“Mom.”
“What?”
“Did you tell Jane she couldn’t have your car just so she’d have to ask you for a ride? And then you could invite yourself in and meet Charlie?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she replied defiantly. Then she added, “Charlie doesn’t even own one store. Annabelle ownshundreds.”
Lizzy closed her eyes. “I appreciate your dedication to the success of Lux Leggings, Mom, but the storm is set to hit us in just a few hours. Jane could get stuck here. Charlie’s car isn’t four-wheel drive. If it rains more than three inches, Lily Pond Lane will flood, and then she’ll be stuck.”
“Well then, I guess we’ll kill two birds with one stone, won’t we?”
“What are you talking—” Even as the words left Lizzy’s mouth, her brain made the connection, recognizing the signature Joanne Bennet plot just under the surface. “Oh my God.”
Mrs. Bennet hummed, barely disguising her self-satisfaction.
“Mom.”
“Hm?”
“Please tell me you’re not purposely stranding your daughter at a stranger’s house during a hurricane.”
“It’s not a hurricane. It’s a tropical storm.”
Lizzy frowned. “I’m concerned that the only thing you find wrong about that statement is the category of the impending storm.”
Another tut. “Stop being so dramatic.”
“What if it’s worse than expected? Then she’s stuck—”
A tittering laugh filled the line. “Trust me, everything will work out. Just you wait.”
“Mom—”
“Lizzy, your sister is so introverted she’s almost a hermit. Now, you have your way of dealing with that and I have mine. M’kay?”
There was a peal of thunder in the distance as Lizzy watched her sister disappear inside the front door. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad, she rationalized. After all, the storm might already have been downgraded to a tropical depression. By the time it arrived, they would probably see a little rain and that would be it. She had nothing to worry about.
CHAPTER 10
Will couldn’t remember a storm that bad in years.
He tugged a gray T-shirt over his head as he descended the glass-and-steel staircase. Charlie’s house was still quiet, with the watery morning light only just beginning to bleed through the wall of glass on the far side of the room. The storm had passed, but the lingering clouds left a sobering reminder behind.
Normally, Will would have canceled his weekend trip out east and ridden out the storm alone at his apartment in the city. But thanks to a series of construction delays, the Montauk house was still without a roof, so he knew he had to take matters into his own hands. He flew out yesterday morning, landing just before they began to cancel flights. By the time he had finished ensuring his house could withstand the beating, he drove down the coast to East Hampton, arriving just before Montauk Highway flooded and made the journey impossible.
When he got there, Will had been surprised to find Jane Bennet in the living room, sitting alongside the Pierces as they all watched a meteorologist motioning to a radar covered almost entirely in red. Soon every road that led to the house was closed, which meantJane was stuck there for the night. But while Charlie couldn’t have been happier about the situation, Jane seemed hesitant. Not that Will thought she would have been overjoyed, but there was a reluctance there that nagged at him.
Then the power went out.
Will found some candles in a kitchen drawer, while Vivienne and Annabelle found two bottles of wine. They downed them over the course of an hour, singing every top forty song they’d downloaded on Spotify between swigs. Thankfully, by ten o’clock both their phones had died.
“Oh, my phone is almost out of battery, too,” Jane had said, staring at her glowing screen.
Vivienne’s head popped up from the sofa. “What if all our phones die?” she asked, her words slurred. “What if we’re stuck here… forever?”
Will took that as his cue. He stood up, ready to excuse himself to the blessed solitude of his room upstairs, when Charlie piped in from where he sat with Jane by the fireplace.
“We should get Lizzy’s number before Jane’s phone dies, don’t you think, Will?” he asked.
