Chapter 3 - The Missing Envelope

Rosa emptied the drawer onto the sidewalk.

Receipt rolls, twine, pruning shears, rubber bands, a cracked calculator.

No envelope.

“No, no, no.”

Naomi crouched beside her. “What was in it?”

Rosa looked at Celeste.

Celeste raised both hands. “Don’t look at me.”

“You were leaning over the cart.”

“I took flowers, not your junk mail.”

Marcus stepped between them. “Ms. Whitmore paid. This is over.”

Rosa pushed past him and looked beneath the buckets. “It was here ten minutes ago.”

Naomi replayed the video on her phone. In the first wide shot, Celeste lifted the bouquet. Behind it, an envelope sat partly visible beneath the register. Then a delivery cyclist crossed the frame. After that, the envelope was gone.

“Someone took it,” Naomi said.

“What was inside?”

Rosa hesitated.

Then she looked at the Whitmore logo on the SUV.

“Copies of property records,” she said. “Old ones. Deeds, signatures, tax maps. Proof that the Mercer vendors’ cooperative owns part of this block.”

Celeste laughed once, but it sounded forced. “That’s ridiculous.”

“My husband spent three years fighting your father over it.”

“My father owns this block.”

“Your father says he owns this block.”

Celeste’s eyes sharpened.

Rosa continued. “After Miguel died, I stopped fighting. Then last week, someone slipped a note under my apartment door. It said your mother kept copies.”

At the mention of Evelyn again, Celeste’s face lost its color.

Naomi stood up. “Who sent the note?”

“I don’t know.”

A horn sounded from the curb.

Marcus looked toward the SUV. “We need to leave.”

Celeste took one step backward, bouquet still in her arms. “This is insane.”

Rosa watched her carefully. “Maybe. But your mother came to my cart three nights before she died. She was crying. She gave Miguel a brass key and said, ‘If anything happens to me, don’t let Arthur bury this too.’”

Celeste stopped breathing for a beat.

“My father’s name is Arthur.”

“I know.”

Naomi’s phone buzzed again.

This time it was not a news alert.

It was a text from an unknown number.

DELETE THE VIDEO. WALK AWAY FROM THE FLOWER CART.

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A second message appeared immediately.

OR ROSA LOSES MORE THAN HER BUSINESS.