Free Never Die Alone (A Bentz/Montoya Novel Book 8) by Lisa Jackson

barely look at her friend.
    Why New Orleans? Selma had asked.
    The answer was simple: Because of frickin’ Rick Bentz.
    “You have to go to the police,” Brianna said. “I’ll come with you.”

C HAPTER 6
    “T hat wasn’t the deal.” Jase Bridges stared his older brother down, but Prescott only shrugged as he stood in the living room of the old house where they’d grown up.
    “The deal changed.”
    “How?”
    “Lena doesn’t like livin’ here,” Prescott said with a shrug. “Says there’s too many ghosts.”
    “Ghosts?”
    “Ghosts. Memories. Spirits. Whatever.” Prescott, an inch taller than Jase, was a bigger man all around. Thicker in the middle, wider shoulders, heavier face. His hair was near black where Jase’s was a lighter brown. Prescott had been a defensive tackle on the high-school football team, all-state with offers of full rides to several small colleges, while Jase, a running back three years later, hadn’t garnered the notice of college scouts. Now Prescott raked back his black hair and scowled through the window at the surrounding acres of what had once been a large sugar plantation. Over the centuries the farm had been cut into smaller plots, which most recently had been used to produce soybeans and raise cattle. Now the fields had gone fallow, the barns empty, the sheds filled with unused equipment that was rusting. Jase and his brother had inherited the place with the death of their uncle, who had never married or fathered children. The plan had been that Prescott, who had lived here with his family for five years, was to buy out Jase. Now, with payment finally due, the deal had just gone south.
    Prescott placed a hand on Jase’s shoulder. “See, what’s happened is that Lena, she wants to live in town near the school so she can keep an eye on the kids and help out. And now that I’m selling insurance, I don’t have time to mess with this place. We need to move on. You understand about that, brother.” Then as if a sudden thought had struck him, he asked, “You run into Brianna since you’ve been back?”
    The muscles in the back of Jase’s neck tightened, but he didn’t answer.
    “She’s in town now, has a little place in the Garden District. Come home to roost, just like you.” He sent his brother a look only the two of them could understand. “From what I gather, she’s a psychologist now. Been back nearly a year. She has a practice and runs some kind of group for twins.”
    “How do you know all this?”
    “Come on, you’re the reporter. Figure it out.”
    Jase waited.
    Prescott shrugged. “Hell, I’m in insurance. Always pressured to get new clients, so I checked. Who knows, maybe she could use some term life?”
    Jase let further conversation about Brianna Hayward slide, didn’t want to go there. “You’re already looking to move?” he asked, following his brother down a short, familiar hallway.
    “It’s gone a little further than that.”
    In the kitchen, where the old linoleum curled and the counters were scarred by decades of use, Lena was pouring cereal into bowls. Pale hair had been scraped into a loose bun on the top of her head, and she was wearing a T-shirt that hugged her large belly, a white skirt, and flip-flops that snapped as she moved briskly around the kitchen.
    A short woman who had once boasted an hourglass figure, Lena was in her eighth month of pregnancy and appeared squat. She glanced over her shoulder at her brother-in-law. “Pres told you we’re moving, right?” she asked, slipping the tab on the top of the Cheerios box into its slot.
    Jase nodded.
    As if needing to explain, she said, “I can’t stay here. I just can’t. I won’t bring another child into the world to be brought up out here in the middle of nowhere.” She walked to the pantry, stuck the box into the cupboard, and yelled up the back stairs. “Kids! Come on! We’re gonna be late for VBS! Trinity? You hear me? Caleb, you come on down here! Pronto!”
    Hearing