CHAPTER 8
Wilson Estate
Cliff Road, Nantucket
It was time to meet the Wilsons on their home turf.
Si gave me directions to his family’s “cottage” on Cliff Road, which overlooked the most stunning expanse of waterfront I had ever seen on this island or any other.
I admired the circular cobblestone driveway, the manicured lawn as lush as the putting greens at Augusta National, and a flagpole flying Old Glory, POW/MIA, and the Wilson family crest.
Si introduced me to his mother and went to get cleaned up. Connie Wilson was clearly happy to have her wayward son home.
She was a natural beauty with a genuine smile.
Like her husband, she was a fit, tan fifty-something with a few light streaks of gray in her hair, and looked like she’d stayed active with years of tennis and maybe some Tae Bo or spin classes, definitely a lap or two down at the club.
She wore a high-end version of the Nantucket summer uniform: red shorts, a white tee, and flip-flops.
We chatted comfortably, comparing favorite spots on the island, as Connie gave me a quick tour of their eight-bedroom place, which was as tastefully appointed as it was architecturally impressive. It had to have cost north of $15 million.
When we moved to the large veranda overlooking the Atlantic, Alan brought us each a beer in a green bottle. I liked that despite their clear wealth, the Wilsons were down-to-earth, beer-in-a-bottle kind of people.
Straightforward, no bullshitting around, right up the gut without a chaser, I sprang my plan on them.
I suggested that effective immediately, Si come work directly for me and CSTC until he went back to college in January. I explained a little more about what I did on a normal day, then laid out a timeline: In a few months, we’d take stock to see if he wanted to make a deeper commitment.
“Would he be carrying a firearm?” Connie asked somewhat nervously.
“After sufficient training he would be licensed to carry a weapon, but only if he traveled overseas with me.”
Alan was smiling. “I think it would be a great opportunity for him, Nat. Hell, I still remember going through airborne school at Benning.”
I’ll be damned. Alan Wilson, scion of the financial world, was a member of the Benning Boys Club.
To my relief, Connie was all smiles too.
When I mentioned that some of my team members were coming to the island this weekend, she went directly into party-planning mode. Before I knew it, a CSTC welcome-to-Nantucket party at the Wilson shack was on the calendar.
When I dipped inside, I encountered the youngest Wilson—a handsome devil now that he’d cleaned himself up. The peach fuzz was gone; his sandy hair was neatly combed; and he was dressed in a summer uniform much like his parents’.
I updated Si on his new job, which would officially begin after we fixed the drywall, rewired the garage, repaired some leaky faucets, and painted all the windows.
He smiled as brightly as his parents had out on the veranda.
Who knew what the future might hold? But maybe I had just hired the next Tristan Dent.
* * *
As Alan brought out a second round of beers, he pointed to another palatial estate farther down the beach and told me it belonged to Senator Coleman Harrison. “I can’t believe we’re neighbors with that asshole.”
Connie shook her head, smiled, and gave her husband an embarrassed look. “Nathan, my husband seems to have forgotten his filter this evening.”
“What, Connie? Coleman is without a doubt the most pretentious asshole I have ever met on this island—which is saying something. And he may be our next president.”
“Commander in chief,” I noted.
Alan gave me a look that reminded me I had promised to relate my ambush story to his wife. I hesitated. Telling a member of the Benning Boys Club a war story was one thing, but giving a blow-by-blow description of a firefight to Connie felt a little different.
I didn’t want Mother Wilson getting cold feet this early in the game.