Nantucket Nights (31 page)

She didn’t cry. She just stood and ate him up with her eyes, and when he said, “Do you need help with your bags?” she let him come to her rescue.

Kayla stifled all the questions that had been running through her mind for the previous six weeks:
Do you still love me, can we make this work, will you ever trust me again?
She reminded herself that Raoul was a builder; he believed in process. The relationship would have to be restored one brick at a time. There was no quick fix, and there were no easy answers.

Still, she felt she had to be the first to say something. As they stood at the baggage claim waiting for her suitcase, she spoke up. “I missed you.”

“Oh, yeah?” he said.

She swallowed. “Yeah. Did you miss me?”

He turned and took her in his arms, and she pressed her face into the side of
his neck and wondered how she’d made it through six weeks without him.

“Oh, yeah,” he said.

By Thanksgiving, things appeared, on the outside, to be back to normal. Kayla ventured out of the house again, although she spoke to no one about what had happened Labor Day weekend. When people asked about Theo, she told them he was attending Boston Hill to improve
his chances of getting into a good college.

Raoul went to court and was fined five hundred dollars and sentenced to fifty hours of community service. He offered to build a new jungle gym for the elementary school playground, and he let Luke help him design it. He and
his crew started work on a house on Eel Point Road. The client bought the sixty-five-acre parcel of land for almost twenty million dollars and he told Raoul he wanted a house that would make the Tings’ look like a scallop shanty.

The kids—Jennifer, Cassidy B., and Luke—still didn’t know the whole story. They became absorbed with school and friends and pretended to forget all about it.

Raoul and Kayla called Sabrina to find out how Theo was doing. He was hurt, Sabrina said, but healing. Kayla wanted to talk to him, she wanted to see him, but he wasn’t ready. He needed space, he needed time. Kayla, more than anyone else in the family, understood.

In the
Inquirer and Mirror
in the middle of November, Kayla saw that John and Val’s house had sold for over a million dollars. A few weeks later, the Nantucket Bar Association placed an ad wishing Valerie Gluckstern “lots of luck in her new practice in Annapolis, Maryland.” Kayla felt a sense of loss, but more than anything, she was relieved.

On the outside, everything appeared to be back to normal.

And then, December. The day that Kayla went Christmas shopping in town, the day when everything seemed so festive, so right. The day the phone call came that nearly stopped her heart.

“Kayla,” the voice on die answering machine said. “This is Paul Henry. I have news. Please call me.”

I have news.
Kayla walked aimlessly through the house, trying to control her breathing. She entered Theo’s room. It was pristine—dusted, vacuumed, bed made. The way Kayla always imagined it would look once Theo went to college, until she and Raoul bought a large piece of exercise equipment, or decided to redecorate and make it a guest room.

I have news.

What was she afraid of? The reality of Antoinette’s death—perhaps even the physical reality of it, the remains of Antoinette’s body. What would that look like now, after so many months? A skeleton? A blue, bloated corpse? Once Kayla saw the body, the body that contained her grandchild, it would haunt her forever. She would see it in her sleep, she would become afraid of the dark. The finality of it: a dead body. Not to mention the possible criminal charges, the word
murder
silently attached to Kayla’s name. Or not so silently: If the detective drummed up enough evidence, there would be an indictment, a trial.

I can’t do it,
she thought, longing for her one-bedroom unit at Mary Lee’s by the Sea.
I can’t call him back.

What was more terrifying was the thought that Antoinette might be alive.

She tried to forget about the message. After all, it was Christmastime. Kayla convinced Raoul to take the next day off of work and they flew to the Cape to do some Christmas shopping while the kids were in school. They bought Luke a North Face jacket and a Razor scooter, Cassidy B. a complete set of grown-up art supplies: oil paints, watercolors, pastels, charcoal pencils, sculpting clay. They bought Jennifer a leather skirt and Rollerblades. They bought Theo a computer and arranged to have it sent to Boston. Then, exhausted, they ate lunch in the noisy, crowded food court, where kids too young for school screamed and smashed French fries into their hair.

There, amid the din, Kayla heard Paul Henry’s voice.
I have news.

Kayla listened to the piped-in Christmas music, Karen Carpenter singing, “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas.” She wanted to disappear into the glitter and tinsel and spun sugar of Christmas at the Cape Cod Mall. Forget about drownings and love affairs and detectives. But the specter of Paul Henry crunched into her Christmas spirit like the Grinch. Kayla tried to smile at Raoul across the dinky Formica table.

