Chapter 9
Chapter Nine
I da didn’t sleep that night. In the shower at five thirty, she rehearsed what she wanted to say to Shelby as she scrubbed her scalp. Suds rained down upon her, and the water was hotter than was necessary, so hot that it nearly scalded her.
We have to do everything to keep the business alive. We have to get to the bottom of this.
Even if it means looking at everyone—everyone who might have wronged us—and figuring this out.
Even if it means looking at our husbands for clues.
Ida got ready, put on a bright shade of red lipstick, and left the quiet and still-dark house. It was just past six in the morning, and Frankie and Nellie wouldn’t be up for another three or four hours because they liked to stay up late and watch television and talk and talk and talk. Once or twice, they’d even invited Ida, allowing her to sit with them on one of their beds and give her opinion on celebrity couples or TikTok videos of dancers Ida had never seen before. Ida really preferred it when they spoke of celebrities she knew about—actors from Friends or Modern Family, singers who’d been on the radio for decades. But Nellie and Frankie were Gen-Z, and they knew an entirely different roster of celebrities, a roster that Ida couldn’t fathom.
Ida remembered to thank her lucky stars that Frankie’s medication seemed to be working. Although Frankie didn’t seem keen on the job interview from yesterday, nor the job itself, at least Frankie had gotten out of bed, gotten dressed, and gone to the city to do the interview in the first place. The Frankie of May or June hadn’t even wanted to go to the grocery store.
Ida and Shelby pulled into the parking lot of the Nantucket Sunset Cruisers at exactly the same time. Shelby smiled happily, her bob bouncing as she got out. But when she spotted Ida’s expression, her smile melted.
Behind her was the most splendorous sunrise—a smear of crystalline light.
“Are you okay?” Shelby asked.
“No,” Ida said. “Come on.”
Ida’s hands shook when she took the keys out of her purse. She realized this would be the first time she’d explain everything, which meant it was the first time she would have to own up to the fact that this was all true and really happening. The bank teller knew. The insurance agent knew. But they were legally obliged not to say anything to anyone. They didn’t care that much, anyway. They probably saw businesses fail all the time. It was just another story to them.
“You’re freaking me out,” Shelby chirped, watching Ida. “Can you just tell me what’s going on?”
Ida pressed her lips together, opened the door, walked across the office, and sat down in front of her computer.
“You remember how the insurance company said we didn’t pay? That we weren’t insured at the time of the incident?”
“Yeah, but we did pay,” Shelby countered, following Ida across the room. “We have the receipts.”
“Right. I wanted to cross-check those receipts with our actual account,” Ida said. “But it looks like our online bank account has a different password than it used to?”
Shelby furrowed her brow. “I don’t know. Maybe it made me change it last year or something. The password automatically updates on my computer, so I just log in automatically.” She took a beat. “Why didn’t you just log on from my computer?”
Ida tugged her hair. Shame spilled through her. “I didn’t think of that.”
“Okay.” Shelby tilted her head. “That’s okay.”
“It’s not,” Ida said. She felt utterly drained. “Have you actually logged on recently to see what’s going on?”
Shelby’s face looked scrunched with panic. “I’m sorry?”
Ida breathed deeply and told herself to calm down. I can’t accuse Shelby of being negligent. I was just as negligent, too.
I was just as capable of looking at the bank accounts. I was just as capable of keeping tabs on this.
“The money to pay the liability insurance company has been leaving our account on the first of every month,” Ida said. “But it hasn’t been going to the insurance company.”
Shelby’s mouth was twisted. “What are you talking about?”
Ida spread the bank printouts across the desk to show the funds leaving their account and entering this other account.
“Tyson Rogers Advertising?” Shelby breathed. “What is that?”
Shelby gave Ida a look of accusation, a look that meant, have you been making deals with companies behind my back?
Ida balked at the wordless implication. “I’ve never heard of this company in my life.”
“Neither have I.” Shelby spread her hands across the desk and took a deep breath. “Have you looked it up?”
Ida had. But she pulled up the internet again and googled TYSON ROGERS ADVERTISING to bring up a very simple website. It looked like something made in the early 2000s: a very basic website that just barely suggested they worked in advertising.
“The website contradicts itself,” Ida said. “If they’re so good at advertising, why is their website so awful?”
“Is there an address? A phone number?”
“Nothing,” Ida said.
Shelby crossed her arms over her chest and exhaled.
“But look,” Ida said, flipping through the bank printouts. “Look at how much money’s really in our account.”
Shelby’s eyes widened to saucers. “That can’t be right.”
“The bank teller printed it out.”
Shelby stuttered. “No. I mean, that’s crazy. That’s like…”
“Three hundred thousand less than we thought,” Ida finished.
Shelby was on her feet. Tears streamed down her cheeks.
Ida filled her lungs and gazed up at her best friend. She’d seen her upset before; she’d seen her minutes after a breakup and at the height of influenza and keeling over with sorrow after her children said something cruel to her. But Ida had never seen Shelby like this. Shelby’s face was white as snow, her eyes laced with red, her arms and legs shaking. She looked as though she were possessed.
Shelby shrieked and smacked both hands over her mouth. She hiccuped and turned her back to Ida as though the immensity of her feelings was too great. As though she didn’t want to be seen like this.
“Where is it?” Shelby cried into her hands. “Where? Where is it?”
