“He only went because Taylor decided not to,” Maddie heard herself say.
Grandma stood, stared into the fire for a moment, then said, “Huh.” She took a step back. “Well, time for my nap.” She shuffled off toward her old bedroom without removing her coat.
Maddie took a mug out of the cabinet and wondered why she felt uneasy. Was her intuition trying to tell her that something was going to go wrong? Then she realized it wasn’t her intuition that had poked her. It was a slice of envy.Because Annie Sutton apparently had enough money to risk so Rex could get the Lord James.
But as she stood, waiting for the water to boil, she vowed she would not let Grandma’s offhanded comment ruin the day. Rex would or would not return alone—Maddie couldn’t control his movements or his intentions. Sure, they’d had fun together and he bought her a nice bracelet for Christmas and she knitted him a throw, but that didn’t mean that he owed her. Unlike Grandma, Maddie would mind her own business. And, right then, that was to try and figure out how to run a bookshop. Because tomorrow she had to show up at the town hall and sign her life away, or rather five years, which was the length of the lease.
She’d created an attractive workspace for herself in the bedroom—a nook with a corner desk and a view of the water. Right then, however, sitting by the fire seemed more important. So Maddie trotted to the bedroom, grabbed her laptop, and returned. When the tea was ready, she set her mug on theend table and curled up on the sofa, wrapping her great-great-grandmother’s warm blanket around her legs. Then she put her computer on her lap, opened it, and googledHow to open a bookstore.
Every article started by listing costs: inventory, construction and fixtures, signage. Instead of becoming bogged down by money, she began skimming articles and extracting interesting points: how to choose the books, unload the cartons, and “receive” the inventory (a computer job); how to shelve the books and keep track of what was where (another computer job). And, hallelujah, there was software for everything except for how to open the cartons and take the books out, which she was fairly certain she could manage. She could also manage to learn new technology; she’d readapted many times, as the college often updated systems while upgrading methods to disseminate information, conduct online classes, and more.
She tried not to wonder what the heck she should do about teaching now. She’d only committed to conduct one online class in the coming spring semester; she now hoped it would be her last.
Opening a new file, Maddie organized her list while being grateful that Rafe wanted to be involved, especially by helping her learn an accounting program. Her father could have done it, but she couldn’t count on him now. The reality of that was stinging, but she was determined to stay the course.
The flames in the fireplace crackled and popped while she cut-and-pasted countless tips and tricks. And though her back was aching and her neck was stiff from hunching over the keyboard, she wasn’t discouraged by her “stuff to know” and “stuff to do” lists. When she started to waver, she closed her eyes and said, “I can do this. Yes, I can.”
Then her phone rang. Unfortunately, it was still in her purse, which now hung from the doorknob of the coat closet in the hall. Hoping it was Rex, she untangled her legs, ran tothe hallway, and dug it out. Caller ID said the caller was unknown, but that didn’t stop her. There were lots of people on the island who weren’t yet in her contacts list.
“Hello?” she asked, breathless from her dash.
At first there was no answer.
“Hello?” she said, more loudly.
There was breathing.
But no answer.
Thenclick, a hangup.
Maddie moved her phone from her ear and stared at the screen, as if doing that would tell her who the caller had been and what they’d wanted. Then a chill as cold as the January wind outside shot up her spine.
Which felt an awful lot like her intuition. And not the good kind.
Maddie wondered if she should call Ken Lawrence.
But she didn’t—couldn’t—know if the bullying notes and the anonymous call were even connected.
Nor was she sure if Ken was the right person. As a registered Wampanoag now, Maddie wondered if she should call tribal headquarters first. She could ask Joe if that was the protocol, but then she’d have to tell him everything. She’d have to tell Grandma, too, because she’d blow her stack if Maddie shared something with Joe that she hadn’t told her first.
In that moment, all Maddie knew was that standing at the coat closet in the hallway, staring at the dark screen of her phone, would get her nowhere. So she retreated to the living room, sat back down on the sofa, and fixed her eyes on the dwindling fire. She supposed she should get up, go outside, and fetch more logs from the stack in the backyard so the room would be nice and warm when Grandma roused from her nap. But moving from the hall back to the couch had depleted her energy.
She wanted to believe the call was a mistake. That someone, somewhere, had plugged in a wrong number and, not recognizing the voice, had rudely hung up.
It was plausible.
Wasn’t it?
There was, of course, the breathing. It wasn’t the heavy stuff of an obscene call, though it had seemed deliberate. Not that she would know the difference. She struggled to assess the situation.
First the notes.
Now a call.
Was the same note-writer trying a new method to scare her? Unfortunately, Maddie did not believe in coincidences, though many times she wondered why not. Like when she’d wanted out of her marriage, and Owenhappenedto fall in love with his now society wife. Or when she’d been second-guessing getting a PhD as a middle-aged woman without teaching experience, and a position at Green Hillshappenedto become available, and shehappenedto become the leading candidate for their tenure track. Or, most recently, when shehappenedto overhear the conversation about Arnie’s Bait & Tackle thathappenedto be down the hill from the cottage, and Rexhappenedto know people at the town hall …
She blinked. She wondered if the fire in the cottage that relocated Grandma and her across the harbor to Rex’s cabin had also been a coincidence.