“Is something wrong?” he asked her. “You seem preoccupied.”

“I have to make a phone call,” she said. “Where are the pay phones?”

“Who do you have to call?” Raoul asked.

“Your mother,” Kayla lied. “There was something else she said Theo wanted, something for school, but I can’t remember what.”

Raoul nodded and Kayla ran around the perimeter of the food court until she found the corridor with the rest rooms and the pay phones.

“Come in,” Paul Henry said.

“I can’t,” Kayla said. “I’m in Hyannis. Christmas shopping. Just tell me what the news is, Paul. Did you find a body?”

“I’ll tell you when you come in,” he said. “This isn’t something I’m willing to tell you over the phone. Tomorrow morning?”

“Fine,” Kayla said. She slammed down the phone.

“What did mom say?” Raoul asked when she returned. He was busy finishing her chicken teriyaki and didn’t notice her agitation.

“Sabrina wasn’t home,” Kayla said.

“Probably out shopping for dinner,” Raoul said.

The police station was decorated for Christmas—a row of garlands across the front desk, blinking white lights in the window. The officer behind the glass shield was wearing a Santa hat. He took one look at Kayla and picked up a phone. Paul Henry emerged from the hallway ten seconds later. He reached for Kayla’s hand and, incredibly, kissed her on the cheek. Kayla hadn’t slept at all the night before. She lay next to Raoul counting
his breaths, imagining possible scenarios. Kayla realized she was grateful for one reason. She wanted an end; as gruesome or as scary as it might be, she wanted closure.

She followed Paul Henry down the dim hallway to his office. Paul Henry sat down behind a kidney-shaped desk. Kayla collapsed in a needlepoint chair while Paul Henry opened a manila file folder. He read. Kayla studied the photographs on his desk— his wife, Carla, their kids, a grandchild. Kayla studied his hands—he wore a gold wedding band. Raoul never wore his wedding ring because when he built houses it could catch on something. Instead, he kept it in a plain white box in
his sock drawer. A lonely gold band with her name inscribed inside and their wedding date, June 1, 1981.

Kayla looked expectantly at Paul Henry.

“I have to tell you, Kayla, I called the woman’s daughter yesterday. Told her who I was. She hung up on me, and I haven’t had any luck reaching her again.”

“Okay.”

Paul Henry took a small notepad and copied something from the file. Like a doctor writing down the diagnosis of a terminal disease, Kayla thought. He slid the paper across the desk. Kayla was afraid to look at it. “Can’t you just tell me?”

Paul Henry put down his pen. “Ms. Riley is living on Martha’s Vineyard.”

“She’s
alive?”
Kayla’s stomach dropped; she started to sweat. “For the love of God, Paul, she’s
alive?
Living on the Vineyard? Are you sure?”

“Detective Simpson was conducting the missing persons, and he subpoenaed pertinent information from Valerie Gluckstern’s office.”

“What kind of information?”

“Information about Ms. Riley’s assets. Back when this whole situation started, John Gluckstern told us that
his wife had convinced Ms. Riley to take her assets out of Nantucket Bank and invest them with a broker in London.”

“London,” Kayla repeated.

“We finally tracked down the guy in London, and he refused to answer our questions, so we went to his supervisor and what while found out was that the bank has been sending Ms. Riley money to an address on the Vineyard the first of every month… since, well, since September.”

“You’re kidding.” Kayla nearly swooned. She put a hand on Paul Henry’s desk. “Did Val know? Did Val know this whole time that Antoinette was alive?”

“I called Valerie myself and asked her because I couldn’t believe it. She said she merely put Antoinette in contact with the London broker and that she knew nothing of their arrangements.” Paul Henry smoothed
his crew cut. “If Valerie knew all along that Ms. Riley “ran away,’ as it were, we can slap some fraud charges on her. Detective Simpson has big hopes for this. I don’t. This police station isn’t set up to handle big cases. I’m just glad Ms. Riley is alive.”

Kayla looked at the piece of paper. “This is Antoinette’s address?”

“Supposedly.”

“What should I do with it?”

