Last Day (11 page)

Sam wanted to tell them to skip the tests. Her parents had tried protecting her from the truth for months, but try hiding a seriously
deep, dark secret from your teenage daughter—it’s a colossal waste of time.

Her dad was cheating with Nicola, from the gallery. As soon as it started, Sam felt a storm cloud settle over her house. She began listening at doors, and when her father left his computer on, she read his email. The truth was right there in front of her face: gushy notes to Nicola, sometimes complaining about Sam’s mom. Having a dad who lied, who wanted to be with another woman instead of staying home with his wife and daughter, sucked in a way that made Sam literally sick, to the point she couldn’t concentrate on schoolwork. Or anything.

Sam listened to her parents whisper and fight in their bedroom with the door closed. She wanted to hear every single detail and pretend it wasn’t happening, both at the same time. One day they walked out of their room, stone faced, and caught her standing in the hallway.

“I know,” she said.

“What do you know?” her father asked.

Sam looked at her mother. From the stricken look in her eyes, Sam could see her mother understood. Her mom had a sixth sense when it came to Sam.

“Why did you bother dragging me to all those doctors?” Sam asked.

“Because of your stomachaches,” her father said. “And the fact you’re failing in school.”

“You can tell him the real reason for that, Sam,” her mother said softly.

Sam wanted to, but she couldn’t bring herself to say the words. Her mother said them for her.

“It’s you,” her mother said.

“I know about Nicola, Dad,” Sam whispered.

Her father didn’t hug her or apologize to her mom or anything else. He just stood there as if he had frozen. Sam waited for him to say something. His mouth started to form words, but no sound came out. The tension in that hallway was so intense Sam couldn’t take it anymore. She
ran out of the house and didn’t stop until she got to Hubbard’s Point, across the sandy parking lot and right into Isabel’s arms.

After that, her parents didn’t even bother to hide their fights. The night her father’s son, Tyler, was born was one of the worst of her life. Sam and her dad were in the den watching
Vice Principals
on HBO. They were on the couch, feet up on the big footstool, eating ice cream and laughing at who could be the biggest jerk at the school. It felt good, almost normal, as if they were still a real family. But then her mother walked into the room, holding up her dad’s cell phone.

“You left it in the kitchen,” she said.

“Yeah, we’re watching the show. Come sit with us,” he said.

“You have a text,” she said, handing the phone to him. Sam leaned over to read the screen.

Nicola had texted:
My water just broke
.

That was that. Her father didn’t say a word, didn’t kiss her goodbye, just left the house. He didn’t return for two days, and when he did, he didn’t mention Tyler. Sam had to find out the details, the fact that she now had a half brother, by hearing her mother talk on the phone to Isabel’s mom.

So partying began to make more sense than studying. Isabel was into it too. She had had some family stuff she hadn’t wanted to talk about, but Sam had been able to tell by the way their moms had whispered on the beach that they had had dark secrets in common.

“Be all right,” Rebecca said.

Sam looked over at Rebecca, her big brown eyes, blonde hair falling in ringlets to her shoulders, her mouth quivering as if she was about to cry.

Rebecca wanted to be really close to Sam, but it was impossible, as long as Sam had Isabel. Sam and Isabel had been friends forever, since before the beginning. Their mothers had sat together on the beach when they had been pregnant, the two about-to-be moms in a tight
friendship knot that included Kate and Lulu—both non-mom types. But even so, the four of them were blood-sister close. They even had a name for their friendship—the Compass Rose. Four directions on the compass.

“I just want to help you,” Rebecca said.

“Thanks,” Sam said, forcing a smile. But she knew: no one could help. She had thought her family was one way, and it had turned out to be another. Sam knew why her mother had gotten pregnant when things were so bad with her dad, even without being told. Matthew was going to be
hers
, just the way Tyler was
his
. Sam hated to even think this about her mother, but it was almost as if she was having a baby out of spite.

They parked along the stone wall next to the boat basin and walked up to the Waterstons’ front porch. Isabel’s parents were abnormally normal. They had cookouts and went waterskiing. They played Scrabble and Mad Libs. Their life didn’t revolve around nineteenth-century art, acquisitions and sales, provenance, pretending to be happy while one of them was fucking the assistant, having babies all over the place.

