Chapter 12
Chapter Twelve
Nina
June 2025
B ecause the exotic and elusive multimillionaire Ralph thought Nina and Amos were a couple, after their time at the bar came to a close, he put them in what he called his “honeymoon suite” and told them to have a wonderful night to themselves. Nina was reeling. It was eleven thirty, and she felt she’d been living the millionaire lifestyle for enough hours at this point to question how any of them lived to be older than sixty. All that alcohol? All those greasy snacks? She collapsed on the bed like a starfish. Vaguely, she felt Amos in the room, moving around nervously. She patted the other end of the mattress and said, “Have a seat!”
Amos perched at the edge of the bed and looked down at her. “I can sleep on the sofa,” he said, gesturing to the long and glowing dark-green couch near the window.
Nina tried to remember the last time she’d been in a bedroom with a man who wasn’t her husband and came up dry. She shifted to her side and propped her head up with her elbow. How could she make Amos feel at ease?
“It’s a funny situation,” she said finally. “I’m sorry I didn’t correct him when he said, you know, that we were a couple.”
Amos laughed a little too long, and his cheeks turned cherry red. “I figure with these wealthy guys, you have to agree with whatever they say.”
“Those are my instincts, too. Although what do I know?” Nina got up and searched through the minifridge for a bottle of sparkling water. She handed one of them to Amos, who accepted it gratefully and drank.
“You’re a Whitmore,” Amos said, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “And you married into the Plymouths, whoever they are.”
Nina grimaced. “But I always felt like I was on the perimeter of those families. I was so much younger than my siblings, and…” She trailed off. “I never felt my mother really liked me. Like she was done with mothering by the time I was born. And what kind of mother never reaches out to her daughter again after all that?”
Nina’s mood soured. She returned to the bed and leaned against the thick pillows with her legs extended in front of her. “I took Will and Fiona to summer camp, and I fight my instincts every day to go get them. I miss them so much. How did my mother let me go like that?”
Amos shifted up the bed a little bit, stretching out his legs like she did. Nina was surprised to see that there was a pattern on his socks. Because the bed was so massive, his face was still about three feet away from hers, a greater distance than they’d had at the bar. But still. They were sitting on a bed—alone—together.
“Do you think Seth Green is Jack?” Amos asked after a long pause.
Nina raised her shoulders. “There’s no way to know.”
“But what’s your hunch?”
Nina smiled. “My hunch is that I’m alone in the world, chasing a ghost.”
Amos reached across the bed and touched her hand. It was tender and soft and made Nina’s eyes flutter. She hadn’t expected it. But just as soon as it was there, it was gone, returned to Amos’s thigh as he said, “We have to go out to Madequecham Beach and see what we find.”
Nina wanted to remind him again that he didn’t need to help her and could return to his real life whenever he wanted to. But she didn’t want him to.
She kept her mouth shut.
Still on the bed and still in their clothes, Amos and Nina kept talking for a little while. They exchanged stories from their childhood on Nantucket. Amos told Nina about a time Jack had taken him out sailing and he’d felt the wind through his hair and felt fully free in a way he, at sixteen years old, hadn’t in a long time. Amos was responsible for making money for his mother and ensuring the bills were paid.
“I did think your brother was incredible,” he affirmed, his eyes cast to the mid-distance.
Nina wanted to point out that Amos had initially said he was sometimes close with Jack, but other times, not so much. But undermining Amos’s memories was something Daniel might have done, not Nina. Nina didn’t want to be like Daniel. She tried to listen. She wanted to be open to whatever Amos had on his mind.
That night, they both slept on the bed in their street clothes, slumbering gently three feet away from one another. It was the best sleep Nina had had in years.
The following morning, Nina and Amos got up at eight and padded downstairs to find several maids cleaning the living room, kitchen, and dining room. It looked as though there’d been a massive party, with beer bottles strewn everywhere, and lamps tipped over, and a curtain torn off its rod.
“What happened here?” Nina asked, rubbing sleep from her eyes.
“Ralph had a party after you went to bed,” one of the maids said evenly.
“What? I didn’t hear anything!” Nina cried.
The maid shrugged, as though to say he can’t be stopped .
“He won’t be up for another eight hours or so,” another maid said. “I can pass along your thanks if you want to hit the road.”
Nina and Amos returned to Nantucket, realizing that they liked the tamer side of life and could never be millionaires chasing the next party.
They also left with an address. Ralph had written it out on a piece of paper:
77 Madequeum Beach Drive. It was where “Seth Green” stayed when he came back to the island.
Once on the ferry, Nina googled “Seth Green” and found more than five thousand of them. The first ten or so images that popped up looked nothing like her brother. She laughed at herself for even trying.
At ten in the morning, Amos pulled the truck up to the curb and got out to say goodbye. Nina wanted to tell him he didn’t have to, that he could wait in the car, but an urgent and strange part of her wanted him to walk with her to the front door, maybe even to hug her. A kiss feels out of the question , she thought, her heart pounding. But we just spent the night together! Is he feeling what I’m feeling? Am I alone in this? The look in his eyes told her she was not.
They were at the front door and turning to look at one another when they heard sounds from within the cabin. Nina froze with alarm. There was the bubbling of a coffee maker and the television. The boink sound that so often came with cartoons. Her blood ran cold.
Amos had heard it, too.
Nina whispered, “Did someone break into my cabin?”
Her first thought was a drifter, someone who needed a place to spend the night. Maybe he or she had been watching her and realized she hadn’t come home last night.
Amos muttered, “I’m going in first. Get behind me.”
Nina clasped her hands. “Shouldn’t we call the cops?”
But Amos was already using her keys to open the door. Just as he had on her first night, he charged in to find the cabin inhabited. But he stopped dead when he saw who it was.
“Mommy!” Will shot off the sofa and ran to the foyer to hug her. Fiona was hot on his heels, tan and happy with beads in her hair.
With both of her children’s arms wrapped around her, Nina allowed herself a millisecond of joy. It crashed into itself almost immediately.
“Morning!” Daniel wore a violently white smile and stuck his hand out to greet Amos.
Amos looked down at Daniel’s hand, his face green. He glanced back at Nina with an expression like what is going on?
“Mommy, where were you?” Will asked. “Why didn’t you come home?”
“I was on another island, honey,” Nina explained in her best and brightest mom voice. “Martha’s Vineyard. It’s right next door.”
“The Vineyard is supposed to be beautiful,” Daniel said. “I’ve only been to Nantucket one other time. Our honeymoon, right, Nina? What a great time that was.”
Nina stepped into the cabin and closed the door behind her. Her eyes were smarting. She looked down at her children and said, “Why don’t you go watch the television in the bedroom?”
“We can sit on your bed?” Will asked.
“Of course,” Nina said.
Will and Fiona slunk out of the room, and Nina hurried to close the door behind them. She glared at Daniel with more rage than she’d ever mustered.
“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.”