Chapter Thirty
—JAMIE
Sun streams in from the windows of the lower deck of my father’s yacht.
I turn over, still sore from… well, from everything.
My arm throbs with new stiches. I climb out of bed and enter the skinny corridor, the other bedroom doors closed as I make my way to the upper deck.
Noa is in one of the rooms, hopefully still asleep.
Her father and brother also stayed on the yacht, their family home all but destroyed.
After my father was brought to the police station for questioning, along with his lawyer, my mother came down to the dock to speak to me.
She apologized and asked me to come back to the resort with her.
I wasn’t ready for that. I asked her instead if I could stay on my father’s yacht—it was the least they could do—and she agreed.
I know I’ll have to talk with her later today.
I might even have to speak to my father again eventually, although I’m not going to do that without witnesses. Brent Matthews is a dangerous guy.
But I’m not afraid of him anymore. I can’t guarantee he’ll ever be charged with a crime, if he’ll ever see justice, but I know the bad press will be a killer for him.
He won’t be able to bury the story this time, and he deserves every second of misery it brings him.
However, it guts me that my sister will be collateral damage.
I’ve already called my grandfather, and he promised to be there for Astrid if she needed him.
Same with me. I told him I’ve missed him.
As I get into the kitchen, I find Noa’s brother, Ellis, there with a mug of coffee. He jumps up when he sees me, clutching his side for a moment, before apologizing for wandering around the boat alone. I let him know it’s fine and pour myself a cup of coffee. I join him at the table.
When I do, I smile. “I’m so glad to see you alive, man,” I say, making him chuckle. He winces, holding his side again. Luckily, it was just a graze.
“I could say the same for you,” he says. “You disappeared yourself. But it’s good to have you back in Cape Hope, James.”
“Jamie,” I correct.
“Jamie,” he repeats, like I’m fancy. “You got taller,” he adds, looking me over. Noticing my eye. “Did Noa punch you in the face when she saw you again too?”
“Nope,” I tell him, taking a sip. “But she did steal and wreck my boat.”
“Oh no…” Ellis says with a laugh. “I would have rather taken the punch.”
“Same.” We sit quietly for moment, and then I look at Ellis again. “Are you sticking around?” I ask him point-blank. I don’t want anything to hurt Noa, and her brother leaving again would do just that.
“Yeah, I’m back,” he says with a smile. “How about you?”
“No place I’d rather be,” I say, meaning it.
“I’m glad to hear it,” Noa says, startling us both.
She walks out in one of my oversized T-shirts with basketball shorts, her hair an absolute knot of tangles, and smudges of smoke still dotting her face. She grabs a bottle of water and comes to lean against the kitchen counter, looking over at her brother.
“All right,” she says to him. “I know you already told the police, but it’s time for my version. Why did you abandon us like that?”
Ellis winces, looking down at his coffee cup on the table.
“I was trying to save the Surf Shack,” he says.
“When Dad told me about the loan with Mancini, I knew it would end badly. I couldn’t let that happen to Mom’s dream.
Felix and I… we put together a plan. We had to find the one thing Alessandro Mancini was scared of… ”
“The Starline Hotel,” Noa says, and he nods.
“At first we couldn’t find it,” Ellis continues, “but I knew time was running out to save the Shack. So Felix and I went to see him. Although we hadn’t found Rum Runner Island, we had a pretty good idea of where it was.
We faked it. We went to Mancini and told him we’d been there.
That he lied about the Starline, even though I had no actual proof.
Still, we demanded he rip up the loan and back off the people of Cape Hope.
He agreed.” Ellis shakes his head, throwing up his hands.
“Felix and I couldn’t believe it—Mancini actually agreed and had us sign NDAs. ” His expression falters.
“Too easy,” I say, and Ellis nods.
“Too easy,” he repeats. “A few weeks later, Felix came rushing down from the resort. He told me we had a problem. He’d overheard Mancini talking to the owner of the Sunset Docks. He asked one of his men to take me out. He told him to burn down the Surf Shack once I was dead.”
Noa shifts uncomfortably, horrified at the threat they were facing.
“What could I do?” Ellis says, looking over at her.
“I packed up and left, but there was nowhere to go. I didn’t have money, a place to stay.
At first, I’d camp out in the Everglades and Felix would bring me supplies.
We kept searching for Rum Runner, and then…
one day… we were out after a small storm and we found it.
