“Oh,” Gigi says. She seems to think for a moment. “The Four Seasons once…”
So Matthew had the decency to take Gigi someplace other than the Fairmont. But Hollis won’t give him points for that; the Four Seasons sounds like an upgrade.
“And the St. Regis once, and then we stayed at Auberge du Soleil in Napa once.”
“You met him in San Francisco three times?” Hollis says. She’s so horrified by this, she can’t even cry. Matthew took her to Napa? The gall, she thinks. The hubris. He could have run into any number of people who knew him or Hollis.
“I didn’t find out he was married until last May,” Gigi says. “The night we met, he told me he was divorced with one daughter—”
Hollis cries out.
“And I believed him. He didn’t wear a ring. He wasn’t on social media, and Google turned up only his professional accolades, his professional profile.”
“But then he told you?”
“Yes. We were in Greece. Santorini.”
“Greece!” Hollis says. Can this get any worse? She has to remind herself to breathe. Greece last May—yes, while Hollis was here, opening the house by herself.
“He said he wouldn’t see me much over the summer because he’d be on Nantucket with his daughter… and wife.” Gigi pauses. “I screamed, I cried, I threw things. But I was too in love with him by that point to end it.” She looks straight at Hollis. “That is my crime.”
Yes, Hollis thinks. Matthew had a wife, a family, two homes, a dog, friends, colleagues who respected him, a community, a life. To stay with him after learning this was a crime.
She’s intrigued to hear Gigi say she was too in love with him to end it.
“Was he in love with you too?” Hollis says. “Did he tell you that?”
“He did not,” Gigi says. “I think he felt things for me but I’m not sure he felt love.” Now is the time, she thinks. “There’s something else you should know.”
Hollis holds a hand up. “Please just let me finish!” she says. She can’t believe this is her speaking. She feels possessed. “When did you reach out to me on Hungry with Hollis?”
“Right after he told me who you were.”
“And why? Why?”
Gigi puts her palms to her cheeks like she’s in Edvard Munch’s The Scream and exhales. “I think it’s natural to want to know all you can about the wife of your lover.”
Hollis laughs bitterly. “Oh, is it?” She almost adds, I wouldn’t know, but then she thinks about the way she clicked on Mindy’s Facebook page after seeing her in Jack’s pictures. Mindy’s profile showed a quilt. And hadn’t Hollis then searched for quilting clubs in Western Mass., hoping to find other pictures of Mindy? She certainly had.
“Yes,” Gigi says. “And you’re a public figure, so it was all there.”
“Why did you engage with me?” Hollis asks. “You weren’t just watching from afar—you commented on all my posts, you said smart things, you wanted me to notice you. When you were sleeping with my husband.”
“Maybe it was a bit unhinged,” Gigi says. “I wanted you to know me, even though you would never realize who I was. I wanted you to… like me.”
“It worked!” Hollis says. “I did like you. When Matthew died, I waited to hear from you. It took you a week.”
“Yes,” Gigi says. “I wasn’t sure what to do.”
“Then you told me you were there to listen.”
“I was.”
“I confided in you. I told you things I didn’t tell another soul. I thought it was safe because I didn’t know you. You were like a… virtual therapist. I told you Matthew and I quarreled right before he left the house”—Hollis swallows—“and you ghosted me! You made me feel like I was to blame for his accident.”
“Oh, Hollis,” Gigi says. “Can I please speak now?”
“No,” Hollis says. “Because I haven’t gotten to the best part. Do you know what the best part is, Gigi Ling?”
Gigi grips the pale suede arms of the club chair. She doesn’t have to stay. She can order another Uber, head to the airport, fly to Boston, New York, or DC and make her way home from there. Outwardly, her life will remain much the same. She’ll cuddle with Mabel, go to Tim and Santi’s for dinner, fly her routes—she might even ask for Europe back. She can leave Hollis and this drama behind.
Except she can’t.
Gigi understands best to mean “worst.” “The best part is that you invited me to your Five-Star Weekend on Nantucket and I accepted. And now here we are.”
