18

TABITHA

It was late afternoon on the Fourth of July, and I’d been driving all day. New Hampshire to the Hamptons on a holiday weekend was slow going—especially when you needed to pull into random gas stations at intervals to throw up in their bathrooms. The sleeve of saltines and two-liter bottle of water that I’d brought along for nourishment were long gone by the time I hit the outskirts of Southampton, and my whole body shook with fatigue. It wasn’t safe to keep driving. I needed to find a place to stay. I’d take a nap, have something to eat, and gather my strength before I tried to find Connor.

I drove around for a long time. All the affordable motels had NO VACANCY signs, which shouldn’t have come as a surprise. This trip had been doomed from the start. Dropping in on Connor unannounced on the Fourth of July was a terrible idea—one I never would’ve entertained had I not been desperate. I’d Googled “Windswept” and gotten his address—correction, Nina’s address—but I had no real plan, other than walking up to the front door and knocking. Nina would probably sic the dogs on me. Hell, she probably knew I was coming. I had a sick feeling that I was being followed again, though not by the Suburban this time. I’d noticed the same nondescript brown Ford Fiesta with New Hampshire plates behind me at several points during the drive, though it wasn’t there now. Maybe it was a coincidence. But the New Hampshire plates had me worried it might be Derek.

My body was stiff from hours of driving and I was on the verge of tears when I finally spotted a motel with a VACANCY sign. The Ocean Vista had a parking lot full of potholes and a sad-looking swimming pool that backed up to the road. There was zero view of the beach, but Google Maps said it was a twenty-minute drive to Nina’s house, and I wasn’t likely to do any better. I parked by the office and got out of the car. The air felt heavy and smelled of rain. Thunder rumbled in the distance. Inside the office, the humidity was thicker than outside. An air conditioner buzzed, unable to keep up with the oppressive heat. A man in a turban sat behind the counter talking on a cell phone in a language I didn’t recognize. Finally, he hung up.

“I saw you have a vacancy. How much is a room for the night?” I asked.

“Two hundred and thirty-nine dollars.”

“Really?”

I winced. That was nuts for this place.

He shrugged. “It’s July Fourth. You’re lucky I had a cancellation. You won’t find another vacancy between here and Montauk.”

He was probably right. Anyway, I didn’t have the strength to keep looking. I handed over my debit card.

In the room, I collapsed on the bed and pulled scratchy covers over me that smelled faintly of cigarettes. Fatigued like nothing I’d ever known, I was asleep instantly. When I opened my eyes again, it was dark out. Feeling dazed, I went to the bathroom and splashed water on my face. At least I looked better than I felt. My eyes were bright, my hair was shiny, and spots of color burned in my cheeks. I’d brought a duffel bag with a change of clothes. I traded my crumpled jeans and T-shirt for black pants and a sleeveless black top. They were basic, from Old Navy, but serious enough for this daunting venture. With flats and a swipe of lipstick, I was as ready as I’d ever be to find Connor and tell him my news.

Just my luck—the storm that had rumbled in the distance all afternoon reached the motel as I stepped out of my room. The first fat drops fell, splatting on my bare arms and making me shiver. As I ran to my car, the rain became a deluge. I dove headfirst into the Toyota, already soaked.

The car smelled rank after the long drive. So much water sluiced down the windshield that I could hardly see out. It was like driving through a car wash. As I turned the ignition, a crack of thunder exploded close by. In the glare of the headlights, the driveway was a boiling cauldron, drops hitting the ground with such ferocity that they bubbled back up. Rain pounded the roof. A bolt of lightning split the sky, followed by a loud clap. The orange light on the dashboard reminded me that I was nearly out of gas. I’d wind up stranded on the side of the road before I could even find a gas station. I couldn’t go back into my room without getting drenched, and these were the only clothes I had. I turned off the car engine and waited.

Desperate as I was to talk to Connor, I didn’t feel safe driving in this mess. After ten minutes passed with no letup, I called an Uber. Surge pricing was in effect, forty-six bucks for a twenty-minute ride, my food budget for a week. But if I didn’t do this now, I’d chicken out, and go back to New Hampshire without ever telling Connor about the baby.

The Uber arrived, and I ran to it. The air-conditioning was on full-blast, giving me goose bumps in my damp clothes. The driver was an older guy with gray hair, wearing heavy cologne. The pregnancy had increased my sensitivity to smells, and the cologne combined with the pine-scented air freshener hanging from the rearview mirror made me gag.

