Local Girl Swept Away by Ellen Wittlinger

Author:Ellen Wittlinger
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: F+W Media
Published: 2016-05-06T04:00:00+00:00

18.

I showed the jacket to Lucas and Charlotte the next morning as we stood in front of my house waiting for Finn to pick us up. They were stunned into silence and had barely begun to babble their questions when Finn pulled up and rolled down his window.

“I see the whole entourage is coming,” he said, glaring at Lucas.

“They want to help out.” I stuffed the jacket into my backpack for the moment.

Charlotte gave Finn a nervous smile, but Lucas kept his eyes on his Bigfoot boots.

“Charlotte can come. He can walk.”

The bombshells of the day before—from the promise of the show at the Center, to my emotional session with Cooper in Cabin 5, to the shock of finding Lorna’s coat stuffed in the closet—seemed to have blown away the cautiousness I’d felt around Finn for months. “Don’t be a dumb-ass,” I told him. “You can’t be mad at Lucas forever.”

He looked surprised by my bluntness, but he didn’t back down. “Sure I can.”

Lucas bent over to look in the window. “Look, man, I’ll apologize as many times as I have to. I’m sorry I slept with her. I’m sorry I left without telling you. I’m sorry about everything. I mean that. Isn’t there some way we can put it behind us?”

“Not that I can think of,” Finn said. He looked like he was barely containing himself from leaping out of the car and pounding Lucas. “Jackie, why are you hanging out with this asshole when you know what he did?”

“He’s not an asshole, Finn. He’s our friend. I forgave him.”

“Well, I guess he didn’t sleep with your girlfriend, did he?”

“Oh, for God’s sake, he screwed up!” I yelled. “Haven’t you ever screwed up, Finn? Lucas has been miserable for months. Isn’t that enough punishment? Besides, we have more important things to think about now.” I opened the front passenger door and crawled in with my portfolio and backpack.

“Nothing is ‘more important’ to me.” His voice was knife sharp.

“Not even this?” I pulled out the crumpled white jacket with the embroidered black diamonds on the collar and cuffs. “Don’t even consider telling me this isn’t Lorna’s jacket.”

Speechless, Finn reached out to touch the grimy, stained coat. Lucas and Charlotte got in the backseat quietly, without further invitation.

“It can’t be,” he said, as he took the coat out of my hands. He buried his face in it and breathed in the mildew. “Where did you get this?”

“It was hidden in a closet in Cabin 5 at Dugan’s.”

“At Dugan’s? What were you doing there?”

I felt my face heat up. “What difference does that make? The important thing is I found it.”

“But she was wearing it . . .” Finn said.

“I know! I mean, I don’t know. Why do you think it was in the cottage?”

Charlotte leaned forward. “All the reports in the paper mentioned the white jacket,” she said. “If somebody found it right away, wouldn’t they have turned it in to the police?”

“Maybe somebody found it over the summer,” Lucas said. “A tourist who was staying at Dugan’s.

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