Ida got up and placed her hand on Shelby’s back. Her best friend shook so violently that Ida eventually eased her back into her office chair and hurried to pour her a glass of water.
Ida was now grateful that she’d been the one to discover this. Had Shelby been the one, she might not have been able to handle it emotionally. It might have destroyed her.
I have to be strong for both of us. I have to keep us together.
Shelby drank water with both hands around the glass. Her chin quivered. “What are we going to do, Ida?” she stammered. “What are we going to do?”
Ida set her jaw. “The obvious thing to do is go to the police. But the problem is, our business has been illegal the past four months.”
“But we didn’t know,” Shelby said.
“Sure. We didn’t know.” Ida swallowed and rubbed her temples. She felt what she needed to say coming like a storm in her chest. “I can’t believe I’m going to say this. But I don’t know if I want to go to the cops yet. I don’t know if I want to reveal any of this. Because it’s obvious to me that whoever took our money is somebody we know.”
Shelby’s eyes glinted murderously. “What are you talking about?”
“Think about it. We weren’t the only people with access to the bank accounts.”
There was a horrible moment of silence. Shelby looked as though she were melting.
“You can’t mean what I think you mean,” Shelby muttered darkly.
Ida gestured to the bank statements. “Whoever took the money understands our system. They know that we share bank files online with each other. Which means they knew to fake the files so that we were none the wiser.” Ida let out a soft laugh. “They also know how busy we are all summer long. They know we aren’t always up to date on what money is going where.”
“What a nightmare.”
Shelby turned to look out the window. Ida followed her gaze to watch as three longtime employees boarded the Benson yacht to prep and clean it for its Boozy Brunch Cruise—a top-selling and brand-new offer at their cruise company. Shelby and Ida had gone together on the maiden voyage of the Boozy Brunch Cruise, drinking too many mimosas and eating more than their fair share of elaborately decorated donuts. That had been in May. Funds had already been taken from their account by then.
“You really think somebody who works here stole from us?” Shelby asked softly.
Ida hadn’t considered that.
“We’ve always been good to them,” Shelby marveled. “We’ve given them bonuses and good salaries and plenty of time off. You know, not many Nantucket companies do all that. Tourism season goes fast. We have to make as much money as we can.”
“I was thinking it could be someone even closer to us,” Ida offered. “Somebody with literal access to the bank accounts.”
Shelby gave her a look of horror. “You can’t be talking about…” She trailed off.
Ida could barely say their names aloud. “Malcolm. Or, I mean, or Rick.”
The minute she brought the idea into the world, she wanted to crawl under the desk and cry. It’s impossible. Rick would never.
Or would he?
Shelby gestured wildly toward the notebook with the passwords in it. She looked frantic. “Come on. We’ve been stupid. We write all our passwords down. Probably ten of our employees have seen us write things in that notebook. We barely ever remember to lock the door to this office. If somebody wanted to get the codes for the bank, they could.”
Ida’s head pounded.
Of course. It’s so obvious.
“Should we interview everyone?” Shelby said. “Maybe they’ll crack under pressure?”
Ida’s heartbeat was strange and syncopated. “I don’t want to stage a witch hunt.”
“How else will we get our money back?” Shelby asked.
Ida was quiet. Her thoughts were twisted.
Shelby studied her quietly. Ida felt her trying to read her mind, digging through her consciousness, trying to make sense of her.
“We have to change,” Ida said. “We have to put all our money in a different account. We have to change our bank passwords and our shared document passwords. We have to start from scratch. That way, whoever knows too much will be stopped in his tracks.”
Shelby’s lips twitched. “What makes you think it’s a guy?”
“It’s just a hunch,” Ida said.
“No police?” Shelby asked.
Ida closed her eyes. “I just don’t know. I don’t want to close down. The only way we’ll get out of this hole is through working, working, working. We have to make the money back that we’ve lost. If we close for an investigation, we probably won’t ever reopen. That will be it. The end of the Nantucket Sunset Cruisers.”
The end of everything we’ve ever worked for. The end of us.
Shelby’s face turned gray. She placed her hand on her forehead and, after a very long time, muttered, “I didn’t expect today to go this way.”
Ida didn’t know what to say to that. She returned to the website for Tyson Rogers Advertising and scrolled up and down, searching for clues that never came.
A few minutes later, the office phone rang. It was Mr. Grayson’s lawyer.
He wanted to alert them ahead of time. “Mr. Grayson plans to sue the Nantucket Sunset Cruisers for two million dollars. You will receive a notice later today.”
Ida and Shelby sat in silence and watched the sun rise higher over the island. The sky was overwhelmingly blue. They hadn’t yet turned on the air-conditioning, and Ida felt sticky; she wanted another shower. She wanted to turn off the calendar. She wanted a Boozy Brunch Cruise.
“We should call our lawyer,” Ida said finally. “Maybe she’ll have an idea of what to do.”
Shelby set her jaw. “Good idea.”
Along the docks stretched the line of Booze Cruisers in sundresses and khaki shorts and sun hats. They smiled happily at one another; they showed off little souvenirs they’d bought during their trip; they showed off swimsuits they would don once aboard.
Ida imagined them a few weeks later, calling one another on the phone and saying, Can you believe that scandal with the Nantucket Sunset Cruisers?
Ida thought she was going to throw up. She reached for her phone to call the lawyer immediately.
It was time to take matters into her own hands.