Chapter 16 - Brent Comes Back
Mateo stepped in front of his mother.
The door opened.
Brent Cole stood there wearing a baseball cap and dark jacket.
Celeste backed into the table.
Naomi reached for her phone.
Brent pulled a small canister from his pocket.
“Don’t.”
Everyone froze.
It was not a gun. Pepper spray. Still enough to control a tiny room.
“I want the drive,” he said.
Rosa looked at him. “You killed Evelyn.”
Brent’s jaw tightened. “Arthur killed Evelyn the second he told me to make sure she stopped.”
“You cut the brake line.”
“I loosened it. She was supposed to get scared and come home.”
Celeste stared at him. “She died.”
“I know.”
“Did my father know what you did?”
Brent looked at her. “He knew enough.”
Naomi subtly moved her phone across the table, camera facing up.
Brent noticed.
He sprayed.
Naomi screamed and dropped backward, hands over her face.
Mateo lunged.
Brent slammed him into a shelf. Buckets crashed. Water spread across the floor.
Rosa grabbed the nearest thing she could reach: a metal watering can.
She swung it hard into Brent’s wrist.
The spray canister flew.
Celeste kicked it under the table.
Mateo tackled Brent against the wall.
“Call 911!” he shouted.
Naomi, eyes streaming, found her phone.
Brent fought like a man who knew prison was waiting. He drove an elbow into Mateo’s ribs and broke free, knocking over a bucket of roses.
He ran through the front of the cart into the sidewalk crowd.
Rosa followed.
“Brent!”
He looked back.
That was his mistake.
A bicycle courier slammed into him.
Brent hit the pavement.
Two construction workers from across the street held him down until police arrived.
As officers cuffed him, Brent looked at Celeste.
“You think Arthur will go down for this?” he said. “He’ll bury you first.”
Celeste wiped tears from her face.
“Not if I bury the name myself.”
Brent smiled through a split lip.
Then he said, “You still don’t know where the original deeds are.”
Rosa went still.
May you like
Brent’s smile widened.
“And without them, Arthur still owns Mercer.”
