Chapter 21 - The Fugitive Sister
Julian tore the steering wheel to the right, sending the SUV fishtailing down an unpaved logging road that sliced through the dense state forest. Tree branches scraped against the side panels like desperate claws. In the rearview mirror, the headlights of two trailing sedans flickered between the snowdrifts.
“They’re tracking my phone,” Julian realized aloud, immediately rolling down his window and hurling his smartphone out into the black woods. “Evelyn, yours!”
Evelyn opened the glove compartment, pulled her phone’s SIM card out, snapped it in half, and dropped the pieces onto the floor mat. “Where do we go? We can't go to the police yet. If Vance-Sterling controls the municipal district, the local precinct will hand those files straight back to Patricia’s lawyers.”
“Newark,” Julian said through gritted teeth as he navigated a steep, icy curve. “Celeste isn't at a motel. She’s at the old secondary distribution warehouse my father owned. She has the hard drive Marcus hid before he died.”
“You told Patricia that Celeste lured me to the vineyard,” Evelyn said, turning to him, her eyes burning in the dim dashboard glow. “Was that a lie?”
Julian met her gaze for a split second. “Celeste didn’t set you up, Evelyn. Celeste called me three hours ago weeping, saying Patricia had taken her passport and threatened to send her to Rikers Island. Celeste is the one who unlocked the vineyard security cameras for us. She’s terrified... but for the first time in her life, she’s trying to be your sister.”
Two hours later, deep inside the industrial wasteland of Newark, the SUV rolled beneath the rusting corrugated awning of an abandoned shipping facility. Inside a dimly lit office heated by a single kerosene stove sat Celeste.
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The former high-society bride looked unrecognizable. Her polished manicure was gone; she wore an oversized army surplus parka, her eyes hollow, red-rimmed, and swollen with exhaustion. When the door opened and she saw Evelyn standing with her cane, clutching the blood-stained ledger, Celeste collapsed to her knees on the dirty linoleum, sobbing uncontrollably.
“I didn’t push you to hurt you, Evie,” she choked out, her forehead almost touching the floor. “I tried to pull you back... I swear to God I tried to pull you back, but mother kicked the marble post... she wanted you dead so we could take the patent rights!”
