“Asshole,” Kayla said. “I’d like to know what his agenda is.”
“Who is that guy?” Lindsey asked.
“John Gluckstern,” Kayla said. “Husband of my friend Val, the other woman who was with us at Great Point.”
“And he knows my mother?”
“He’s her banker,” Kayla said. “Believe me, his only interest in her is monetary.” They pulled up to the front of Antoinette’s house, next to the police car. A kid of about eighteen sat in the driver’s seat reading Rolling Stone. He straightened when he saw the Trooper; then he put down the magazine and got out of the car.
“Can I help you?” he asked. He was dark-haired and had some sore-looking acne on his chin. His name tag said JONATHAN LOVE. Officer Johnny Love. Behind him, the house was aflutter with yellow police tape, like a badly wrapped gift.
“Has Ms. Riley returned?” Kayla asked, though anyone could see the answer was no.
“No, ma’am. The fire department is still up at Great Point on the recovery mission.”
“I see,” Kayla said. “Well, Officer Love, this is Ms. Riley’s daughter, Lindsey. I brought her by to see the house.”
Johnny Love took a long, appreciative look at Lindsey. “No one can enter the house, ma’am.”
“So Mr. Gluckstern, the gentleman who was just here-he didn’t go into the house?”
“No. Mr. Gluckstern wanted to look in the window, and I did allow that.” Johnny Love pointed to the back deck. “If you stand on the deck, you can see into the bedroom. But no crossing the police tape. I would be in hot water if I allowed you to cross the police tape.”
“We don’t want to get you in trouble,” Kayla said. “But I think we’ll have a look. Did Mr. Gluckstern say what he was looking for?”
Johnny Love picked at his chin. “Something about his wife being a friend of Ms. Riley’s and her telling him to come out here and see for himself if he didn’t believe it. I figure there’s no harm in looking.”
“Yes, we just want to look,” Kayla said.
She and Lindsey stepped onto the deck, and Kayla ushered her toward the bedroom window. “Go ahead,” she said.
Lindsey cupped her beautiful hand around her eyes and peered in. “Ransacked,” she said. “As reported.” She straightened up and looked at Kayla. “Okay, so now what do we do?”
“What would you like to do?”
Lindsey turned toward the woods and took a deep breath. Her shoulder blades protruded through her pink T-shirt. “I’d like to know what’s going on here. I prepped myself for a lot of shit, you know, but not this.”
“I understand,” Kayla said.
“No,” Lindsey said, “I don’t think you do. I have a space, you see, right here-” she tapped her breastbone “-and that space needs to be filled. I need to see my mother. Only now I’m beginning to think this dream isn’t going to come true for me. Not today, maybe not ever.” She pronounced ever “evah,” and this small bit of street accent caught Kayla’s interest. She studied the girl. Lindsey was trying hard to keep it together-makeup, hair, clothes. Until now, she’d been acting like seeing Antoinette was simply a choice she’d made, rather than a burning desire. A way to fill a weekend, rather than a life-defining moment. But Kayla recognized her desire-no, her need-to see Antoinette. Just to meet her for a moment, to stand face-to-face, say hello, and touch-God, touch-the person who had given birth to her.
“You’re right,” Kayla said. “I don’t understand. I’m sorry.”
“Can we go to Great Point?” Lindsey said.
“That’s what you’d like to do?”
Lindsey pulled a clump of hair into her fist and held it so that it strained the skin of her forehead. “Yes,” she said. “Take me to the place where she disappeared.”
And so, fourteen hours later, Kayla made the same trip she’d made the night before: first to Antoinette’s, then to Great Point. It wasn’t a bad idea- the police might have missed something in the dark that would be clear now that it was two in the afternoon.
Because it was Labor Day weekend, the parking lot by the Wauwinet was crowded with happy beachgoers: rental Jeeps and trucks crammed with children. Someone else was playing her radio station loudly; Eric Clapton’s “Wonderful Tonight.” Kayla wanted to separate herself from their frivolity, but she had to let the tires down. She jumped out of the Trooper with the gauge. She saw the tires were plenty low-they hadn’t been refilled from the night before. One good thing. But then the gatehouse attendant motioned for her to stop.
“I have a sticker,” Kayla said. “And my tires are already low.”
Another teenager, with a brown ponytail and bangs, serious looking in her dun-colored uniform with her clipboard. “I need to advise you that the fire department is conducting a recovery mission off the end of the Point,” she said. “We lost someone last night.”
Lost someone.
“We know,” Kayla said. “Thank you.”
Even under the circumstances, it was impossible to find the ride out to Great Point anything but beautiful. The white sandy beach, the Rosa rugosa in its final bright pink bloom, the harbor on one side dotted with sailboats, and the ocean on the other, the seagulls, and the distant figure of the lighthouse. Kayla wasn’t surprised when Lindsey caught her breath and said, “Wow.”
“There’s a map in the glove compartment,” Kayla said. “I’ll show you where we’re going.”
Lindsey pulled out the map, and Kayla pointed to the spit of land sticking out into the sea. It was daunting to see how isolated Great Point was-surrounded by water.
“Why did you go swimming out here?” Lindsey asked. “It seems kind of reckless.”
“It was your mother’s idea,” Kayla said defensively. “A long time ago. Twenty years ago. We drove out here in the middle of the night, and it’s been a tradition ever since. It’s not reckless because we’re careful. We’re good swimmers and we understand the water. And Antoinette is the best swimmer of the three of us. How she got swept away, if she got swept away, is a mystery to me.”
“What was she like before she went into the water? Was she okay? Was she upset about seeing me? Did she want to see me?” Lindsey’s neck splotched. “I can’t shake the feeling that it’s my fault. That Antoinette, you know, chickened out.”
Kayla touched Lindsey’s arm. “It wasn’t you, Lindsey. It was me. I said something that upset her. And after I said it, I thought she was going to take the car and drive away. But instead she held her arms in a circle, like she was holding a ball, and she danced into the water.” In fact, something about the dancing bugged Kayla. It had seemed so, well… so staged. Like she’d been planning it.
“You said something to upset her?” Lindsey asked.
“She was upset because I… “ This felt reckless- confiding the truth in someone she barely knew. It was like stripping off all her clothes and letting Lindsey see her naked. But the poor girl deserved as much of the truth as Kayla could give her. “I accused her of sleeping with my husband.”
Lindsey fingered the hollow at her throat. “Oh, God,” she said. “So you’re telling me that you upset my mother, and then she went swimming in this dangerous water.” She let her window all the way down, and they both watched the waves sweep up onto the beach. The water didn’t look dangerous at all-it was blue-green, crystal clear.
“The fact is, Lindsey, your mother was hiding something.”
“Oh, really?”
They passed other cars that had made camp- beer, sandwiches from Henry’s, boom boxes playing Kayla’s station (Lynyrd Skynyrd, “Free Bird”), umbrellas, shrieking children. Before Ting, Kayla and Raoul had enjoyed days at the beach just like this with their kids.