Page 124 of Unexpected Entanglement

“That’s true,” Rae agreed from Rowan’s other side.

“Who the fuck would do this?” The seething rage in Chris’ voice rang clear.

They had called the police to report it under the recommendation of the fire chief, who believed it might be arson. He couldn’t confirm until the rubble cooled down, but he thought he could smell a trace of gasoline.

Rowan had no clue who could have done this.

“I swear to God if Gibbes is behind this—” Chris started to say.

“I don’t think it’s Gibbes. He’s a respected member of the community. Why would he do this?” Rowan reasoned, though she wasn’t sure she believed her own argument.

“Who else has been against you all this time?” Chris questioned, his face tight as he glanced between Rowan and Kieran.

“I don’t know,” Kieran answered. “We’ll let the fire investigator and police figure it out. We have more important things to do than speculate about who the culprit is.”

“I assume Bright Head has insurance?” Rae asked.

“Yeah. I’ll make the call,” Rowan said glumly.

“I can help if you need more money for the repairs,” Rae offered.

Rowan patted Rae’s arm. “Dad set up funds for Bright Head. Now that we’re all together, we’ll have access to it. And with the insurance money, we’ll have more than enough to fix this.”

“What’s the point of fixing things if someone keeps breaking them?” Chris questioned. “We need to catch the person behind all of this!”

Rowan turned to Chris. “Kieran is right. Let the police handle it. You were the one who encouraged us to go to the police after the stairs incident.”

“And what have they done so far? How do we know Gibbes doesn’t have them in his pockets?” Chris demanded.

Frowning at him, Kieran said, “This isn’t New York, Chris. We have honest people working and serving this island.”

Chris scoffed. “You guys are so naive.”

“Chris,” Rae warned, surprised by Chris’ remark.

“I’m with Chris on this one,” Alex, who had been quiet, chimed in. “This is serious, guys.”

“Since I got here, there have been broken pipes, broken steps—both have injured you, Rowan. Then there was the breaking and entering, the inspector’s surprise visit, and now fire. Whoever is doing this, he’s escalating. You are damn luckyno one got hurt. But who knows what could happen next?” Chris pointed out.

“What else can we do besides let the police investigate?” Rowan challenged.

“I don’t know. Something!” Chris threw his arms up in frustration. “We can’t just stand here and say, ‘Oh, well. This sucks.’ We have to do something.”

“We are doing something,” Kieran said, putting his hand on Chris’ shoulder to calm him. “We'll rebuild. They won’t scare us off.”

“Fuck!” Chris cursed under his breath as he pulled away from Kieran.

Chris’ level of anger confused Rowan. She was furious about what happened, but did Chris expect them to play detectives?

“What if someone gets hurt the next time this person strikes?” Chris hurled the question to Rowan, staring straight at her. “Really hurt? Like you did, but worse. First, a cut, then a sprained ankle. What if the bastard had torched the house instead? While you were sleeping?”

Everyone went still.

“I don’t think this is about the fire anymore,” Rae told the rest of the group. “Why don’t we leave the two of them alone?”

Chris didn’t take his eyes off Rowan. He didn’t even register when Rae, Kieran, and Alex left. Scenarios where things went terribly wrong had played in his mind during the fire. He’d seen Rowan trapped in the burning barn. He'd never felt that kind of fear before, the fear that something bad could happen to her and he wasn't there.

“I told you I can’t think of what-ifs,” Rowan said. “I can only deal with what’s happening in front of me. And right now, I’ll deal with this by cleaning this mess up and fixing it with what we have. If I focus on what horrible things might happen, I’ll never do anything, Chris. Of all people, I thought you’d understand that.”

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