“As your lawyer, I advise against it,” Elijah chimed in.

“Caveat,” said Cole, “you’re not my lawyer.”

Elijah glared at him. “My point stands.”

“Can we go back to the part where there was an ‘incident’ that led to your trust fund terms being rewritten and your parents refusing to pay for your college?” Hannah said, and Noelle could hear the frustration she was trying to keep out of her voice.

Why were they still talking about this? If it wasn’t a solution, Cole’s antics were just a distraction. They needed to fix this problem.

Cole scooted his chair back and crossed his arms defensively over his chest. “There was lighter fluid, and a golf course, and then there wasn’t a golf course. Anymore.”

The stares around the table intensified.

He cleared his throat. “Tara and I tried to write Eat the Rich, in fire, on the ninth hole. It didn’t go as planned.”

“Tara…Chadwick? Our Tara?” Miriam asked, her eyes glassy with shock.

Noelle was flabbergasted, her rising panic temporarily interrupted. “Tightly Wound Tara? Lit a golf course on fire?”

“More like, burned it entirely to the ground,” he said. “Also the country club next to it. There was no one in it, thank God. That’s how she got so tightly wound, by the way. She went all the way in the other direction. Anyway, there’s a lot more to the story, but I am probably not your plan B on this one. I wish I could be.”

He looked at Miriam for a long moment, moving a curl off her face before blowing out a breath. “You could sell the paintings. Undiscovered Mimi Roz paintings would bring in a hell of a lot of interest.”

The color drained from Ziva’s face. “There are paintings left?” she choked out.

“In the attic,” Miriam confirmed, as if in a daze. “I found them a couple of days ago.”

“You can’t make them public,” Ziva said, her knuckles white where she was clasping her hands. “He’ll retaliate. You know that, Miriam.”

Noelle felt Miriam flinch, and the fear she’d been feeling started to harden into anger.

“And do what, Ziva?” Noelle snapped. “Threaten Carrigan’s? Oh wait.” That anger unfurled something awful in her gut. A suspicion that felt like poison worked its way up her throat before she could stop it. “Miri, did you know he would do this? Did you know he would threaten Carrigan’s, and you came here anyway?”

“Can someone tell me what we’re talking about?” Hannah asked.

At the same time, Cole grabbed Noelle’s arm and said, “HEY. Back off. She would never do that.”

Noelle immediately wanted to snatch the words back out of the air.

Next to her, Miriam had started shaking, looking up with wild eyes.