“You entered my house, you ate my food, drank my wine, slept in the finest of my guest suites—if I’m being honest, I wanted you to have it; you were the one I felt I had to impress—and relaxed on my beach. I made a playlist for you! The smart-woman playlist, because I thought you’d appreciate it.” Hollis stops for a moment; she’s frightening herself. “You met my friends, women I have known for decades. Women who have stood by me, supported me. Women who love me. You took a place among them, but you’re a liar, a cheat, a charlatan.”
“Yes,” Gigi says.
“Why?” Hollis says. “Why did you come?”
That’s the question, isn’t it? Gigi could give many answers: I came for the same reason you invited me—because we hit it off. I came because I wanted to feel closer to Matthew. I came to find out what I could about your marriage. I came because I was inexplicably drawn to the person I betrayed. She could even say: I came because I was lonely.
Gigi did not come to Nantucket to reveal her secret—but now that it’s out, there’s something else Hollis needs to know. Something important.
47. Under the Influence II
The Endeavor delivers the ladies back to Straight Wharf at four o’clock. Caroline expects Hollis to be waiting at the dock with a tray of iced tea and perhaps some homemade gougères as an apology for missing the sail. But her mother is nowhere to be seen. She checks her phone—and there’s an alert of a text from Isaac.
She feels a jolt of adrenaline at seeing his name. Has he realized he’s not in love with Sofia after all, did the picture Caroline posted of herself and Dylan make him jealous, are his feelings for Caroline too strong to be denied?
As long as she doesn’t read the text, the answers to these questions can still be yes.
She calls her mother but she’s shunted straight to voice mail. Fine, she thinks. They’ll take a cab.
Caroline watches the others disembark. All three women seem caught up in their own thoughts.
Tatum is thinking that, at this time tomorrow, she’ll know the answer. She also thinks how excited she is to tell Hollis that Dru-Ann finally apologized. It only took twenty-five years, but now we’re good. More than good. Against all odds, Tatum and Dru-Ann are going to be friends. Because the truth is, Tatum kind of likes Dru-Ann.
Dru-Ann is thinking about how miraculous it is that Phineas Pine, ranked number 127 in the world, has won the British Open. (She went to the head and checked her phone.) This is why Dru-Ann loves sports—competition is fun and exciting and unpredictable. Everyone loves an underdog.
Brooke is thinking how easy it was to tell James she was gay. She tried to tip him when she got off the boat, but he pressed the money back into her hand and said, “You already gave me a gratuity. Thank you for sharing your news with me.”
Honestly, what a cutie.
As Caroline is walking by Provisions, she sees a guy sitting at the café table out front who looks, from behind, like Dylan. When she gets closer, she sees that the chick sitting across from the guy looks like Aubrey. Then she sees the little kid between them with a piece of bacon hanging from his mouth.
Dylan, Aubrey, and Orion are having lunch—or an early dinner before Dylan has to go to work—at Provisions.
Caroline feels a hand on her arm. It’s Tatum, pulling her in the other direction.
“You don’t want to end up with another drink on you,” she says. “Let’s just pretend we didn’t see them.”
A minivan from Roger’s Taxi idles at the curb in front of the Club Car. Caroline climbs in, and Brooke and Tatum follow. Before Dru-Ann ducks in, she hears someone calling her name.
She looks across the street to see Gucci Bex and Laura Ingalls pop out of the Blue Beetle—and Gucci Bex is waving her arms. “Dru-Ann! Wait!”
You want me to wait so you can publicly ridicule me in front of my friends? Dru-Ann thinks. No, thank you.
“Dru-Ann, I’m sorry, we’re sorry!” Gucci Bex says. She runs across the cobblestones in a pair of platform Mary Janes. “We were wrong, you were right.”
Dru-Ann blinks.
“About Posey,” Laura Ingalls says. (Another day, Dru-Ann notes, another prairie dress.)
“What about Posey?” Dru-Ann says. Her boyfriend pulled off the biggest coup of the year, Dru-Ann thinks. He’ll be on the cover of Sports Illustrated this week for sure. It’s crazy.
“Are we going to Squam or what?” the taxi driver says. “It’s so far away, we need to leave now to get there by nightfall. And I hope you brought snacks.”
“Get in, sis,” Tatum says and Dru-Ann can’t help but smile. Sis!