“I took lot of people to this party tonight. Some I recognized from TV,” the driver said.

“Party?” I asked.

“You’re going to Windswept, right?” he said, gesturing at the destination on his phone. “To that celebrity party.”

Shit. Nina Levitt’s annual Fourth of July party. How could I forget? I’d been reading about it in the gossip columns for years. Since Connor hadn’t mentioned holding it this year, it had slipped my mind. This was a freaking disaster. No. Wait. It was an opportunity. A stroke of luck. Hundreds of people got invited to this thing. I could slip into Windswept with the other guests and walk around unnoticed, looking for Connor.

I finally had a plan. For the first time since setting off on my journey, I felt hopeful, even glad that I’d come. I’d never been to the famous Hamptons before, and I craned my neck from the backseat of the SUV, ogling the ritzy surroundings. We were now ten minutes from Windswept, cruising through the downtown. The sidewalks ponded with rain. Red-white-and-blue bunting and American flags hung limp and sodden from every quaint storefront. But even in this weather, the town managed to look storybook gorgeous.

Then I noticed that the driver kept glancing in the rearview mirror.

“What are you looking at?”

“Same car behind us the last ten minutes, making all the turns,” he said.

With a jolt of fear, I twisted around to see. It was that Ford Fiesta again. Its headlights glared at me, and its windshield was obscured by rain, so I couldn’t see the driver. To spend several hours at my motel, get in an Uber, and find the same car behind me? No way that was a coincidence. Someone was following me.

“Is it the paparazzi? You’re famous, right? An actress? Yeah, I recognize you,” he said.

“I wish. Can we lose him?”

“Why? You know this guy?”

“I have no idea who that is. It’s just creepy.”

“Ah, he’s probably just on the same Google Maps route as me. Happens all the time. The phone takes you a weird way, and everybody else goes that way, too. Look, he just turned off. Gone now.”

True, the car was no longer behind us. I wanted to believe that meant it hadn’t been following me, but that seemed unduly optimistic. I kept checking behind us, waiting for him to come back.

“Wait, I got it now. You’re a model, right? To show up so late, you gotta be someone special,” the driver said.

“I’m nobody. I’m late because of the rain.”

“This late, they might not let you in. An hour ago, I took somebody else, and the front gate was already closed,” he said.

“There’s a gate?”

“Of course. And guards checking names off the list. High security for a party like this.”

How could I not have reckoned with Nina Levitt having security? What if I got caught trying to crash? Connor might find out. He’d think I was trailer trash. I looked ahead, straining to see the houses. The rain was letting up, but the street was dark and parked up heavily with cars on both sides. Fabulous cars—Porsches and BMWs and Mercedes, every last one beautiful and new. I couldn’t see the houses. On either side of the road, high walls blocked my view. When the Uber’s headlights shined on them, they looked like they were made of leaves.

“Where are the houses? Are those—walls?” I asked the driver.

“Hedges. They got tall hedges around the houses out here, so nobody can see in.”

“Windswept, too?”

“Part of it, yeah.”

“If the gate’s closed, and there are hedges, how will I get in?”

“Is there a number to call, on your invitation?”

“I forgot my invitation at the hotel.”

He glanced at me suspiciously in the rearview mirror. “It’s not a smart idea to crash.”

“I’m not crashing,” I said, but my voice sounded like a guilty child’s, and the driver wasn’t fooled.

“You crash, they’ll arrest you for trespassing.”

At that, I blanched. When he saw the look on my face, he stepped on the brake.

“You should get out here,” he said.

“Please. Take me to Windswept. I’m paying for the ride. What happens after that is my problem.”

“No, look, I was young once, too. I get it, you want to have a good time. You won’t get in the front gate if you’re not on the guest list. But the beach is right there.”

He gestured. Between the parked cars lay a narrow, sand-covered path. As the moon broke through the clouds, I saw the wide swath of empty beach beyond.

“You can walk down the beach to Windswept. It’s maybe five minutes on foot. Sneak into the party the back way,” he said.

That was probably wise. Not only so the guards at the entrance wouldn’t ask to see an invitation, but so Nina—who, I had to assume at this point, had seen a photo of me—wouldn’t spot me.

“You’re sure it’ll work?” I asked.

“No. But it’s worth a try. Anyway, you get caught, you didn’t hear it from me.”

