Page 62 of Brutal King

Oh, shit! I stood and threw my dress on, buttoning it up as I ran out of the office. Entering the dining room I ran into Kobe.

“Kat,” he said as he looked at me, his eyes instantly pained. “What are you doing here? Are you okay? Did he hurt you?”

“Kobe, no. I’m fine, he didn’t hurt me one bit, but the question is, what are you doing here?”

“I saw a light on and...”

“You drove all the way out here to check and see if a light was on?”

His jaw tightened and his nostrils flared. “No. I came out here hoping to find evidence of what my father did. I want to shove the proof in his face and have him own up to it.”

“But you told me that he’d already admitted to it. He told you how he wanted to see the Lee Family restaurants destroyed.”

He pulled in a deep breath. “He said he’d be happy to see your father go down, but he didn’t say, in so many words, that he actually did this. I want the proof. When I confront him with this, I don’t want him to weasel out and say it was just talk. Besides, I know his ability to lawyer up and I want to be ready.”

I was stunned. “Other than confronting your father, what are you going to do with this proof, should you find it?”

“Show it to the authorities and have him charged.”

“You’d do that? You’d turn in your own father?”

“If that’s what I have to do, yes. Besides, how can I respect a man who would stoop so low? All my life I was raised to respect my elders, but... hell, if this is what my elders are up to, I don’t owe them anything. I don’t owe him an ounce of respect.”

“I can’t believe you would do that, Kobe.”

“I want you to know how sorry I am that this happened... all of it. The vandalism, the breakup, the cold shoulder that I was ordered to show you. I don’t care what my father wants. I want us back together. I don’t care that you’re the daughter of his rival. That’s between your father and mine. But us... me and you? Damn, I already miss you, Kat. I want you back at the Academy. I want you back in my life. This whole thing has been torture. I want you back... period.”

Stunned into silence, I just stared at him. Of course I wanted him back, but could I really trust him this time. Or was he going to abandon me the moment his father objected?

“Okay,” I finally said. “You’re right. I’d like to know the truth behind this as well.”

“Glad you’re on board. Now... I noticed that there are surveillance cameras outside. We could start by looking at the footage from those.”

“Good idea. What about Trent? Maybe he could help us with this.”

Kobe hesitated then tilted his head toward the dining room. “Trent is sort of out of commission for the moment.”

“Kobe? What does that mean?” Before he could answer, I walked past him to find Trent on the floor, knocked out. “You did this?”

“Come on, Kat. He came out here half naked and I could hear... anyways, I thought he’d hurt you. I thought he was taking advantage of you.”

“So, you knocked him out?”

“I didn’t mean to. I mean, not really. The arrogant jerk wouldn’t even admit that you were here. What does that tell you?”

“Oh, Kobe. I wish you hadn’t done that.” I looked at Trent and wondered how seriously he was hurt. Inside, however, I was smiling with glee. Kobe was actually jealous of Trent.

“Don’t worry about him. I didn’t knock him out that hard. He should be up in a few minutes. In the meantime, let’s take a look at some of that surveillance footage.”

“Okay,” I said. “You’re right about the cameras outside, although there are four and not two. We also have two cameras in the dining room, one in the kitchen and one in Trent’s office.”

“How do you know all this?”

“I’ve been working on this project, Kobe. I know you think I just came here to fool around with Trent, but we actually did get some work done. Part of that work was looking at the budget. I was surprised to learn that a good chunk of it had gone to security; re-enforced doors and windows, motion detection lights and, of course, these security cameras. And they are all linked to some application that one can pull up and check out.”

“Great. Let’s have a look.”

We headed back to Trent’s office, and I sat at his desk while Kobe pulled a chair up beside me. I opened Trent’s laptop and glanced at Kobe. “I think I should be able to access them from here.”

---