‘Only Murders In The Building’ Season 5 Ending Explained—Who Killed Lester?

Lester's killer is finally unmasked in the Only Murders in the Building Season 5 finale, now streaming on Hulu and Disney+. Episode 10 ties up the lingering questions from this season's twists and turns and sets up an intriguing new murder mystery that could send the podcast trio across the pond.

In the fifth installment of the beloved murder-mystery series, podcast sleuths Charles (Steve Martin), Oliver (Martin Short), and Mabel (Selena Gomez) are tasked with investigating the tragic death of the Arconia’s beloved doorman, Lester (Teddy Coluca), who was found dead inside a fountain in the Season 4 finale.

The trio is drawn into an investigation that intertwines old and new New York, from billionaires to mob ties. Their search for answers only leads to more questions as they attempt to uncover how mobster Nicky Caccimelio’s death connects to Lester’s, how both men’s wives are involved and how the billionaires — along with the secret casino hidden inside the Arconia — fit into the puzzle. And, of course, whose decapitated finger was left in Oliver's shrimp cocktail.

Before the finale, viewers learn that Manhattan billionaire Camilla was in love with Nicky. After discovering his wife's affair, Nicky decided to go all in with Camilla on building the city's first casino. To bring their vision to life, she began buying up Arconia apartments to transform the building into a luxurious gaming hall.

With Camilla close to demolishing the Arconia to make way for New York City's first casino, Charles, Mabel, and Oliver are running out of time to solve Lester's murder. Fortunately, they manage to piece the puzzle together before it's too late and bring Lester's killer to justice.

Only Murders in the Building Season 5 Ending Explained

At the start of the finale, “The House Always…,” Sofia Caccimelio confronts Nicky about their marriage, telling him it’s not working. He asks if there’s someone else, but she tells him not to worry about it. Nicky then warns that when he finds out who she’s sleeping with, he’ll kill them.

Who Did The Decapitated Finger Belong To?

Before Lester died, he instructed Randall, his butler in training, to put the decapitated finger in the shrimp cocktail being sent to Oliver's room. After the finger was stolen from Oliver's fridge mid-season, the trio traces the thief to Sofia's mother, the matriarch of the Caccimelio family. She reveals that Sofia recognized the finger the moment she saw it. The finger belonged to Sofia's lover.

While the trio interrogates Camilla, Bash, and Jay in the casino room, the mayor arrives. At that moment, Mabel makes a startling discovery. She takes the cleaver and slashes Mayor Beau Tillman’s fake pointer finger, and it flies off, confirming her suspicion the finger is his.

“You were at the game that night,” Mabel says to him. “You were sleeping with Sofia.”

So, how did Mabel piece it all together? It turns out she received texts from Howard shortly before the mayor entered the room that read: "Someone's coming down. It's Beautiful. It's Beautiful. Sorry, autocorrect. It's Beau Tillman."

If viewers remember, “It’s beautiful” was the last text Lester sent his wife before he was killed.

What Really Happened The Night Lester Died?

On the night Lester was killed, he was in the casino room with the billionaires and mobster Nicky. The mayor was also there to be bribed for the casino. Before the mayor entered the room, Nicky saw pictures of Beau and his wife kissing on the street, confirming her affair and the identity of her paramour.

When the mayor asks for a drink with one finger, Nicky returns with a cleaver and slices off his pointer finger. Nicky chases Beau with the cleaver throughout the room, and that's when Lester grabs the elevator crank and stabs Nicky in the back.

Nicky, confused and injured, asks Lester what he's doing. The veteran doorman replies that he's finally standing up to the mobster, putting an end to the illegal casino once and for all. Lester shows Nicky his book and threatens to go to the cops with all of Nicky's shady dealings. Nicky, losing consciousness, falls on top of Lester, sending the cleaver into his own chest.

While Beau isn't looking, Jay takes the finger, and Lester runs off. Beau chases after him, demanding the finger back, but Lester says he doesn't have it. (Lester really doesn’t have it, but Beau doesn’t know that Jay was the one who stole it.)

