Chapter 21
Chapter Twenty-One
Present Day
R ose invited the Salt Sisters to the Grayson Estate three nights after she returned to Nantucket from Manhattan. She wanted to show them her very own haunted house. And she wanted to tell them how much they’d been on her mind lately—specifically Stella and Hilary, who’d saved her life.
She practiced it in her head. I always thought men were the ones who had to save women. I never knew women could save each other. Not until you two walked into my life.
I didn’t deserve you. I still don’t understand how I got so lucky.
It was a beautiful day in August, just south of seventy-five degrees. Rose set up a few picnic tables across the grounds and hired a private chef to grill sensational barbecue chicken on the grill she brought from home. Because some of the construction workers groaned with hunger during the chef’s prep time, Rose ran out to grab more ingredients to feed the construction workers, too. She didn’t want anyone to feel left out.
“Guess what?” One of the head construction guys approached with his hat in his hands. He looked cute, his hair slightly greasy on top, his face and arms tan from all the hard work.
“What’s up?” Rose smiled.
“We figured out a way to save the ballroom roof,” he said. “Want to come check it out?”
Rose followed him through the back entrance all the way to the ballroom. Rose hadn’t entered that area of the house in quite a while, and she was amazed at the amount of work they’d finished. It was beginning to look like something out of a storybook. They’d even managed to save the ceiling paintings of the starry night sky.
“You can walk under it safely,” the worker explained. “We secured everything. Look.” He gestured toward pillars they’d built along the edge of the ballroom. The pillars were delicate and beautiful, reminiscent of French castles. Rose took a hesitant step into the ballroom and raised her chin. Beneath her feet was a sparklingly clear marble floor—one they’d apparently discovered under mats Oren or somebody had laid down after they’d abandoned the house.
“It was really in better shape than we thought,” the construction worker explained now.
Rose blinked back tears and imagined tourists here as early as next summer. She imagined their laughter and conversation in this very space—a space where, once upon a time, a young woman named Natalie had laughed and conversed with Oren.
Natalie’s dead, Rose reminded herself now. Don’t get your hopes up.
“Rose?” Hilary’s voice echoed through the ballroom.
Rose twisted around and watched as Hilary strode through the ballroom and sidled up beside her with her eyes on the ceiling. Rose took Hilary’s hand. For a moment, Rose imagined herself at thirty-two—broke and lost and nearly homeless. Hilary had said: Why don’t you move in with me? And now, their lives were entirely different, but they were still themselves. They were still the best of friends.
They would always be the Salt Sisters.
“It’s sensational,” Hilary said now. “I can’t believe I’ve driven past this place thousands of times and never knew what the inside looked like.”
Rose pointed toward the far edge of the ballroom and said, “I imagine a big table right there next to a table with the best view of the water. That’s where we’ll always sit. You and me and all the Salt Sisters.”
Hilary blinked rapidly. It looked like she was fighting tears. “You’ve had a difficult few weeks, haven’t you?”
Rose sniffed. “I just don’t know what to make of any of this.”
Rose briefly explained their trip to Manhattan. She talked about her strange “fantasy” that Natalie was still out there somewhere. “Maybe Oren forced her to go somewhere else? Perhaps he pushed her out?” she speculated. “Maybe he just wanted to create a sob story about his wife. About his past. Perhaps it was all a manipulation tactic to get someone like me under his control.”
Hilary cupped her elbows and raised her chin again to gaze at the ceiling. It was truly sensational. It was difficult to look away from.
“You shouldn’t rule any of it out,” Hilary said finally. “Not with Oren.”
Rose’s heart seized. She’d half expected Hilary to tell her to drop it, to remind her that they lived in the real world, where real rules applied.
But Hilary didn’t do that.
Instead, Hilary said, “You might want to look into hiring a private investigator.”
Rose tilted her head with surprise.
“I know. You wanted to be the private investigator,” Hilary teased her lightly. “But there’s so much about this world you can’t know. It’s so deeply entrenched.” She spread out her fingers.
Rose knew Hilary was right. Hilary was from wealth. She understood the intricacies.
“I don’t want you to get in over your head,” Hilary said. “But you have money, now. Your own money. There’s no reason you can’t throw money at the problem and figure this out.”
Rose’s heart opened up. She remembered how strange it had been for her to learn that wealthy people just threw money at their problems to make them disappear.
Rose would never be as wealthy as Hilary or as Oren or as Mr. and Mrs. Walden. But she had enough for a private investigator. And she thought she owed it to herself—and to Natalie’s memory—to pursue this. She’d already bought the Grayson Estate, for heaven’s sake. This was her life’s work.
“I have a recommendation,” Hilary said, reaching into her pocket to find her phone. “She’s brilliant. Lives in Manhattan.”
“Why do you know a private investigator?” Rose asked with a laugh.
“You don’t want to know,” Hilary said.
“You’ll tell me later?”
Hilary raised her shoulders and gave Rose a funny smile. “Maybe. Maybe not.”
Rose received a text message from Hilary, filled with the details for the private investigator. Vicky Smith. Was it her real name? It didn’t matter.
The other Salt Sisters arrived a few minutes later. They were overjoyed to be there, swallowing Rose in hugs. Rose tried to tuck all ideas about the private investigator into the back of her mind. But by the time they were on their second glasses of wine, Rose couldn’t take it anymore. She fled to the other side of the estate to send Vicky Smith an inquiry.
She wrote: I need to find Natalie Quinne Grayson. She apparently “died” in 1993, but there’s no death certificate to speak of, and the funeral seems fishy. They didn’t allow anyone to attend.
For background, I married Natalie’s husband not even a year after she “died.” I was very young. I hope you won’t think too harshly of me.
Money is no issue.
Rose stared at the message for a full thirty seconds before pressing send. She gasped, then hurried back to the table, where Katrina was doing an impression of a musician they all liked, and all the Salt Sisters were howling with laughter.
It was the first night of fun the Grayson Estate had seen in many, many years.
Rose knew it was the beginning of something incredible.