Suddenly Yun seemed to remember the role with which he’d been charged and nodded. “You’re right. I’ll put some comparison charts together tonight.”

Across the way, Mr. Bouchard didn’t seem to like his store being called a diamond in the rough. He scoffed loudly, then shuffled his paperwork, mumbling something under his breath. All Gabe caught of it was “You can never count on the boy when you need him.”

Since he didn’t seem to be directing it their way, Gabe opted to ignore it. He headed over to Olivia, who was looking out one of the big side windows at the line of trees that separated this property from the shelter. He could just make out the building through some of the thinner spots in the cedars, hickories, and overgrown honeysuckle bushes.

He closed a hand over her back. “You okay?” Rather than looking at him, she dropped her gaze toward the floor, clueing him in for the second time tonight that something was wrong.

“Yeah, I’m good. I just have a little headache, that’s all.” After closing her eyes for the space of a few heartbeats, she opened them, and her shoulders dropped an inch or two. “This place is great,” she whispered. “Almost too good to be true.”

He cupped one hand over the side of her face. “Whatever it is, we’ll talk about it in a little bit. Okay?”

“Yeah, okay.” A flood of moisture seemed to wash over her eyes but not enough for tears to well up. “That sounds good.”

“You know what else? It’s not the only thing that’s almost too good to be true.”

His words seemed to cut through her. He locked a hand around her elbow, but with her sister approaching, heels clicking on the hardwood, Olivia gave a little shake of her head and pasted on a bigger smile that for the second time in a few minutes didn’t reach her eyes.

“You two want to check out the back rooms? Or have you seen enough?” Ava asked in a tone that seemed to say she’d picked up on Gabe’s quasi disappointment.

Seeing in his peripheral vision that Mr. Bouchard was craning his head in their direction, Gabe shrugged. “Wouldn’t hurt to take a look.”

Locking Olivia’s hand in his, he fell into step behind Ava to check out the rest of the place, even though he knew he already agreed with Yun. He was just as sold on it as she was. If they could make this place work financially, buying it and going into business with her would be the best business decision he could make.

Chapter 25