Page 29 of Love Conquers All

“I am the best version of myself!” Sylvie cried.

But James was not to be swayed.

Sylvie went upstairs and sat on the edge of her bed. It was a clear evening, and a fingernail moon hung low, dipping toward the frothing Nantucket Sound.

Suddenly, she was hit with clear-eyed focus. She could not let her father do this to her. She’d rather run away.

Maybe it wasn’t rational. Perhaps it wasn’t safe. But over the next two hours, as quietly as Sylvie could, she packed a backpack, gathered relevant paperwork, cleaned her room, and stood at the door, listening to hear where her father was in the big, drafty house. But after just a step into the hall, she realized he was downstairs watching television, probably with one eye on the door. He wasn’t going to let her escape.

She had to concoct a different plan.

That night, she couldn’t sleep. She was sick with worry, reminded of her favorite fictional characters who’d had to escape dark and alienating lives just to continue to be themselves. The problem with her plan was Graham. Her love for him felt like the most powerful thing she knew—the only thing. But her love for Valerie complicated it. After all Valerie had done for them, howcould she steal Graham away from his mother? How could she destroy what was bound to be a bright future?

The following morning, Sylvie was needed at The House on Nantucket. As casually as she could, she put her backpack on her shoulders and walked from her house to the inn. There, she greeted Mrs. Galloway and Frank and checked out four couples, all headed back south to Savannah. Sylvie heard herself make light small talk, amazed at her capacity to pretend in the face of her fear.

At lunchtime, Sylvie told Frank she was going to the sandwich place by the boardwalk.

“Your dad isn’t going to like that,” Frank said.

Sylvie shot him a look that meant she didn’t care. She put her backpack on her shoulders and headed out, hurrying down a sidewalk dappled with shadows from overhanging trees. She realized she was headed for Graham and Valerie’s house, a detour she hadn’t fully planned. When she reached it, she found Graham’s two sisters sunning in the front yard and Valerie’s car gone.

“Hey there,” one of the sisters, Britney, said, propping her sunglasses on the top of her head. “You’ve been a stranger.”

“Not on purpose,” Sylvie said meekly.

“Graham’s not here,” Britney said as the other sister remained on her back in the sun.

Sylvie felt a stab of fear. “Do you know when he’s coming back?”

Britney shrugged. “He went off with that other girl from your little club. Janice?”

Sylvie’s mouth went dry. She remembered Janice being long-legged with bright blond hair slathered with blue streaks. She was punkish and cool, and she had the best CD collection out of any of them. She was also—sometimes—pretty fired up about theenvironment. Sylvie and Graham had often called her “their only hope.”

And now Graham was running off with her.

Sylvie’s head spun with fear. She twisted around, half expecting to find her father at the corner, waiting for her to return to the inn. But there was nothing but a golden retriever sniffing a fire hydrant and a child on a tricycle.

Maybe this was her only chance to flee.

Sylvie didn’t say anything else. She shot down the road, running like videos of gazelles on safari, running as though her very life depended on it (because it did). The ferry was finishing its 12:30 boarding, and the ramp was nearly on its way up when she arrived. The ferry employee was nobody she knew, just someone who’d been hired to work on the island for the season. She paid with cash she’d taken from the inn’s till and hurried to grab a seat down below. She didn’t have the heart to sit on the top deck and watch the island recede forever. She didn’t have the heart to watch her love drift away.

Chapter Thirteen

Present Day

Afew hours before Graham’s dinner with Hilary Salt and Sylvie Bruckson, he got a call from his lawyer. “Open some champagne! Apparently, all the charges against you have been dropped,” he said.

Graham was in the kitchen of his mother’s house, drinking a cup of coffee that he nearly let go of with surprise. “I beg your pardon?”

“I don’t understand it either,” his lawyer said. “I think someone pulled some strings for you. Maybe somebody you know has power with Next Generation Nantucket Designers?”

It had been only a few days since Graham’s arrest at the construction site of the brand-new luxury resort. Graham hadn’t even fully wrapped his mind around the subsequent litigation he knew he’d have to go through. And now, it had mysteriously disappeared from his life as though someone had magicked it away.

“Wow,” Graham said. “Do you need a raise?”

His lawyer chuckled. “Promise me you’ll give me a heads-up before you perform another stunt like this? I know it’s sort of your thing, but it’s good for me to get a handle on the monster you’re up against. The Next Generation Nantucket Designers aren’t easy folks to deal with.”

Graham laughed, remembering his early days of protests with Sylvie, how they’d thrown themselves into everything so messily and completely that giving anyone a heads-up would never have occurred to them. “Sure, I guess,” Graham said finally. “Thanks.”

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