Pearl laughed. “I’m working the reception, thank God.” It was infinitely better to arrive after the ceremony was over; you didn’t want to be within a mile of the tents with the wedding planner, Meriwether, and the mother of the bride all swarming around, sniping at one another about floral arrangements and seating plans. Meriwether was already in a snit over preparations for the upcoming formal ball and charity auction; club members were donating antiques and passes for all-day boat tours of Frenchman Bay faster than anyone could keep up with them. Seeing Dad and a couple of other groundskeepers lugging massive carved armoires or boxes of carnival glass past the dining room windows on their way to the storage building had become a regular occurrence.
Pearl studied Dad over her juice glass. His eyes were red from the six-pack he’d killed last night, but otherwise, he seemed okay, complaining about familiar things that had always been in their lives: the tight-ass club, management breathing down his neck. An outsider would never know he’d been called into a closed-door meeting this spring with General Manager Gene Charbonneau and the board to discuss the Garrison incident, and how exactly they were supposed to continue to put their trust in him. After fifteen years with the club, Dad had been made to beg for his job. Few people would blame them. Even after the state police chief came out to say that the killings had all the earmarks of being an isolated incident, and that the murderer had almost certainly left the area, people were scared. If there was no arrest, you just didn’t know. It could happen again.
“How about we hit North Beach after supper one of these nights?” Dad said suddenly, and Pearl glanced up. “We haven’t been out there yet this year. Might be some good glass.”
“Yeah, absolutely. Anytime.” Beachcombing on North was a summer tradition for them. The currents around the cove made for some unique finds. Pearl had done some research online about rare sea glass colors; she’d found both purple and aqua on North, not to mention a scalloped white that looked like it might have come from an antique serving dish.
Down the hall, her ring tone trilled. She went to her room and picked up the phone, reading Bridges Spencer on the caller ID. She stared, the scrambled eggs she’d eaten doing a lazy loop-de-loop in her stomach. Two more rings. Her voice mail would pick up in a second. She answered.
“I didn’t wake you up, did I?” He sounded casual. “What’re you doing this morning?”
“Not much. Breakfast.”
“Listen, I have to head back out to the island. Thought you might want to come along.” At her hesitation: “It’ll be just us. Akil doesn’t get out of bed until noon.”
It wasn’t Akil whose gaze had left her feeling harrowed and raw last night, who she’d proceeded to read online articles about until she could barely keep her eyes open. From the kitchen, Dad called good-bye, and the front door shut. She leaned across the mattress, parting the curtains to watch him go down the steps to his truck. To her right and left spanned her collection, mason jars of shells and sea glass lining her windowsill, beachcombing treasures she and Dad had collected over the years. More jars of glass—mostly common colors, green, brown, and clear—sat on her desk, catching sunlight. “I’ll bring coffee,” Pearl said. “Twenty minutes?”
After the disconnect, Pearl retrieved her tablet, looking at the article she’d left open last night. Curtain up on act two of the Garrison tragedy.
By Christmas Day, Tristan had been found. It took that long to locate his cell phone number, provided by some member of the Garrisons’ household staff back in Greenwich. State police took him into custody at the Sugarloaf Mountain Resort, a three-and-a-half-hour drive from MDI. On the evening of the twenty-third, while his family was dining at the club, he’d driven his BMW through the snowy dark to stay with a friend from Yale whose family owned a condo near Sugarloaf’s Burnt Mountain Road. According to Tristan, there’d been a disagreement at his house: he’d wanted to spend the holidays skiing, his parents wanted him to stay home. He’d left at the earliest opportunity.
Pearl exhaled steadily. Here was Tristan’s senior photo from the Brunswick School, unsmiling, yet not without a certain sardonic implication. Gold crest on his blazer, school tie of brown, white, and gold. Accelerant used. Autopsies revealed that Garrison, his wife, and two of their three children were each shot in their beds multiple times with a semiautomatic handgun before the fire was set. Tristan’s hands, folded one over the other on a polished mahogany rail, a photographer’s prop. Oldest son in custody. Person of interest. Under suspicion.
It was a blindingly sunny day, the brisk wind raising whitecaps across the surface of the harbor. A banner advertising the Centennial Celebration Regatta, cosponsored by the country club, flapped against the railing of the yacht club’s waterfront deck.
This time, Pearl saw Bridges first, bent shirtless over a tangled line on a small two-seater powerboat. She thought of last night, the taillights of Tristan’s boat fading into the darkness, leaving her behind. Where did you go after that? Where in hell did you three go?
She came up behind him and cleared her throat, watching him snap around. “Good thing I wasn’t a bear.” She held up a big Coleman thermos. “As promised.”
“Whoa. That’s old school.” He took it from her, sniffed under the lid. “Something tells me you brew it strong.”
“Might put hair on your chest.”
“Finally.” They both smiled, relieved; the kiss could go unmentioned. “Hop in.”
“Where’s your other boat?” As she stepped into the cockpit, his hands briefly found her hips, guiding her down, another unnecessary touch that she let slide.
“Still at the island.”
“Tristan didn’t bring you back for it last night?” She stared. “Somebody could’ve stolen it. Stuff like that happens all the time in the summer.”
“Tristan doesn’t think like that.” Looking uncomfortable, Bridges started the motor. “Buckle up.”
This morning, Little Nicatou was back in the hands of nature. There were a few stray beer bottles on the beach, but the coolers, chairs, and fire pits were gone, cleared away by somebody other than Bridges, obviously. Pearl thought of the servant in the cottage, then tried to remember how she’d disposed of her own bottle last night; she couldn’t.
The Talon was still moored at the dock where they’d left it, bobbing with the pull of the tide. Bridges was on his feet before the engine died, straining to see. “Looks okay.”
“Except for the metric ton of gull crap.” As they approached, Pearl took the wheel, which Bridges seemed to have forgotten. She brought them about, then made a soft sound. “Looks like your friend Quinn left you a love note.”
Manwhore was written in lipstick across the entire length of the starboard side. Cursing, Bridges tied off and clambered into the Talon.
Pearl went up the ladder and down the dock, giving him some privacy while he tried to clean up.
She walked along the beach toward the boathouse. It was more impressive in the daylight, with steps that led up to a sitting area on the battlemented roof. The year 1922 was carved into the cement over the doorway. She walked into the shadowy recesses, discerning shapes that turned out to be fragments of rope, dried seaweed pods. Who knew what Tristan had seen in the dust?
Pearl walked out of the boathouse and onto the sand, blinking as her eyes adjusted to the light. Her gaze landed on a crumpled foil square by her feet.
In the same instant that she realized it was a condom wrapper, she felt Bridges standing behind her. She jerked around.
He was looking at the wrapper, too. He shifted slightly, lifting his gaze to her. “It’s not true, you know.” When she stared, flushing, he gestured back to the boat, where manwhore had become a five-foot-long burgundy smear. “Quinn’s crazy.”
“Okay.” Her toes curled against her flip-flops.
“I brought the coffee. If you still want it.”
She nodded, grateful to move. She sat on the lip of the boathouse floor, swinging her feet, willing herself not to be the kind of girl who got flustered, whose whole body blushed.
They drank cups of Dad’s Folgers and watched the tide. Gulls had dropped mussels and clams on the rocks, shattering the shells to dig out the meat; iridescent fragments were everywhere. “I’m surprised Akil missed this.” She cleared her throat, took a sip. “I thought you guys were grafted.”
“I’m a morning person, he’s not. He’ll have to get his ass up next Saturday, though.” At Pearl’s look: “For the regatta. Race starts at ten a.m. Are you going?”