Chapter 32
It was done. The bookshop was ready for business, awaiting the grand opening on Friday—the day after tomorrow.
Rafe’s graduation would be Sunday—the all-terrain bike Maddie had ordered as his gift arrived that morning.
If Maddie had forgotten anything, so be it.
She was no longer a student, fearful of being graded as a shopkeeper or as a mom.
After scanning the shop for the one-hundredth time, she was pleased. Rafe had sent the sign—Kevin and Dave had already hung it over the front door, near where Arnie’s Bait a sheep was peering at her from a pasture, as if searching for a break in traffic. It was, however, surrounded by a fence and a gate that looked like it was locked.
“I’m not going to laugh,” Rafe said. “Instead, I’ll say good-bye so you can pay attention.”
“Good idea.” She told him she loved him and that she’d see him Sunday.
It then took every ounce of patience she had bottled up inside her not to stomp on the gas pedal.
Fortunately (or not) the swell of summer traffic had begun; more vehicles were on the road now than in January, some of which might be police cars in speed traps.
More important, bearing her baby in mind, she did not put Orson to the test.
When she finally reached the little lot behind the cottage, she grabbed the bags of scones, hurried down the slope, and in the back door.
Carefully setting the bags on the counter, she took a deep breath, then quickly went into her bedroom, found the carton of her mother’s memories, and riffled through them until …
She found it: Martha’s Vineyard High School Class of 1972.
She flipped through the pages until she reached the senior photos: A, B, C.
And there was Hannah Clieg, so young and pretty, her black hair thick and shining, her dark eyes sparkling, her whole face smiling, her image at eighteen forever captured in a formal studio photo that was anything but stuffy. Best of all, it was perfectly intact.
But as Maddie started to close the book, a photo on the page below her mother’s caught her eye: a blond girl with high cheekbones.
She wore a tailored blouse and a single strand of pearls.
Under the photo was the name: Evelyn Davis.
Evelyn, as in Brandon’s mother; as in her mother’s childhood friend. Who, no doubt, had the same yearbook.
She forced herself to eat Grandma’s herb-roasted chicken, not because she didn’t like it—typically, it was delicious—but because Maddie had no appetite.
However, the baby probably did. So she ate.
At least with Grandma chattering about the upcoming trip to graduation, Maddie didn’t have to talk.
Or try to camouflage the impact of having seen her mother’s photo.
She only needed to stop thinking about it and erase the possibility now in her mind that, for some unknown reason, Evelyn might have sent the notes.
Dinner took forever to finish.
“When one cooks, the other cleans,” was a routine Maddie had learned while living with her father.
As she stood at the sink, looking out at dusk, she supposed if she and Rex ever wound up living together, she’d have to resign to a permanent role of washing, rinsing, drying, because she’d never dare cook for him.
Rex.
Why hadn’t she shown him the notes? Was she honestly still trying to protect him from getting upset while he was recuperating?
But he was doing so much better. In fact, if he could find a way around his sister, he’d surely wrap up in a blanket and hide in Orson’s bed in order to be at Rafe’s graduation.
After drying the roasting pan, Maddie said sweet dreams to Grandma, who was toddling off to bed, and waited until she heard the bedroom door close. Then she dug the notes—and her phone—out of her purse, sat on the couch, and called Rex.
When he answered, she simply said, “I’m so sorry.”
“Oh, good,” he said. “I love it when someone other than me thinks they’ve done something they have to apologize for.” He always had a way of calming her, of restoring whatever peace she might have rattled. “So, what brought this on?”
“My mother’s picture.”
“Okay. Can you begin at the beginning?”
She pulled out all the notes. “The notes. I got another one, which makes five. They’re all written in block letters using a felt-tip marker.
” She read them to him, in the order in which she had received them.
She told him when each one had arrived and under which rock.
The only time he let out a sigh of frustration was when she added that the first one was left at his cabin, and the second at Grandma’s cottage on the day he left for California. “The others came to the cottage, too.”
He asked her to read them again. So she did.
Then she told him about the creepy phone call and about the night that he’d come home, how she was at the boat, hoping to see him, but hadn’t expected that he’d be in an ambulance, so when he texted her at 3:00 a.m., she’d rushed to the rehab center, but they wouldn’t let her in.
Then came the part about the vehicle that followed her up State Road, after which she told him about the second, breathing call the night he went into the ICU.
Finally, she told him about the day he’d been discharged, when she received the picture of her mother from the yearbook. She couldn’t bring herself to say that Evelyn might be involved.
“Jesus,” Rex said when she was done.
“The worst part was I thought someone had come into the cottage, found her yearbook, and cut her picture out. Thankfully, that didn’t happen.” She would have cried again, but talking to him helped her start to feel better.
“What did Ken say about that one?”
“He doesn’t know. It arrived after I’d given him the other notes; you were getting situated at Kevin and Taylor’s, and my mind was in a million directions.”
“Oh, Maddie,” he said softly.
They didn’t speak again for half a minute, maybe more.
Then he asked, “What year did your mother graduate?”
“1972.” She paused. “Why?”
“I’m wondering if someone in her class has a grudge. Maybe a guy she’d dated and was pissed when your dad came along.”
Maddie was stumped. “I have no idea.” But she knew it could be possible. “Should I tell Chief Lawrence?”
“Hold off on that. I’d like to see the yearbook first and hunt for a clue or two myself.”
“I don’t know when I can get it to you, what with the opening …”
“No need. There must be one stashed around here somewhere. My father was on the school committee for years; I’m sure there’s a bunch of yearbooks stashed somewhere in this house. At least it’s a place to start. Maybe I’ll find a prom picture of her with our note-writing guy.”
She smiled. “Mr. Winsted, I learn something new about you every day.”
“I know. I lead a fascinating life, don’t I?”
“More than mine!”
“Next thing I’ll tell you is that my father was on the school committee because my mother gave music lessons to the kids at school.
Did you know that before she married Dad, she played flute at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City?
No one ever figured out how he lured her to the Vineyard, though everyone agrees she was not happy here. ”
She frowned. “You’re serious, aren’t you?”
“Yes. Believe it or not, sometimes I’m capable of it.”
“And sometimes I think I’m going to have my hands full if our baby takes after you.”
“You absolutely will. Good thing I’ll be looking out for both of you.”
“Yup,” she replied. “Good thing.”