We actually found the Starline Hotel. At that point, I had the leverage—proof it will still there—meaning Mancini lied to the cops from the start.
With that, it was time to renegotiate our terms,” Ellis adds.
“That wasn’t very smart,” Noa says, shaking her head.
“Clearly,” he says. “Felix went to him, and Mancini wanted to meet me in person. Seemed the safest place to do that was at the Starline.” He lowers his eyes. “We just… we underestimated him. It should have been me instead of Felix.”
“It should have been none of you,” Noa says immediately.
He shrugs like he’s not sure he believes her, and I feel for the guy. It’s a messed-up thing to lose someone, but having to witness it… I can’t imagine.
“I really thought it was almost over,” he says quietly. “And then… he killed him. I can’t tell you how much I miss him. I don’t even have those words. But I will say, I always planned to make Alessandro Mancini pay. I just had to find a way home first.”
“And what about the sheriff?” Noa asks. “What role did he have in this? Because he’s been really annoying.”
Ellis sniffs a laugh, a slight break in the grief.
“He did what he could,” Ellis says. “He didn’t know who he could trust in his department, so we decided it was best if Felix passed along my messages.
The sheriff knew I was alive, of course—I’d let him know that pretty quickly.
And he and Felix were trying to make arrangements to break the story, playing out different scenarios.
Sometimes they’d loop Dad in, but… I asked them all to keep you out of it, Noa. ”
“I wish you would have trusted me,” she says. “My life has been hell worrying about you, being gaslit by everyone. You should have just told me.”
“In the end,” he says, “I lost anyway. No matter how hard I fought, they took Felix from me. And Mancini made good on his promise to burn down the Surf Shack.”
“We’ll rebuild,” Noa says, coming to put her arm over his shoulders. “I’m just glad you’re home. I’m glad this nightmare is over. But next time you keep secrets from me,” she warns, “your eye is going to look worse than his.” She points at me, and the three of us burst out laughing.
And it feels good, even if it’s just a moment. A moment to feel real again inside all this tragedy.
As Noa and her brother continue to catch up, I smile, comfortable in the room. More comfortable with them than I’ve felt in my own home for a long while. Although the minute I think about that, I consider Astrid.
“I’ll be right back,” I tell them, and excuse myself back to my room.
Once there, I close the door and pull out my phone, my hands unsteady. It’s barely eight in the morning, but I know she’ll be up. She answers on the first ring.
“Why are you calling and not texting me?” she asks, trying to sound annoyed, but there’s relief underneath it, like she’s been waiting for me to reach out.
“Because I wanted to hear your cranky voice,” I answer, trying to sound casual. But as soon as the words leave my mouth, I feel it—a sharp, hollow ache in my chest, like something important is slipping away, and I can’t hold on. I sink down into the nearest chair.
There’s a beat of silence on the other end before she speaks again, her voice small and uncertain. “Mom wouldn’t tell me what happened last night,” she says. “But I saw the building on the beach burned down. Is that where you’ve been staying?”
“Yes,” I say simply.
“Did someone really set it on fire?”
“Yes,” I repeat.
“That’s so wrong,” she murmurs, and I feel a pang of guilt twist in my gut. She doesn’t deserve to be tangled up in this mess. She’s still a kid. “People around the resort are talking about coming down there to help clean up,” she says. “I’d come too, but we’re leaving today.”
The words land like a punch in my stomach. “What do you mean?” I ask. “Where are you going?”
“Mom said we’re heading to California for the rest of the summer to see Grandma and Grandpa. Wait…” Alarm creeps into her voice. “You’re not coming with us?”
I close my eyes. Of course my mother is running away from this. I’m too old to send away this time, so she’s the one leaving.
“No,” I tell my sister. “I’m sorry, Astrid. I’m not coming with you.”
I hear her inhale sharply, like she’s trying to hold herself together, but her voice breaks anyway. “Why?” she asks, and the question wounds me. “You said we’d have the summer together. You promised, Jamie.”
“I know I did,” I say quietly, hating myself for not being able to keep that promise. “I tried. I really did.”
She starts to cry, and it nearly breaks me. “Listen,” I say, trying to keep my voice steady. “I’ll come see you when you get back from California, okay? You can take me to the coldest lake you can find, and I’ll jump in first.”
I try to make her smile, but the words feel hollow. She doesn’t laugh. Not this time. Her voice is small and distant now, barely audible. “I’d ask you to promise,” she says, “but it doesn’t matter. You always break your promises now.”