Page 52 of Middle Ground

“So what, you’re just going to ignore me now?” he continues. “That’s really mature, Jackson. Running from your problems won’t get you anywhere in the long run.”

“I’m not running,” I snap. “I’m doing exactly what Cherie asked of me.”

“Didn’t realize she told you to ice your whole family out in the process. My bad, man.”

I don’t even dignify that with a response. When I make it to the line of trees, I push through the needles and branches. Wells is hot on my heels, ready to keep reprimanding me. We both stop short.

On the ground, a sleeping bag is rolled out. It looks a little dirty, like it’s been there for a while. There are a few wrappers from chocolate bars scattered around the trunk of the tree.

“Whoa,” Wells says when he sees the mess. “Has someone been camping out here?”

Camping orwatching? None of the trash on the floor is what drew me over here in the first place. I look up, searching the branches.

There, wedged between the limbs of a tree, is a set of binoculars. And they’re pointed in the direction of Meyer’s cottage.

CHAPTER 19

JACKSON

Someone has been watching her.

Those five words reverberate inside my brain, over and over, as I stare at the binoculars.

Every morning, when she leaves her cottage to head to work, someone could be in this very spot, watching. Waiting. For what, I don’t want to think about.

“What the fuck?”

The sound of Wells’s voice pulls me from my daydreams of violence. He has taken note of the binoculars now, and I can almost see the realizations he’s having as he takes in the evidence before him. From this very spot, someone has been spying on Meyer, right under our noses.

I think I’m going to be sick.

“Maybe someone left them here by mistake?” He says it like a question, but we both know the answer.

I shake my head, swallowing the sour feeling that is threatening to rise. “No,” I say. “It’s no coincidence.”

Wells studies me. “I know you’ve been holding back lately. What haven’t you told me?”

A lot.

“Meyer fired one of our employees a little while ago. He was caught stealing, so it had to be done.” My fists clench at my sides, remembering the rage simmering in Reggie’s eyes as I told him to get out. “Before he left, he called her a bitch. And then the next night, someone vandalized the inn.”

Wells sucks in a breath. “Fuck. You think it was him?”

I nod. “I do. It has to be, given the threat left in spray paint.You will regret this. There are cameras outside the building, but they don’t do a sufficient job covering the whole property. That side of the building was a blind spot.”

“Shit, Jackson.” He shakes his head. “Why didn’t you say anything?”

In truth, it didn’t occur to me. I truly have been so caught up in the inn and Meyer, it didn’t even cross my mind. That, and I knew it would only make my family worry. They had been wary about me coming here by myself to begin with.

I clear my throat. “I’m saying something now.” I look at the binoculars again, the mess on the ground. “I don’t want to be the one to tell her.”

I saw what the spray paint did to Meyer. How rattled she was after firing Reggie. Despite the unruffled façade she tries to cling to now, I see beyond it. And I don’t want to be the one to ruin her day. To make her question her safety, when she deserves to feel more than safe in her own home.

“I know,” Wells says, placing a hand on my shoulder, “but she needs to know.”

I kick at the sleeping bag, and something small and white comes loose, fluttering to the ground. I pick it up and turn it over, and my blood runs cold.

I’m holding a picture of Meyer in my hands, taken the day I came back to Fraisier Creek. I can tell based on the teddy bear she’s holding in her hands. The one she accused me of leaving for her.