Page 28 of The White Oak Lodge

“What are you doing here?”

He looked tan and sleek, like he’d been working out a lot since she’d last seen him. A suitcase in the corner with a sticker on it suggested he’d recently flown to Jersey directly from Buenos Aires, where he’d apparently checked their children out of camp and driven them here. But Nina had never told Daniel where she was, nor what she was up to.

How had he guessed?

Daniel kept that infuriating smile on his face and continued to look at Amos. “What’s your name, my man? I’d like to be friendly with my wife’s new boyfriend.”

Nina wanted to smash all the plates in the cabinet.

Amos’s voice was guttural. “You have no right to be here. This is Nina’s rental.”

“I’m married to Nina,” Daniel said. “What’s mine is hers and vice versa. Right, honey?”

“How did you even get in?” Nina demanded.

“Nancy let me in,” Daniel said. “I told her that I was your husband, that it was always the plan to join you here. She was thrilled! She said it was sad to see you here all alone.”

Daniel dropped his chin and added, “So close to the White Oak Lodge! Is someone homesick?”

Nina’s hands were shaking. “This has nothing to do with you. Why aren’t you in South America?”

“There are times in a man’s life when he must ask himself what really matters,” Daniel said.

Nina let out a small laugh. “What is that supposed to mean?”

Nina felt wretched—both for herself and for Amos. Her head swam with a mixture of hangover and hunger and shock. But Will and Fiona were in the next room. Daniel had used them to get power over her. What could she do? She couldn’t throw them out.

Daniel put his hands on the kitchen table and leaned heavily over it, glaring first at Nina and then at Amos. His voice was like a growl. “I know what you’re up to,” he said stiffly. “I know, and I won’t let you do it without me. Half of that money is mine.”

Chapter Thirteen

Nina

June 1998

It was the last day of fifth grade, which, to Nina, had felt like the longest year of school so far. Being ten and then eleven was no easy feat for a girl, and Nina had been through a great number of hardships—like the day her entire family had forgotten her birthday, or the day she learned everyone else in her class had been invited to Tiffany Bannerman’s birthday party, and she had not. But it was over and done with, and now, summer could begin. Nina took the bus back from elementary school, her eyes to the clouds out the window as she daydreamed. The other kids were screaming, competing for attention, singing songs, but Nina was lost in the rapture that was sure to come from long and beautiful days spent by herself, wandering the beaches or eavesdropping on the elegant guests of the White Oak Lodge.

Nina got off the bus without looking back and was immediately struck by a sight—lined up in front of the WhiteOak Lodge were no fewer than five police cars, their lights flashing. Nina had never seen anything like this before. Even the bus driver paused longer than necessary, rubbernecking to see what was happening. Nina hurried around the cars, noting that a few of the officers were talking to hotel staff. Her father was chatting with another officer near the bar, wearing a big and almost ridiculous smile. It looked like he was faking it. Nina’s heart pounded. She hurried up to her father and interrupted the officer mid-conversation, “What’s going on?”

Her father flinched and glanced down at her. “Ah! My youngest. Nina, say hello to Officer Delaney.”

Nina gave the officer her best glare. She’d seen enough movies and read enough books to know that sometimes fathers were arrested by officers, even when fathers had done nothing wrong, and there was no way she’d let them take him without a fight.

“Why don’t you run inside and have Charlotte make you a snack?” her father suggested.

“I can make myself a snack,” Nina said. “I’m eleven.”

She felt ashamed for saying her age in front of the officer and slunk away, still watching the cars. Maybe something had happened with one of the guests? It was impossible to always know what they were up to, where they’d come from, or who they really were. They came to the White Oak Lodge with stories and missions all their own—sometimes to conduct love affairs with people they weren’t married to and sometimes to hide out from governments they weren’t keen on returning to. She’d heard a rumor that part of the reason her Italian grandfather had been at the lodge in the first place was because he’d been hiding from the Italian tax authorities, although Nina didn’t know enough about taxes to confirm or deny that.

Before Nina ducked into the kitchen, she heard the familiar sound of her mother having a mini breakdown. Nina creptaround the corner to witness Francesca leaning over the railing and calling out to the officers. She was wearing a silk dress, and her hair was styled elaborately, but she looked in the middle of a depressive episode. “Don’t you realize you’ve made a mistake?” she was saying to them, half begging, half singing. “Don’t you realize you’re hurting good Nantucket people? We rely on our guests to come year in and year out. Think of our reputation!”

Nina couldn’t remember ever seeing her mother like that. Terrified of what might happen next, she hurried back to the kitchen and slammed the door behind her.

At the kitchen table sat Charlotte, Allegra, and Lorelei—her three beautiful older sisters. They were pale and jittery. When the door slammed, Allegra said, “Nina, you need to think about other people for a change!”

Nina felt as though she’d been smacked. Confused and exhausted after the long day at school, she nearly burst into tears. Lorelei sighed, sensing she was about to cry, but Charlotte got up and hurried to make her a snack. “She doesn’t know what’s going on any more than we do,” she said to them. “She’s just a kid.”

Charlotte made Nina her favorite after-school snack: peanut butter and jelly toast. Nina sat at the table with her sisters and ate as softly as possible. Allegra had once told her she sometimes smacked her mouth, and she didn’t want to be yelled at again. When she fully swallowed a bite, she got up the nerve to ask, “Why are the cops talking to Dad?”

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