but I have to ask. Are you sure she didn’t do it? Money has been tight for her. Her life has been in an uproar for the past year. Maybe she panicked. Thought she could steal some equipment and sell it.”
Gavin paused, then stretched out his hand. “Or maybe she has some deeper issues, Baby. Mental issues. Maybe she has done all these things—the stuff in Boston, her house, and now this.”
Self-sabotage.
Jesus. Was this what she’d been talking about when she said that she did things to harm her future? That she was her own worst enemy?
As soon as the thought came to him, Baby dismissed it.
“No. She didn’t do it. Things aren’t great for her, but she didn’t do this.”
“Are you sure, Baby? I’m not certain you can see her clearly. Your feelings for her may have clouded your judgement.”
“No,” he said again. “My feelings for her are the reason for the clarity. She didn’t do this, Gavin. She didn’t vandalize her own house or office, and she didn’t steal anything here or in Boston.”
He knew her. Knew this was a fact.
Beyond that, he knew people. He had a lot of weaknesses, but reading people wasn’t one of them. And he’d read Quinn.
In so many ways, it was like their ages were reversed. Like she was the younger one just now starting to understand who she really was—growing into the woman she was meant to be without all the restrictions that had been placed around her for the past decade.
Finding herself. Finding her strength.
But it was like the universe didn’t want that to happen.
Baby stood and turned to look out the window onto Oak Creek’s main street.
No, not the universe.
Somebody didn’t want it to happen.
Looking at it from that lens, it all made sense. Not self-sabotage, just sabotage.
He turned back to Gavin. “I need you to come with me.”
Gavin immediately stood. “Where are we going.”
“We need to feed Quinn’s dog.”
Chapter Thirty-One
“Honestly, I’m a little surprised Grizzly has been living here with Quinn,” Gavin said from inside Quinn’s house. “I thought that thing was a drifter to his bones.”
The dog in question was sitting out on the porch, not coming near them. Baby wasn’t surprised. The only time Grizzly tended to come close to Baby was when he was with Quinn.
“You’re a good judge of character, aren’t you, boy?”
Luckily, Quinn had given him a key last week. His heart ballooned when she had. Gavin followed him into the kitchen to get some dog food.
“Damn, what happened in here?” Gavin asked.
Evidence of the fire was all over the room. “She said her curtains caught fire when she left a candle burning on Wednesday night.”
“Wednesday night,” Gavin murmured.
Baby could almost see the cop wheels turning in his friend’s head.
“Did she call the fire department?”
“No,” Baby said, then took the dog food out to Grizzly where he still sat on the porch. The dog wasn’t interested in coming inside if Quinn wasn’t there. “She got it under control herself.”
“I see.”
“Gavin, I want to talk some stuff out. But I need you to work from the assumption that Quinn is innocent. I know that’s not your nature, and I certainly know it’s not your job, but I’m asking you to do it just the same.”
“Okay, she’s innocent. Tell me why.”
Gavin was taking this seriously. It was all Baby could ask for.
“Quinn thinks she’s self-sabotaging. I think someone else is doing the sabotaging.”
“Who?”
“Honestly, I haven’t gotten that far yet, but I’m convinced there’s someone behind all this.” He walked toward the burnt curtains. “I’m pretty sure it started back in Boston, but let’s focus on what has happened here first.”
Gavin nodded. “Okay, she was here for two weeks, and her house was vandalized. That’s some pretty shitty luck.”
“There was other stuff, too. Things that weren’t nearly as noticeable, but if you look at it all through a lens of her as a victim, then you start to see the pattern.”
“Like what?”
“Like two separate times that I know of, her banking system didn’t work. Like the fact that at both Harvard and at TSC, she had issues with her computer system and lost all the grades.”
His eyes narrowed as he thought of something else. “She wrecked her car. I don’t know if you know that. It was while you were over in the Middle East during that mess with Girl Riley. I towed Quinn’s car for her and brought it into the shop so I could take a look at it. I think her brake lines