Brent Sinatra: All of Me by Mallory Monroe

good is going to come of this.”
    “No good?” Clem sounded stunned.   “You ruined my life and you’re telling me
about what’s good?   You Sinatras walk
around this town like y’all own the earth. Your daddy own everything in sight,
you own the police department, and I can’t pay my rent!   What makes y’all better than me?   You ruined me!”
    Brent looked at his sister.   He allowed Clem to vent because his every thought was on getting his
sister out of this unharmed.  
      “Jo left me,” Clem
continued.   “I loved her so much.   I did everything for her.   That’s why I got into that fight with Eddie
Rivers.   It was because of her and how he
disrespected her.   He called my wife Jo
the Ho!   I loved her and she left me,
Brent!”
    “She left you?” Brent asked, but only to buy time.   He knew Clem Michaels.   He knew how self-absorbed he was.   If the focus remained on him and his
problems, he wouldn’t see it coming.   “Why
did she leave you?” Brent asked him.
    “Why do you think?   I
had nothing to offer her.   You fired me
and changed everything.   She left me,
what difference does it make why?”   Clem
was near tears.   “She was the best thing
that ever happened to me, but she couldn’t take it either.”
    As Clem continued talking, Brent looked into Bonita’s
terrified eyes.    Although Bonita was
only ten, she was a smart and perceptive young lady.   Brent was depending on it.   Because he needed her to understand.   He needed her to forget about fear and focus
on him.   Clem was going to kill her if
she didn’t understand.   That was why he
looked toward the left side of her, and then back at her, as Clem talked.   And then he did it again.    He looked toward the left side of her, and
back at her.   Again and again.   Until little Bonita nodded.
    “Nobody would hire me,” Clem continued talking.   “Nobody would give me a chance to earn a
decent living, how was I going to take care of my family right?   Jo did all she could, but she could only get nothing
jobs too.   I was tainted because of
you.   And I tainted her.   Year after year I couldn’t get anything
going.   You took everything away from
me.   My wife.   My home.   My job.   My life.”   His look changed, and Brent knew it was now
or never.   “Now it’s my time to take away
from you,” he said, and cocked the pistol he had at Bonita’s head.
    As soon as he did, Bonita moved her head to the left as far
as she could, and Brent fired.   One
shot.   Dead in Clem’s forehead.   Clem’s eyes rolled back, and then he and his
weapon fell back.
    The police hurried in at the sound of the gunshot while
Charles and Jenay ran to Bonita, refusing to stop until they had her in their
arms.   Bonita ran into their arms in
tears.   Charles lifted her up, but Jenay
was holding her too.
    Brent hurried to Clem.   He leaned down and felt his pulse.   He was dead.
    Charles and Jenay might have glanced at Clem, to make sure he
could not harm their daughter again, but Bonita had their undivided
attention.   “Are you alright?” Charles
was asking his daughter as she switched over to her mother and Jenay was now
holding her.   He was looking her up and
down and all over her beautiful brown face as if the bullet could have grazed
her somehow.
    “I’m okay, Daddy,” Bonita kept saying.   “He didn’t hurt me.   Brent told me what to do.”
    Jenay and Charles looked at each other.   They didn’t recall any warnings from Brent,
but they didn’t care at this point.    They were just grateful to God that their daughter was okay.
    Brent went up to his kid sister too.   She moved from her parents and jumped into
his arms.   Brent lifted her up.
    “Did I do it right, sir?” she asked him.   Although Brent was her big brother, they had
a huge age difference: a whopping twenty-six years.   She thought of him as her second father.
    Brent was smiling.   “You did it