I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to tip, but as a waitress, I erred on the side of caution and thrust a ten at him.

“I promise. Thank you.”

Hot, sticky air enveloped me as I stepped from the air-conditioned SUV, and I instantly started to sweat. The rain had subsided to a light drizzle, but the road was a mess, mired with standing water and dotted with potholes. At the entrance to the sandy path, I took off my shoes and carried them. My feet sank into the wet sand with every step, making it an effort to walk. The narrow track sloped downward to the beach, between two picturesque fences made of weathered wood. At the end of the path, I stepped out onto the beach, gasping at its eerie beauty. The grand sweep of sand ran for miles in either direction, suffused with a strange yellow light from the hidden moon. The rain had stopped, but the surf was high. Waves crashed onto the sand, the wind rushed, and gulls cawed overhead. The beach felt utterly wild, and yet at regular intervals stood fabulous mansions the likes of which I’d never seen. Shingled manors, embellished with turrets and gables, with lush lawns, pools, tennis courts, outbuildings. I stumbled along, drinking in the sights, unable to believe my eyes, or to comprehend that Connor lived here.

I heard Windswept before I saw it, in the low roar of conversation and laughter, the sound of dance music floating on the wind. Up ahead, the land arched out into the water. Following the beach around the bend, I came upon Windswept, and stopped in my tracks.

I knew it from photographs, of course. The house is famous. But to see it in real life was to understand its magnitude for the first time. It wasn’t just a beautiful mansion, like the others along this stretch. It was a palace, fit for royalty, built of brick and stone made to last a thousand years. And it belonged to Connor’s wife. How could I think he’d give her up for me, when that would mean giving up this kingdom?

Whether he would or not, we had a child coming. And he needed to know.

I walked on. A hundred feet ahead, people milled on the beach in front of Windswept. Guests from the party, presumably—beautifully dressed, holding cocktails, out for a stroll now that the rain had stopped. Above their heads, a sweeping stone terrace was surmounted by a tent large enough to hold a three-ring circus. Noise and music emanated from inside. That’s where the party was, and where I’d find Connor.

A man in a dark suit stood by the terrace stairs. A couple of guests walked up to him. He stopped them and spoke to them briefly before letting them pass. This must be the security that the Uber driver had warned me about. As I walked toward the house, the man’s head tilted in such a way that I knew he was looking in my direction. As an unaccompanied woman coming from the far end of the beach, I was a plausible candidate for a crasher. He stepped away from the stairs and looked up and down the shore, but the casual nature of the surveillance didn’t fool me. He was checking me out while pretending not to. I didn’t know what to do. If I tried to go up the stairs, he’d intercept me, like he’d done with the others.

The security guard was staring at me now. He left his post and started walking in my direction. My heart pounded. The Uber driver thought they might be arresting people for trespassing. Was I on private land here? I had to get away before the guard intercepted me. To my right, a brick footpath, narrower than the path I’d taken to access the beach, turned upward and ran alongside a manicured lawn. It must lead back to the street. I turned onto it and kept walking, afraid to look over my shoulder. There were footsteps behind me. I sped up. The footsteps did, too.

“Sir! Stop right there, you’re trespassing,” a man shouted.

Sir? Yes, it was dark, but with my long blond hair, it was odd that he’d mistake me for a man. A scuffle broke out behind me. What the hell?

“Let go of me, asshole! I’m with her.”

At the sound of the second voice, the hair on the back of my neck stood up.

Derek.

I heard the soft thud of a punch, followed by a grunt, and whirled to see the security guard and Derek in a clinch. Derek stared past him, looking right at me. The rage in his eyes made my blood go cold. That must’ve been Derek in the Ford Fiesta. He’d followed me here from New Hampshire. It wasn’t me who’d attracted the guard’s attention on the beach a minute ago. It was Derek, with his jailhouse fade, clad in gym shorts and a tank top that showed off his bruiser body. He’d been right behind me as I walked toward Windswept. With the waves crashing, and the soft sand, I hadn’t heard his footsteps.

And was that Derek all along, following me in the Suburban? Had he actually tried to kill me? Thank God for that guard. It was plain, dumb luck that he’d stopped Derek before he grabbed me. They were evenly matched. Gritting his teeth, the guard pushed Derek back into the bushes. Derek got his arms loose and started pummeling the guy’s ribs. They grappled, toppling over into the grass.

I wasn’t sticking around to find out how this ended. I ran.