Mrs. Waterston was the sweetest, just like Sam’s mom; that hug at the airport had melted Sam’s heart, reminded her of how her mom had always hugged—full blast. The only thing was, sometimes she could be a little judgmental. Like, watching the news, she always remarked about how stupid people were, or how they deserved what they got because of their own bad actions. But she never said things like that about their circle.

“Well, we can’t all be perfect like you, Scotty,” Mr. Waterston had said once. Sam had cringed, because she’d seen the hurt cross Mrs. Waterston’s face.

She really was Sam’s second-favorite mom in the world. Sam glanced around for her—she craved another one of those hugs.

Isabel was waiting on the front porch. She stood when she saw Sam coming, and they ran together and held each other. Isabel was Sam’s soul sister, and Sam knew instantly that she instantly got it.

“Oh, Sam,” Isabel whispered. “Nothing, nothing could be worse. I am so sorry.”

“Thanks, Izz.”

“My mom’s falling apart over it,” Isabel said.

Sam drew back and saw the sadness on Isabel’s face.

“Where is she?” Sam asked.

“At the beach, and my dad’s at work,” Isabel said. She imitated putting a joint to her lips, and Sam felt her heart ease a little. That was the gift of having someone truly understand and know what would help. Isabel reached into her pocket. Sam flicked her lighter.

“Don’t do that. It’s bad,” Julie said from under a wicker table.

“I didn’t know you were there,” Sam said, crouching down, lifting the flowered cloth to see seven-year-old Julie. Blonde and pale, she wore glasses with blue frames that slipped down her freckled nose. She had an audio processing disability that wasn’t immediately obvious, but kids in school picked up on it and bullied her.

Julie wouldn’t meet Sam’s gaze at first, but then she stole a glance, blinked, and looked away again. It was hard for her, even though Sam had known her since birth. She was severely shy, always hovering just out of sight. When she did talk, it tended to be disjointed and blunt.

“Your mother died,” Julie said.

“Yes,” Sam said.

“You are sad.”

“Very.”

Julie nodded, still looking away.

“Mommy said the bad man hurt her,” Julie said.

“Yes, someone did.”

“Weird and bad,” Julie said.

“Enough, okay, Julie?” Isabel asked.

“Don’t smoke,” Julie said.

“You tell, and you’re in trouble,” Isabel said.

Julie scooted back out of sight. Sam let the edge of the tablecloth drop. Then she stood up and filled her lungs with smoke until they burned, and she knew that Julie, through whatever circuits her mind worked, was right. “Weird and bad,” Sam said out loud as she exhaled the smoke.

11

Kate followed Pete up the river road, in no danger of being seen. Once he left Bryer Funeral Home, passed the library, and headed north, she knew exactly where he was going. A dump truck from Pawlik Construction, loaded with trap rock, rumbled between her car and Pete’s, belching black exhaust. The countryside was beautiful—rolling hills overlooking the Connecticut River and Sill Cove—the same landscape painted by the Black Hall Colony artists. But development was rampant—lots clear-cut, three-hundred-year-old trees felled, and acres of wildlife habitat destroyed for ugly six-thousand-square-foot houses.

Cloudlands, Mathilda’s property, was high on Sachem Hill. The stately white house had been built in 1745 by Judge Thomas Ludlow in the midst of one hundred acres of forest and meadows sloping down to a tidal inlet. Kate watched Pete drive between the tall stone pillars that marked the beginning of the mile-long private road.

Instead of going in that way, she turned left down an untended dirt trail that belonged to the property and skirted the cove out of sight of the driveway and house. The family used to come here to swim and canoe and have picnics. She parked where the pebble-strewn road dead-ended in a thatch of marsh grass.

At the sound of an engine, she turned around and saw a black Dodge Charger bouncing over the ruts. It stopped behind her Porsche, and she recognized Conor’s unmarked state police vehicle.

“What are you doing?” he asked, getting out.

“I own this place, I told you. My grandmother’s,” she said.

“I know that, but why are you here now? You’re following Pete?”

“You’re following
me
?”

“No, him. But you got in the middle. I saw you all at the funeral home.”

“Yes, we were there,” she said.

