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“You want to tell me what’s wrong?” Jason asked.
“Nothing’s wrong.”
Jason balled up the wrapper from his sandwich and threw it in the bag. “You blew off our morning meeting and were thirty minutes late getting here. And I can tell by your cranky disposition it’s not for a good reason.”
One of the frustrating things about having lived in a small space with someone was the lack of privacy. Jason and he had shared a room their entire lives until they bought the townhouse in Tampa. Which meant Jason knew firsthand the good, the bad, and the ugly of Connor’s moods. And vice versa.
“Last night, I told Abby I love her,” Connor said.
“I’m not surprised, but admitting it…Wow. Does she feel the same way?”
“She does…or she did. I’m not sure how she feels anymore.”
“What happened?”
Connor sighed and set aside his half-eaten sandwich. “I was helping her clean up a mug she broke and was looking for a dustpan in a closet. I found three cans of fluorescent orange spray paint and a newspaper article about us renovating Erickson Pier.”
“Coincidence?”
“You tell me. The paper had the words GO HOME written in the margin.”
Jason winced. “What’d you do?”
“I asked her where it came from. She claims to have never seen it there before.”
“Do you believe her?”
“I believe Abby wasn’t responsible for the vandalism. That was after I all but accused her of it.”
“Not good, bro.”
“No shit.” Connor picked up a pebble and pitched it into the ocean. “How did the stuff get there? There has to be a connection to the string of vandalism.”
“You think Natalie is responsible?”
Connor shrugged. “Maybe. Didn’t you catch her son smoking at mini-golf?”
“I did, but it doesn’t mean he’s involved,” Jason said.
“How about the necklace I found? It was a cheap trinket…something a boy would wear.”
“You mention it to Abby?”
“I mentioned finding it just before your text came through and I left.” Connor thought about their conversation. Had she seemed paler than usual when he described the necklace, or had it been his imagination?
“I don’t know, man. You call Ethan?”
“She was going to.”
She needed to call Ethan in order for it not to appear as though she was hiding evidence. If she was innocent and protecting the real culprit, it was as bad as doing it herself, in Connor’s mind.
And if that was the case, Connor didn’t know what it meant to their relationship.
After Connor left, Abby had cleaned up the kitchen, and now paced the back room of the soap shop. She had made more soap samples last night and left them out to set. Now, rather than wrapping them like she should do, she was trying to figure out the best way to approach her sister and ask if her son could be responsible for the vandalism.
She texted Ethan and asked him to come over around nine thirty, which would give her and Nat a chance to talk first. Plus, it prevented Abby from wimping out and not turning over potential evidence…or Nat convincing her not to.
They had to tell Ethan.
