“Family with twin babies!” Jordan laughed. “Three months old. They’ll scream even more than Kiks!” Kathryn—Kat—Kiks was Jordan’s two-year-old daughter. She was a champion screamer.
As they talked, Darcy padded barefoot into the kitchen. She filled a glass with cool water and took a long drink. Nantucket had the purest, sweetest water in the world.
From her kitchen window, she could see right into her backyard, and over the hedges, some of the yard behind it.
“What about you?” Jordan asked.
“Boyz and his family are at this very moment carrying their luggage into the house behind me.”
Jordan went quiet. After a moment, she said in her best GPS bitch voice, “Recalibrating.”
“I know. Never in my wildest nightmares did I imagine this. His wife, the luscious Autumn, is hauling in some grocery bags, and her daughter, Willow, who must be about fourteen now, is wearily schlepping in her duffel bag right behind Boyz, who’s got three heavy suitcases.”
“You’re sure it’s Boyz?”
“I was in the garden when they arrived. I heard their voices. And now I can see them from the kitchen window. Yes, dammit, I’m sure.”
“I don’t know what to say. This is beyond belief. Do you want to come over?”
“No, I’m fine. It’s just so weird.”
“Maybe you should invite Nash over for noisy time on a blanket in your backyard.”
“Ha! My first thought, too!” Darcy left the kitchen and wandered through the dining room and into the living room and on into the room she called the library, which was what her grandmother Penny always called it, probably because its walls were lined with bookshelves and those shelves were packed with books.
“Is Nash coming over?”
“Not today. We were together all weekend. But, anyway, I don’t need to impress Boyz! It’s been three years since I last saw or even talked to him.”
“But wait, Darcy, why would Boyz rent a house so near yours?”
“I can’t imagine he knows I’m living in this house. He knew my grandmother lived on the island, but when I was married to him, Penny was in an assisted living center on the Cape. He met her, but he never came to the island with me. He never saw this house. We always had to go to Lake George in the summer. It was another one of the Family Traditions. I have no idea why he’s here.”
“You’re bound to run into him this summer.”
“I know. I can’t believe it. But you know what? I hope I do meet him sometime so I can find out why he’s here instead of at the family compound at Lake George.”
“Do you really care?”
“Care, no. But I am curious. He was so all about his family—”
“Darcy, Kiks is howling. I’ll call you later.”
Darcy climbed the stairs to the second floor and entered the bathroom off her bedroom. It was one of the luxuries she had built in when she first inherited the house. Large, with a white tile floor and the original old claw-foot tub and a new shower and piles of thick white towels—it was her own private spa. She stripped off her clothes, turned the water on hot, and stepped into the shower.
Memories streamed down on her like rain.
2
Penelope Cotterill, Darcy’s paternal grandmother, hadn’t exactly saved Darcy’s life, but she had given her the best gift in the world—she’d made Darcy believe she was worthy of love, care, and respect. Darcy’s parents didn’t do so well at that.
Darcy’s father, Eugene, had been a well-educated, slightly reserved normal guy, the son of New York banker Eustace Cotterill and his wife, Penelope. After graduating from Yale and starting work in the city, Eugene met Lala Benton and went right off the rails.
The party-loving Lala was a glamorous wild-haired bohemian, sexy and noisy and greedy and racy. Eugene was a man idly sailing on the calm waters of a sheltered harbor; Lala was a hurricane who swept him up into her tumultuous world. They met at a party and had sex that very night in one of the bedrooms—Eugene had never had sex at a party before and he felt like quite a playboy. After that, they spent all their time together, dancing or drinking or driving too fast. Lala made Eugene feel alive for the first time in his life, and he made Lala feel safe and anchored, which was what she thought she wanted.
They got married six weeks after they met by a justice of the peace with two college friends for witnesses. Lala’s parents were glad she was someone else’s responsibility now, but Eugene’s family, including Penny, refused to take this whirlwind marriage seriously. They didn’t want to meet Lala; they didn’t invite her to visit.
So it was easy for Lala to convince Eugene to leave the stuffy East Coast to live near Lala’s family in the wilds of Chicago. Eugene worked for a bank there and Lala shopped a lot and they were both dumbfounded when Lala realized she was pregnant. Darcy was born to much celebration and joy—Darcy had an album full of photos proving that. For two turbulent years, they all lived together, playing at being a happy family. But Lala had an affair, and then another, and Eugene divorced her. Darcy was two, right at that toddling, shrieking, tyrannical untidy age when she seemed at times possessed by demons. Eugene was tired of drama by then. He paid child support for his daughter, but he went back to the East Coast and didn’t think much about her. He sent a monthly check, but never remembered his daughter’s birthday, never even came to see her.