“What are these steps?” he asked, pointing at the steep stairs carved into the granite ledge, shaded by tall pines, half overgrown by myrtle and poison ivy, green with moss.

“They lead to the house,” she said, looking up. “We used to come down here to swim and canoe and have picnics. They’re a shortcut, and if we hurry, we’ll beat Pete.”

She took the steps two at a time, and although it was a hot day and Conor was wearing a jacket and tie, he kept up without losing his breath. So she went faster. Something drove her to practically run the 473 steps—she and Beth had counted once—to the clearing behind the house.

They stayed in the shadows of what the family called Mathilda’s Forest. The clay tennis court was sprouting weeds, and the deep stone swimming pool was dry. But Harold Maxwell, the gardener, still came once a week, and the blue hydrangeas were as dazzling as ever. Black-eyed Susans, pink and white phlox, and bee balm grew tall along the stone wall circling the house. Kate had refused to allow the big center chimney to be capped—both Beth and Pete had argued that squirrels could get inside, but Kate had prevailed—and a family of endangered chimney swifts wheeled through the blue sky above the roof.

“Why are you following him?” Conor asked.

“Because of what you said last night.”

“You think you’re going to catch him with evidence?” he asked.

“I just thought . . . if I could see how he acted when he didn’t know people were watching, I would know.” She looked down at her feet for a few seconds. “Last night, after I talked to you, and this morning, seeing him at the funeral home, I was sure it’s him. But I don’t want it to be. For Sam. No matter how I feel about him, Pete’s her dad.”

“Look, you have to let me do this,” Conor said. “He’s coming in for questioning later. There’s a whole process, so why don’t you—”

“Leave?” she asked. “No chance.”

Conor squinted at her, then looked up at the house. “How are we supposed to see him from here?”

Without answering, Kate led him behind a tall hedge into a boxwood labyrinth. Once they reached the innermost path, they came to a weathered wooden door. The hinges squeaked, and the door opened into a damp cellar.

“You’re allowed to do this, right?” Kate asked, glancing over her shoulder. “You won’t get in trouble for not having a warrant?”

“I’m with the owner,” he said, smiling at her. They took a few steps inside. There was a light switch at the far end of the house, but this part of the basement was pitch dark. She knew every step of this house, could have found her way blindfolded, but Conor swore as he stumbled into her. She grabbed his hand to steady him.

“Where are we?” he asked.

“A cellar Pete knows nothing about.”

“Why doesn’t he?”

“Well, there’s another, one we actually use. It has a wine cellar, a storage room, the furnace, all the water pipes—normal house things. But this was dug during the Revolutionary War, a staging point to fight the British. It was a hiding place, in case of attack.”

“Cool history,” Conor said as she pulled her hand away.

“We found cannonballs once.”

They walked through the darkness. A few times they heard claws scrabbling on the rock walls.

“Monsters,” she said.

“Field mice,” he said.

“You’re right. My grandmother always had a cat, and he brought us little furry gifts nearly every night.”

At the far end of the passageway, Kate flipped the light switch to illuminate a single bulb, swinging from a cord overhead. She carefully and quietly unlatched a door, wincing when it creaked open. They climbed the narrow spiral staircase.

As children, she and Beth had played here, pretending to be spies hiding from the redcoats. The stairs led up three flights to a tiny room, originally built for escape from enemy soldiers, accessible from the main house by a secret door that only Mathilda and the girls knew about. A peephole gave onto the library.

She and Conor looked down. There was Pete. He’d obviously just walked in and was puttering around, putting his wallet and car keys on the desk. He disappeared, and Kate heard him in the kitchen. It was just past noon. He returned with a sandwich on one of Mathilda’s blue-and-white Canton plates.

Now he sat in the chair, pointing the remote toward the TV, wolfing down his lunch. This had always been a room for Mathilda’s vast collection of books, including works of fiction, art, Connecticut history, and aviation. Pete gave every impression of being alone. There were no sounds coming from within the house. Not Nicola calling a greeting, not the baby laughing or crying.

That surprised Kate. Pete had claimed he and Beth had been working it out, but she had never really believed that. He had always been out for himself. He had moved Nicola and Tyler into this house and destroyed his marriage to Beth in the process. Kate had been dreading seeing them here today.