Paul Henry shrugged. “Whatever you want. Go see her. Don’t go see her. I guess Detective Simpson was hoping you could give
him a positive ID so that he could close the case.” Paul Henry reddened. “You certainly don’t have to do anything for Simpson’s sake. He was awfully rough with you, Kayla. I’m sorry.”

“Val was rough with me. I really can’t believe this. I can’t believe Antoinette is alive. I thought… really, I don’t know what I thought.”

“Well, again, I’m sorry for what happened. I don’t like to see good people, good Nantucketers, take it on the chin like you and Raoul did. And your son.”

Kayla stuffed the paper into her purse. “Okay,” she said. She knew Paul Henry was looking for some sign of forgiveness, but she couldn’t give it to him. She had to get out of there. “Thanks.”

On the way home, Kayla stopped at Hatch’s and bought a six-pack of beer and a five-dollar scratch ticket. Antoinette was alive, on Martha’s Vineyard. Kayla laughed in the check-out line.

Later, she sat at the breakfast bar and drank two beers with her lunch. A cream cheese and grape jelly sandwich and eight Lay’s potato chips.
Val had known the whole time.
There wasn’t a doubt in Kayla’s mind. She scraped the silver film off her scratch ticket with her thumbnail. Nothing. She used to find old scratch tickets all over Theo’s room. He’d bought them at the Islander Liquor Store, back when he used to hang out with
his friends. Back when he was a normal kid. The word that filled Kayla’s mind was
outrageous,
because at the center of that word was rage.
Antoinette is fucking alive. On the fucking Vineyard.
And Valerie knew. Now things started to make sense. Val pretended that Antoinette had drowned so no one would suspect otherwise. She threw Kayla to the police to keep the police from investigating any deeper, but she knew Kayla wouldn’t get into any serious trouble because a body would never be found. Kayla had left Great Point for at least half an hour when she went to call the police. There was plenty of time for Antoinette to crawl out of the water and escape. Maybe she’d left her bike somewhere along the way, maybe she rode to Val’s house and hid out there until morning when the ferry left for Martha’s Vineyard, which on Labor Day weekend would have been filled with tourists. Or Antoinette could have taken a motor boat; she knew how to operate one—Kayla remembered the trip to Tuck-ernuck with Theo years before. It mattered very little at this point how Antoinette got to the Vineyard. Once there, she was safe. The Vineyard was the perfect place to hide. It was too close, too obvious, and for these very reasons it was the last place anyone would have looked.

But why, Antoinette? Why run away?

Kayla had to go see for herself.

With the kids at school and Raoul at work on his huge new project, it was easy to slip away the next day. There was one ferry to the Vineyard in the morning, and one ferry home in the afternoon. Kayla was one of three people on the boat. She hunkered down in a window seat and inventoried the damage that Antoinette had caused—Theo’s heart, for starters; Kayla’s good reputation; Kayla and Raoul’s marriage; Kayla and Val’s friendship; Ting. If Kayla did find Antoinette on the Vineyard, what could she possibly say? Only this:
You ruined everything.
Outrageous.

Martha’s Vineyard was much bigger than Nantucket; it had seven towns to Nantucket’s one. The town of Vineyard Haven, though, had the same slow pace of Nantucket in winter. When Kayla arrived, there was a line of taxis, each with a Christmas wreath tied to the grille, and the drivers were clustered together, warming their hands around cups of coffee. Kayla stood by the passenger door of the first taxi in line until the driver, a man with long, deep lines in
his face, tore himself away from the group. He wore jeans, a gray hooded sweatshirt.

“Where you headed?” he asked.

“I’m not sure,” she said. The paper said:
52 Painted Rock Road, between Chilmark and Aquinnah.
When they climbed into the car, she handed it to the driver.

His face creased into more lines. “Well, I know where Chilmark and Aquinnah are, but I’ve never heard of Painted Rock Road. You sure that’s the right name?”

“No,” Kayla said. “This is just an address someone gave me. A… a friend of mine lives there.”

“I’ve lived here twenty-six years,” the driver said. “Been driving cab fourteen and I have never heard of any Painted Rock Road.”

That sounds like Antoinette,
Kayla thought. She was forever stumping the taxi drivers on Nantucket. Even with the address they couldn’t find her house.

“Can you take me out that way?” Kayla asked. “You can drop me off, maybe, and I’ll look for it?”

The driver shrugged. Kayla saw on
his license that his name was Eddie.