God knows that was true. But a Cat Three? Dionis carried their bowls to the sink and ran some water into them. We’re responsible. For all of it. “What about Northern Light? Is anyone still out there?”
“How would we know?” he joked. “Not like they’re paying us to keep tabs on them. We’re too low-rent, Di.”
Northern Light was Tuckernuck’s showplace, shockingly new. It commanded twenty acres and eleven thousand square feet. Seven bathrooms, a wine cellar, and personal gym. A media room and restaurant-grade kitchen; three terraces for entertaining; a swimming pool fed with saltwater, piped up from the ocean. A three-bedroom guest cottage. A helipad, and a horse barn tucked up against the solar array that powered the place.
Nothing like it had ever been seen on Tuckernuck, and the owners didn’t mix with anybody else on the island. Todd Benson was a star NFL quarterback. He and his supermodel wife, Bianca, flew in their friends and staff on helicopters when they wanted to party.
Northern Light had an electronic gate across its quahog shell drive—the only graded driveway on Tuckernuck. Dionis hadn’t been able to get near the door with her flyer yesterday. She and Jack weren’t the estate’s caretakers; the Bensons hired their own people for maintenance. They owned their own powerboat, too, and ran it back and forth to Nantucket’s restaurants and clubs at will. But it was Jack who’d brought the Bensons’ two palominos, Honeybear and Afterglow, across Madaket Sound on his barge the previous June. Bianca Benson liked to ride bareback along the sand in a bikini. Todd liked to photograph her while she rode. Jack and Dionis had met the horse trailer and groom at Jackson Point and delivered them safely to the electronic gate.
Dionis hadn’t seen any of them since.
“I hate those dicks,” she said now.
“Di.” Jack’s voice disapproved.
“They have no sense of history. No idea where Tuckernuck comes from, or why it’s precious. They just want to gut the place for their own pleasure.”
“I left a message about the hurricane with Todd Benson’s personal assistant in New York.” Jack lifted his hands in a gesture of helplessness. “It’s the only contact number I’ve got.”
“And?”
“She texted me back. Said it was all good—the Bensons have no plans to fly in this weekend.”
“What about the horses?” Dionis demanded. “And that woman who takes care of them?” What was the groom’s name—Mandy? Maddie?
“Must’ve hired some other barge to float them off,” Jack said carelessly. “Certainly didn’t hire mine.”
“Dicks.” Dionis paused. “So—not our circus, not our monkeys?”
“Exactly,” her father replied.
Howie Seitz changed into jeans and a Cisco Brewers T-shirt before heading to Stop & Shop that evening. Over the past two days he’d felt the hurricane turn its head slowly and bear down on Nantucket as unswervingly as a heat-seeking missile, sweeping everything from its path. He had gone from door to door through half-deserted neighborhoods, ordering the holdouts to evacuate as soon as possible, and directed traffic for hours in front of the Town Pier, where boat owners were still hauling vessels out of the harbor. He’d stacked walls of sandbags around the diesel substation that would probably be inundated within hours. Taken last-minute first-aid training at the fire station, with an emphasis on CPR. Set up cots in the high school gymnasium, and blocked off all the parking areas that were sure to flood on New Whale and Water Streets.
He was yawning his head off now and wanted nothing more than to sack out in front of his TV. But tonight, along with the rest of the island, Howie needed to buy bottled water, batteries, beer, and sandwich meat. That and a few bags of chips should get him through the duration. He circled the Stop & Shop parking lot for ten minutes before finding a parking space for his battered Nissan. Everyone was hunting groceries before Nantucket’s roads were too flooded to navigate.
Howie lived in a one-bedroom apartment over a garage off New Mill Street, not far from the Quaker cemetery—a caretaker’s quarters, behind a summer home that was currently empty. The owners figured an off duty cop made a great tenant. He had only three windows, but hadn’t had enough time or daylight to board them up yet. Maybe tomorrow, he thought. If there was any plywood left at Marine Home.
He’d parked his shopping cart in front of the market’s deli counter and was checking his cell phone, one hand in the pocket of his jeans, when somebody touched his shoulder. He turned and stared straight into Dionis Mather’s dark blue eyes.
“Nice haircut,” she said lightly. “I wasn’t sure it was you.”
“Hey, Di.” He tucked his phone away, feeling heat rise suddenly to his chest and linger there. You look tired, he wanted to blurt out. Are you sleeping okay? But he said only, “How you doing?”
“Fine. You?”
“Fine, I guess.” He shrugged. Lonely, actually. Pissed as hell, to be frank. Still wondering why you ghosted me. Overhead, the supermarket lights swayed, and acoustic ceiling tiles lifted in a sudden gust of wind. Howie and Dionis both looked up.
“Man. Weather’s crazy, right?” he said.
“Yeah.” She met his eyes. “This is, like, the twelfth time I’ve been here for supplies in the past thirty-six hours—when I’m not out in the middle of Madaket. Wind’s already hitting thirty knots on the water. Skiff’s getting harder to control.”
Howie understood, suddenly. “You and Jack tying down Tuck’s loose ends?”
“We’ve gone through a lot of hammers and nails. Boarding up windows and sliding glass doors. Tomorrow, we have to get the last few clients off. And cross our fingers.” She held up her palms, which were swollen and red. “Mine are shot from lifting plywood.”
Howie took her right hand in his and gently smoothed the palm. “Wish I could help you.”
Dionis drew her hand away. “I’m sure you’re just as slammed.”
He laughed, harshly. “I spent the day being ordered around by a buddy. Scott Tredlow. He’s the PD’s emergency management coordinator—and man, does he like to coordinate.”
“I know Scott.” Dionis mustered a smile. “He called my dad to ask who was left out on Tuckernuck. We told him we had it handled.”
“Remember his name, in case you don’t.”
“I will—if things go to hell, and I need help.”
Howie was about to tell her that the only name and help she would ever really need is his, if only she’d see it, but said instead, “Get those last folks off as soon as possible. This storm’s path is looking pretty unpredictable. First, they were saying landfall would be Rhode Island, now they’re saying they’ve got no idea, but it could hit here and by then it’ll be a Cat Three. The Coast Guard issued a small-craft warning this afternoon—”