Beau desperately needs the finger. Without it, all his hard work (and subsequent corruption) as mayor will be for nothing, he says. But Lester is firm on telling the world what he knows. Lester tells the mayor that if he wants to stop him, he’ll have to kill him in front of all the security cameras. The mayor reminds him that Bash disabled the cameras, and any footage could be made to look like an accident.

Who Killed Lester?

Lester frantically grabs the bird whistle from a drawer in the lobby and runs to the fountain in the courtyard of the Arconia. He picks up his phone off the ground and texts his wife, "It's Beau Tillman," which we now know autocorrected to "It's Beautiful.”

Beau follows him, still demanding he turn over the finger, and pushes Lester against the fountain, killing him. As Lester is dying, he manages to grab his bird whistle one last time, knowing it will activate the Byrdee camera across from him and hopefully help identify his killer.

"So yeah, I killed Lester," the mayor admitted after telling the story. But Mabel notes that he seems calm for someone who just confessed to murder. "Because when the mayor is gone for seven minutes, people come looking for him," he says. His assistant and the crooked police then enter to confiscate Mabel, Oliver, and Charles' phones.

They tie the trio up in the basement of the Arconia, in the hidden stairwell. The mayor says that when the building is demolished, they'll go with it.

How Does Only Murders in the Building Season 5 End?

A police officer throws the trio’s phones down the trash chute, where Miller, the trash guy, finds them. He gives the phones to Howard, who realizes he can’t save them unless he finds a way past the cops to get downstairs. That’s when Mabel’s pop singer friend-turned-enemy-turned-friend-again, Althea, speaks up and says she can help.

Althea seizes the moment during Camilla’s press conference and announces she wants to perform a farewell set in the secret gaming parlor downstairs, shocking both the mayor and Camilla. She tells the press to follow her downstairs and moves past the cops.

Meanwhile, Mabel, Charles, and Oliver manage to free themselves from the chains. They emerge from the casino and reveal that the mayor is the one who killed Lester. Although the mayor insists the accusations are baseless, the trio presents their proof.

It turns out the trio had hidden a secret recording device inside the roulette machine’s drawer, and they replay the mayor’s incriminating words admitting he killed Lester. As the mayor tries to flee, Lester’s birds attack him, and he’s arrested.

Later, Jay reveals to Mabel that the billionaires helped dispose of Nicky’s body by sending it to the cleaners. Bash even kept Nicky in his cryochamber for a week, explaining the freezer burn on his ear. Jay says he confessed everything to the authorities, meaning Camilla’s casino plans are scrapped, and the Arconia is saved.

Sofia then admits to Charles that she has feelings for him. She reveals that she sold the billionaires the finger to get the money to travel to Positano (aka the vacation Nicky never took her on). She invites Charles to join her, but he declines.

Three months later, Sofia sends Lester’s wife a postcard from Positano along with a bag full of cash she earned from selling the finger. She also receives a call from her sons and her dying mother, during which she has some harsh final words for Nonna: “But I did this, Mama. So you can shut up now.”

What Is The Next Only Murders In The Building Murder Mystery?

At the end of the episode, Mabel, Oliver, and Charles sit down to listen to one of Cinda Canning’s (Tina Fey) newest true crime podcasts, The Girl With the Curls. Cinda’s latest case follows a young woman with curly red hair who has been accused of murdering a royal heir. While the press and the public have turned against her, Cinda believes in the woman’s innocence and insists that the safest place for her is in America.

In the final scene, it’s revealed that Cinda was actually describing herself. She’s seen stumbling down the street toward the Arconia, her hands covered in blood. Moments later, she collapses just outside the building’s gates. Howard, Mabel, Oliver, and Charles rush to her side and debate whether the podcast has jurisdiction over her death, since her body is technically outside the building.

Cinda uses her final breath to reach through the gates, placing her hand inside, ensuring that Mabel, Oliver, and Charles can investigate her death.

Only Murders in the Building Season 5 is streaming on Hulu and Disney+.