“Is it true you knew nothing about this little scheme?”
He glared at his mother, then looked back to Maddie. “Not until I asked my mother if she thought someone might have killed Nancy.”
“I laughed,” Evelyn confessed. “I said, ‘Brandon, my darling son, I can’t believe you haven’t already figured out that this is a hoax.’ He’s been furious with me ever since. He said I could have put his license to practice law at risk because he lied to a client.”
Brandon interrupted. “To which she had the nerve to say if that happened it would not be so bad, because then Jeremy and I could move to the island and take care of her.”
“I was joking,” Evelyn added.
Then Maddie’s father stepped forward. “Nancy, it’s nice to see you again.”
The woman didn’t seem to recognize him.
“It’s Stephen, Nancy,” Evelyn said, “Hannah’s husband.”
Nancy offered an unsettled smile. He leaned down, placed his hands on her shoulders, and gently hugged her. Then he stood up and squared his jaw.
“While the two of you were being tended to,” he said, addressing her, “we concocted a revised plan. We decided it will be best for you and Maddie to stay at Rex’s cabin for now. Joe said he’d be pleased to have Rafe bunk with him; I’ll be at Evelyn’s for a short time. It will give me a chance to pick her brain about when she and Hannah were girls.” He drew in a breath, but managed to avoid getting misty-eyed. Which must have taken a great deal of effort. “You and Maddie will be able to get to know each other again. And we won’t be far away.” If he had any hard feelings about their decades-long estrangement, or the reason for it, he didn’t show them. Stephen Clarke, after all, was a consummate gentleman. “As for Rex,” he added, “well, he’ll be in Edgartown, where he supposedly lives.”
A few chuckles rose from the group.
“Thank you, Stephen,” Nancy said. “It sounds good. And . . . it’s nice to see you again, too.” Perhaps Grandma guessed that they’d both been at fault for not having put Maddie’s needs ahead of their own anger and sorrow.
But if anyone was waiting for Grandma to apologize for her rather large ruse, it didn’t happen. More than likely, she didn’t feel an apology was needed. She had done what she’d needed to do, and had not needed anyone’s approval. And who would dare say she was wrong? Her family was together again, just as she’d intended.
Then Rex announced he had to go to Edgartown because a large party was booked at the restaurant for that night, but he’d be back up-island the next day and stay next door in a vacant cabin. He added that he’d ordered lobster Cobb salads from MV Salads and an assortment of treats from Sweet Bites.
More food!Maddie thought with a laugh.
Joe said he’d pick up the goodies on the way back to the cabin; he and Rafe would then help Nancy and Maddie get situated, as if the women couldn’t manage on their own.
“I have a question,” Nancy said, and Maddie sensed the rest of them bracing themselves. “By any chance, is the tall boy who’s standing, half hidden, next to Stephen, my great-grandson?”
The air in the room relaxed, if air could do that sort of thing.
And Rafe cautiously stepped forward. “Only if, by any chance, you’re my great-grandmother.”
“Come closer,” she said. “Let me have a good look. You look like your great-great-grandfather Isaac Thurston, except for those blue eyes, of course. Isaac’s Wampanoag name was Walks with Thunder. If you stay here long enough, maybe you can earn the right to have that name, too.”
Rafe moved closer and smiled shyly. Maddie knew he was ecstatic.
Then Nancy said to Maddie, “As for you, you took the portrait of my father out of my storage unit at the airport, didn’t you? You put it on my mantel.”
Maddie grinned. “I did. He was very handsome, wasn’t he?”
Nancy gazed at Rafe again. “That he was. And so is this young man.”
“By God,” Joe said. “I thought Rafe looked familiar.” Isaac, after all, was his father, too.
Then everyone laughed again, and a young woman wearing a name tag came over and politely asked if they would mind moving their nice reunion outside the emergency department, where they wouldn’t disturb the other patients.
* * *
Brandon and Evelyn went home, ostensibly to get the guest room ready for Maddie’s father. Maddie expected that the real reason was so Nancy could spend time alone with her relations.
When Nancy, Maddie, Rafe, Joe, and Stephen reconvened at the cabin, they found a loaf of fresh bread waiting for them on the kitchen counter. It was wrapped in an embroidered tea towel and set inside a handmade basket. A note next to the basket read,So glad you’ve all had a happy ending. It was signed with severalX’s andO’s.
Maddie and Nancy left the meal preparation to the men; the ladies went into the living room and sat down. Maddie asked her if the basket on the counter was her work. “Of course,” she replied. “Which reminds me, did you find the rest of them in my storage unit?”
