Page 79 of Abdominal Snowman

Before she answered, Sage studied Soren, worry fizzing in her stomach. “I have the feeling you’d want me to ignore it. Why?”

Soren’s gaze flicked to hers, a flash of guilt in them before he focused back on his coffee. “Tobin’s done a lot of damage, and at this point, I don’t think anything can fix it. There’s no reason to go digging around and risk his wrath. I don’t want you on his radar more than you already are.” Soren washed his confession down with a sip of his iced coffee, and the lightbulb blinked on in Sage’s head.

“You’re afraid he’d… what? Come after me next? Soren, I live in Florida. What’s he gonna do to me out there? I’m just visiting, he’s got nothing on me.” As soon as she heard the words aloud, she regretted the way they came out. That was a subject they hadn’t broached yet. When did she end her vacation?

And in her bid to convince Soren to let her pursue this story, she…

She watched his expression shutter.

Her heart sunk as Soren nodded somberly. “You’re right. I guess he can’t touch you, can he?” He stood. “Just be careful.”

“Soren, I, uhm—”

He pointed a thumb over his shoulder. “I’m just gonna go work on some figures. Do your thing.”

Sage didn’t know what to say. It felt too soon to take back her words, but it didn’t feel right just letting Soren walk away either.

But he did, and she let him. It was a long moment before the back door snapped close, and she sagged into the bed, the towel holding on for dear life.

She didn’t know what she would say to Soren if she were to track him down. So maybe they both just needed a moment.

Sage dressed quietly and stood in the middle of the room. Her barely sipped coffee sat on the bedside table, and the soft glow of her laptop was calling out.

Tobin might have been someone that scared Soren, but he didn’t scare Sage.

In the end, he was just a bully, and Sage had plenty of experience with those. Planting herself in the middle of the bed, she pulled her laptop closer and opened another tab.

She typed in “Berrysburg” and “Tobin” since she didn’t have a damn last name for the guy.

Yet.

His familiar, slimy face appeared on her screen under the search results. The title proudly proclaimed his election as a town chair.

Tobin Santorin.

Sage opened a new page, typing in “Tobin Santorin,” and paired his name with all the buzz words, starting with “real estate”. She chewed on her lip as the search page loaded.

And suddenly, her screen was flooded with articles. Newspaper articles from other small towns, photo after photo of a grand opening of something or other.

Apparently, Tobin had been busy before he came to Berrysburg, purchasing and developing properties in Washington, Montana, and various other states. Sage clicked through a few news articles about the properties he’d developed. From there, she followed the buzzwords “fraud”, “bankrupt”, “pyramid schemes”, and “manipulative”. Most of the properties he bought crumbled into ruin within a few years after opening, and the towns he took over were left destitute in the aftermath.

After a dozen or so articles, Sage stumbled across an opinion piece written to the editor of a local paper from a town called Mount Pleasant in Utah.

“Tobin Santorin is a stain on this town that will never be washed out. He swooped into Mount Pleasant and wormed his way into purchasing valuable land from the unsuspecting owners. His plan to ‘develop’ this land was garbage from the start, and I should know. He purchased my 5,000-acre property at the base of the mountains and built a half rate rental property on top of it, which now sits abandoned, mind you! His promises of blooming prosperity have fallen flat, and I, for one, am glad he’s gone. Let this be a warning to all who read, Tobin Santorin is not to be trusted.”

Well.

Sage frowned at her laptop, scrolling through the comments. There were hundreds from the small town and others rallying behind the writer, local Elle Rathmusen, and sharing their own stories.

Sage pulled up her blank document, copying the stories until she had them all. Most of them, including Mrs. Rathmusen’s, usually involved some form of light extortion. Interesting.

Too much time passed while Sage sat on the bed, researching. She googled various laws in the states that Tobin had purchased properties in, her last stop including Vermont and Berrysburg.

If the town was too frightened to take Tobin on and stop his reign of carefully concealed terror, Sage would take up the mantle.

As she read about Tobin and the hurt he caused all over the damned country, she grew angrier and angrier. The people he’d conned out of homes, and towns he’d left in ruins all because of his greed. Sage’s anger festered in her chest, a raging dragon roaring to life the further she dove into this story.

By the time she was done, she had plenty of information on Tobin to do… something.

And it’d only taken… she glanced at the clock, her eyes widening. Shit. It’d taken her more than half the day.

Rolling off the bed, Sage got to her feet and padded across the room, looking out the window for Soren.

He wasn’t visible, but she’d bet he was still in the workshop.

They needed to have a discussion.

Because now that she had what she needed on Tobin, she wanted Soren by her side when she took him down.

She’d be damned before she left the inhabitants of Berrysburg to the same fate as these other forgotten towns.