he always wanted to own a money bin like Scrooge McDuck.
We see Will make his first sale to a man named Henry (Benjamin Spruger). Soon after, the original owner of the stolen rugs, Eddie (James Choi), found Will and Rafael. He demanded the money they made, but also saw their potential and wanted to hire them.
Will and Rafael fight over whether to do it or not. In the end, Will approached Eddie with the money and refused to join his gang. When that plan went south, Will was almost killed. Rafael stepped in at the last minute, saving Will by killing one of Eddie’s goons. “I never want to see you again,” Rafael told Will Trent.
It’s late at night when Rafael Wexford (Antwayn Hopper) knocks on the door of his old housemate, Will Trent (Ramón Rodríguez). “Grandma’s dead,” he tells Will, still in shock at how she suddenly went after a stroke. Will invites him in, having Betty calm Rafael as he asks Will for help with the funeral arrangements. Rafael hasn’t told his daughter, Sunny, yet.
The next day, Will and Faith Mitchell (Iantha Richardson) fill in their boss, Amanda Wagner (Sonja Sohn), about how Faith’s son, Jeremy (Deion Smith), is an informant on Rafael’s RICO case. Amanda is angry that this was kept from her, but she does seem pleased with the information Jeremy has procured. The Piedmont Kings are disguising drug sales as sales of music and merchandise for artists whose sales have been bad. Jeremy was able to retrieve a box of t-shirts from a dumpster that had been written off as “sold” for evidence.
Will accompany Rafael to the funeral home for both personal and professional reasons. While meeting with a mortician, Ivy (Gigi Zumbado), the “brothers” express their desire to give Ms. Pearl a farewell like the matriarchs on her favorite soap opera, General Hospital. Rafael keeps getting phone calls about his business, and Will pretends to be frustrated by it, putting Rafael’s phone under one of Ivy’s catalogs so that he leaves it with Will while Rafael shops for coffins.
Faith acts as a liaison. With Will on Rafael’s phone and Jeremy at his office, she distracts Rafael’s assistant, Tanya (Camryn Jade), by pretending to be a lost delivery driver so she will go outside. Jeremy sneaks into Rafael’s office while Will gives Faith the Two-Factor Authentication key so that Jeremy can get into Rafael’s computer.
He pulls up the accounting files they needed, but before he can download them, Rafael returns to Will, and Tanya goes back to her desk. He seems to suspect something, asking Tanya to check his desk. Thankfully, Jeremy was able to hide. When he got up to leave, he noticed a TV screen showing a live feed to a stash of Rafael’s money. He pulled out his phone to record a video of it.
Back in the GBI Conference Room, Jeremy’s video is reviewed by Faith, Will, and Amanda. They speculate that there is around $4 million in the video, as hands move the piles of money around, preparing it for something. Will thinks they won’t even need Rafael’s accounting records if they can get to the cash before it’s laundered.
When Will returns to Rafael at the funeral home, he’s asked if the GBI ever breaks into computers. Will explains that they do it with a warrant, the same as the FBI and other legal entities. Will offers to place Rafael in protective custody, sharing that he knows people are trying to get his money. That’s what Rafael’s right-hand man, Emil (Chadwick Farley), arrives to speak privately with his boss, but Will overhears the message: “The money’s been moved, all of it.”
Faith Peanut brings (Josue Charles) back in for questioning about the Piedmont Kings, learning that the other gang leaders are upset with Rafael and trying to dethrone him by stealing his fortune. Peanut heard that Rafael hired a fixer who specializes in money laundering. “Things are about to go down,” he shared, telling Faith that Rafael has become more secretive within his circle. Faith learns the name of Rafael’s money launderer and assigns a team to his hotel. Unfortunately, the rival gangs get to him, torturing and murdering him.
Amanda attends Ms. Pearl’s funeral to support Sunny (Kyrie McAlpin), who gives an emotional eulogy to her grandmother. Rafael gets up to console his daughter, leading the running in prayer. When Will’s phone rings, he steps into a private room to answer, receiving an update from Faith. As she told him about Rafael’s fixer’s death, Will watches a new casket get wheeled into the room. Left alone with it, he cracks open the hood to find the coffin full of Rafael’s money.
