Chapter 14 #2
“I should be happy it’s over, but now I’m just bitter that I wasted my time with someone like him.” She looked out in front of her. Whitecaps glowed in the night as the waning moon hung in the sky above them. “And there’s something I should probably tell you.”
His heart sped up. What bomb was she about to drop?
“My brother-in-law is Scott Gagnon.” She looked at him, waiting for the name to register.
He had never heard of Scott Gagnon. “Who is he?”
“Right now, he’s a prisoner at the Federal Correctional Institution in Berlin, New Hampshire.”
He waited for more. “And?”
“And he’s in jail for fraud,” she said before letting out a long exhale. “He stole from almost everyone on the island, and it made the news.”
“Your poor sister,” he said.
She stared at him.
“What?” he asked. But he was nervous from the intensity of her look.
“Thank you,” she said. “It was hard for her.” She shook her head. “Most people wanted Scott to rot in prison, and the long sentence didn’t seem to satiate the locals.”
He heard the sharp tone of bitterness in her voice.
“They treated my sister pretty horribly at first,” she said, “but then she moved into her friend Sophia’s place, and everybody loves Dr. Taylor.”
He had heard the name. “I’m so sorry for you family.”
“It was worse than anything I had ever experienced, but my sister stood tall, never backing from her convictions and staying true to her values, even in the darkest of times.” She spoke with pride, patting his hand. “But I’ll be honest. That’s been my experience with men. They’re liars.”
“Ouch.” It might make things harder than he expected, but this wouldn’t be something that deterred him from pursuing Thea. “I promise to be better than all of them.”
She smiled as he lifted her hand to his lips again. This time, she leaned in to him, and just as they were about to kiss, her phone started to ring, and she hesitated.
“You can get it,” he said, as the ringtone started playing a popular nineties rap song.
“Oh my goodness,” she said, trying to turn off her ringer. “I should see if it’s my niece.”
“Right,” he said, letting go of her hand.
She looked down at the screen. Her eyebrows furrowed. “It’s my sister.”
“Hey,” she said. He could hear panicked voices on the other side of the phone. “What? When?” He couldn’t make out what was being said, but by the way Thea’s face whitened, he could tell something was wrong. “I’m coming right now.”
“What can I do?” he said as soon as she hung up the phone. “Where do you need to go?”
“I need to get to my sister’s.” She started to run in the opposite direction of the car, where Daniel waited for them.
“Let me drive you!” he shouted after her.
She ran behind the house and disappeared into the woods. “It’s quicker this way!”
He ran after her into the darkness of the woods. Within a few minutes, they emerged through the trees to a backyard illuminated by a floodlight. Inside the small cottage, were a group of people.
“Auntie Thea!” a young man said as soon as she came into the yard.
“It’s Thea!” a woman’s voice called out.
They all poured out of the house as they reached the middle of the backyard.
“Did she tell you what she was thinking? Leaving before the wedding to go to Vermont?” a woman from the restaurant asked Thea as she rushed towards her.
“Crissy, calm down.” Thea looked surprised by the question, but shook her head. “She was at my place the last I saw her. That was only a few hours ago.”
“She’s on a bus to Brattleboro.” Crissy raised her voice. “She and Nora took one of the last departures on the ferry. It’s going to be dark by the time they get there.”
“She’s going to Vermont?” Thea rubbed her forehead. “That’s at least three hours away.”
“Sophia’s aunt lives there.” The woman looked at Ryan. It didn’t take long for her to suddenly recognize the football player in her yard. She covered her slacked jaw with her hand.
“Is that seriously Ryan Mathers!” a boy called from the back porch.
“Do you need a ride to Vermont?” he asked, wondering if he could get a private jet to an airport out there.
“Oh no.” The woman’s eyes went back and forth from Ryan than to Thea. “I’m so sorry. I messed up your night.”
Thea put her hand on her sister’s shoulder lovingly and shook her head. She looked at Ryan and smiled. “It’s fine. Do you want me to call her?”
Crissy shook her head. “It’s just that we got into to a fight about her break up with Jason and she left upset. They’ll be okay with Lois. It’s just that…” Crissy’s eyes filled with tears. “I’m a terrible mother!”
She slapped her palms to her face and began to cry. Thea ran to her and suddenly Ryan felt as though he was in the middle of a private family matter. He needed to go, but he didn’t know where he was or how to get back.
“I should leave,” he said, looking around the backyard for the spot in the woods they exited. Was it directly behind the house or did it come out on the side?
“No, don’t leave,” Thea’s sister cried out. “I’ve ruined my daughter’s life and now I’m ruining your date. What else will I ruin?”
“Stop, Crissy,” Thea said to her sister, but this only made Crissy cry harder into Thea’s shoulder, who looked at him apologetically. “I should figure things out here.”
“Yeah, of course,” he said.
“No, seriously,” Crissy weeped out, but she covered her face with both hands. “I’m fine.”
The words were muffled, but Ryan didn’t need to hear clearly to see that he needed to leave. “I’ll check in later.”
He wished he knew what to say to make it less of an awkward goodbye. He waved at her and her crying sister as he backed out of the yard and around the house. He walked down the driveway to the streetlight and stood under it as it buzzed.
He texted, I had an amazing time.
He didn’t expect to get a text back, but right after, she replied, Me, too.
When he found his way back to the car, Daniel shook his head. “Where did you go?”
“It’s a long story,” he said. He didn’t need to reveal any details, not even to his assistant of ten years.
“Well, we need to get back to the house,” Daniel said to him, turning on the ignition.
“Why’s that?” he asked.
Daniel backed up, spinning the wheel in the seashell gravel. “Because you have a beauty queen waiting at your door.”