Amos asked, “You think they had a hand in this?”
“Somebody sure carried a grudge.” Zia kicked at the rubble. “Where was I?”
“Forensics,” Noah replied.
“Right. We’re calling it at least two perps, one strong enough to do this number with their ax. Then they tossed in a pair of compression grenades. Took out these interior walls, cracked the flooring, demolished the kitchen and the main bedroom and bath. All the windows. Boom. Probably assumed that would be enough to breach the hull. But this lady, I’m telling you, it was builtstrong.Which is when they brought out the shotgun. Bing bada-bong, then we think they motored away in their own launch.”
Amos asked, “Witnesses?”
“Nada. First alert came from the Beach Patrol. Boat was resting in eight feet of water. . . .”
Zia’s voice gradually faded into the background. Noah still heard him. But mostly he was now focused on . . .
The wreckage was massive. A gritty waterline stained the furniture and walls. Even so, the longer he surveyed the craft, the more certain he became.
When he looked up, he discovered both men were watching him. He declared, “I’m pretty sure I can repair this.”
Amos said, “Told you.”
Zia said, “You want, you can probably buy this for scrap. That’s the official estimate. Might have a couple of local yards bidding for parts. Engines have less than a thousand hours on them. They can be cleaned up. The rest . . .” He waved a hand at the damage. “I had a word with the auctioneer. Nobody else has registered an interest.”
Noah walked forward, taking in the two ruined master cabins. Shattered baths. So much rage. So much futile fury.
But now he was seeing something else. Standing there in the entry to what once had been a magnificent bedroom suite. Looking inward more than out. Seeing what it might mean. Take this ruined craft, rebuild it.
Try to do the same for his own life.
CHAPTER3
Eight years earlier
The bulky envelope had arrived four days ago. Jenna Greaves signed for it on her way to start another twenty-six-hour stint as a surgical nurse. She had been fully licensed for only six and a half months, and already she felt like she had been wearing the surgical blues for two lifetimes. The work was splendid, but the resident surgeon responsible for Jenna’s operating theater was a louse. Jenna hated the woman, and she suspected the doctor felt the same.
She opened the envelope on her first break, assuming it was just more of the endless stream of documents she’d been dealing with since her mother’s death eleven months earlier. Instead, Jenna found herself surveying a sheaf of pages that completely and utterly upended her world.
As a result, Jenna basically floated through the rest of her shift.
Afterwards she drove home, showered and slept and woke and went for her run. Returned and showered again. Made coffee. Ate breakfast. Reopened the envelope. Read the document more slowly. Taking her time. Trying to absorb.
Her desk overlooked the rear garden of the only home Jenna had ever known. Two and a half weeks earlier, she had listed it with an agent. Even with her mother’s things taken by Goodwill, the house remained far too full of old shadows. Jenna entered her mother’s former bedroom only to dust and vacuum. She spread the documents over her desk. She paced.
Time and again, Jenna returned to the pages. Wondering what she should do.
When the living room was creased by another sunset glow, defeated by all the mysteries and questions the documents had created, she picked up her phone and texted.
The response came lightning fast.Finally, was all the message said. Following that was a Zoom link.
Ten minutes later, they were face-to-face. Sort of.
The stranger, a woman her own age, said, “I know, it’s a kick, right?”
“We’re half sisters?”
“I prefer to think of us as twins. Only with different mothers.”
Jenna took her time, inspecting this woman. The words that best described Millicent Weathers were “old before her time.” Wiry black curls laced with silver threads were bound to her narrow face, like they were somehow shaped by the same frenetic energy there in her dark eyes. Defying the bruised and fragile cast to her features. Behind her, the padded handles of a wheelchair rose above her shoulders. “How did you . . .”
“Oh, I’ve always known. My sweet mother loved nothing more than throwing the fact of your existence in Daddy’s face.” Small, birdlike hands flitted about as she spoke. “Their endless quarrels punctuated my nights. Until Daddy had enough. And paid the price for his infidelity in the divorce settlement.”
