Chapter 12.

12.

We were all still sitting there when Hugo, the man from the front gate, came hurrying over to Gerry with a tablet computer. “I’m sorry, forgive the intrusion,” he said. Gerry took a moment to read the screen and then tapped out a quick reply. “Thank you, Mr. Levinson,” Hugo said. “Enjoy your evening, everyone.”

He darted off into the night, and Tammy stared after him, utterly transfixed. “What a handsome man,” she said. “And such a mesmerizing accent. Is it Transylvanian?”

“Dutch,” Gerry explained. “But Hugo was actually raised in Congo-Kinshasa, after the country declared its independence from Belgium. He played a vital role in some of our business there. Now he’s semiretired and stays at Osprey Cove year-round. Looking after the property but mostly just relaxing. It’s incredibly peaceful here in the winters.”

“Ab-so-lute-ly,” Sierra said, stretching out all the syllables as if she was afraid of mispronouncing the word. She was slouched in her seat and absently twirling her long hair, well on her way to being drunk. I wondered how long she’d been married, if her father had attended her wedding, if any responsible adult male had played a role in her upbringing. The jazz trio went from “All of Me” to “The Way You Look Tonight,” and Gerry invited his wife to join some couples who were slow-dancing on the lawn.

Tammy stared fondly after them. “They’re so sweet.”

“You have to be kidding me. You’re actually okay with them? As a couple? Don’t you call yourself a feminist?”

Tammy sighed. “I used that word one time in high school and you’ve never let me hear the end of it.” Then she reached for her water glass. It was empty except for ice so she tapped some of the cubes into her mouth and gnashed them with her teeth. “I say, the heart wants what it wants. They seem happy.”

“You’re out of your mind. She’s barely finished high school and that guy’s older than Count Dracula. It’s disgusting. If I was her father, I’d be mortified.”

Abigail was bored with the discussion. She slumped in her chair and pulled her furry blue hood over her head and down past her eyes and nose. She whispered, “Meep-meep-meep-meep-meep,” for no discernible reason. I was glad Gerry and Sierra weren’t there to hear it.

A waiter breezed past and offered me another beer but I asked for water instead. I’d already had enough alcohol and it wasn’t doing anything to calm my nerves. Everything about the day had left me feeling unnerved. The conversation with Brody Taggart. The insane fifty-six-page privacy document. The swarm of spiders in my bedroom. My strange introduction to Gwendolyn. And then the conversation in Errol’s office—all his assurances that the picture of Dawn and Aidan was obviously photoshopped. I wished I’d kept a copy for myself; I wished I still had it, so I could show it to an expert and get a second opinion.

Elsewhere, across the lawn, Maggie was still flitting from table to table and personally welcoming every guest. But there was still no sign of her fiancé. “Where’s Aidan?”

“I don’t know. I haven’t seen him all night.”

“Doesn’t that seem weird?”

“You need to stop being so paranoid,” Tammy said. “You’re carrying on like he’s Dr. Cell Phone, but look around you, little brother. Open your eyes. This is a totally different situation.”

Abigail looked up from her book and grinned. “Who’s Dr. Cell Phone?”

“Maggie’s last boyfriend,” said Tammy.

“No, no, no, don’t call him a boyfriend.”

“His real name was Oliver.”

“But he wasn’t a boyfriend.”

Tammy shrugged. “I kinda think he was.”

“For how long?” Abigail asked.

“For never! That guy was a creep and a pervert and an absolute fucking degenerate.” I might have been shouting a little because Tammy clapped her palms over Abigail’s ears, shielding her from my outburst.

“Frankie, calm down,” she said.

“And you know what else bothers me? Where are Maggie’s friends?”

Tammy gestured out to the lawn. “These are her friends.”

“I mean her real friends. School friends. Girls from Stroudsburg.” I tried to summon their names from memory, but it was hard because Maggie had brought so few of them around to meet me. She claimed that my shoddy housekeeping embarrassed her; she was always wishing we’d move to a nicer house on a better block. “What about the girl who lived on the corner? The Indian girl with the lisp.”

“Priya Hattikudur,” Tammy said. “I think they drifted apart after high school, Frankie. But that’s normal. People develop different interests. Priya’s doing real estate with her parents.”

I understood that Maggie had chosen a different path for herself and now she lived in a different world—but I thought the point of a wedding was bringing everyone from your past together, so that people could celebrate your future.

“Instead of complaining about who’s not here,” Tammy suggested, “maybe you should go meet some people who are.”

She pointed me to a table full of young men and women and explained that they were Aidan’s groomsmen and Maggie’s bridesmaids. I went over to introduce myself and regretted the decision almost immediately. The chairs were full so there was no place to sit and I just had to stand there hovering while everyone introduced themselves. They all had exotic names like Bacchus and Mathilde and Tarquin, and I couldn’t hear the rest because the music was too loud. There was talk of skinny-dipping later, and all the women wanted our waiter to join, because they claimed he looked just like Jeremy Allen White. Listening to their banter was like wandering into a movie thirty minutes late; they were referencing people I didn’t know and things I’d never heard of: Slack, Chloé, Charli, Banksy, BeReal, Bad Bunny, NPCs, A24. I swear I’d never felt so old.

The woman closest to me was named Khalani. She was tan and pretty, with a starfish tattoo and long blond hair braided into ropes. She must have registered my discomfort because she encouraged me to move closer, then reached into her handbag for a tin of Altoids. She lifted the lid to reveal some two dozen gummy bears and encouraged me to choose one. “These are THC with a little extra wild card.”

“What’s wild card?”

Khalani whipped around her hair ropes and laughed. “Frank, you’re so funny! If you knew, it wouldn’t be wild. You just pick one and roll with it.”

I told her no thanks, and she shrugged before choosing an orange bear for herself and passing the tin to her neighbor. I watched the box of gummy bears go around the table, and everyone regarded it matter-of-factly, like a basket of garlic bread at the Olive Garden. Some helped themselves; others just passed it along. I’ve never really felt comfortable around drugs, so I glanced up at Osprey Lodge, just to have a place to look. At a window on the third floor, I glimpsed the silhouette of a person standing between two curtains and looking down at the lawn. With all the light at their back, I couldn’t discern their features—but the size and posture suggested a woman, tall and thin, with her hair pinned up.

Khalani saw me staring, then smiled up at the window and waved. “That’s Catherine Gardner.”

“How do you know?”

“It has to be. That’s her bedroom.”

“You’ve been inside?”

She nodded. “A couple years ago. She used to be a real mentor to a lot of us women. Such a shame she isn’t feeling well.” She continued waving, gesturing for Catherine to come downstairs and join the party, but the figure in the window didn’t react. It was so rigid, it may as well have been a mannequin.

I explained that I still hadn’t met her, and Khalani turned to me in astonishment. “But the wedding’s in two days! You’re kidding!” She placed a hand on my shoulder and gently pushed me in the direction of the lodge. “Go introduce yourself right now. Third floor, top of the stairs.”

“Errol said she’s napping.”

“She’s not napping now. Look at her! She’s wide-awake and dying to talk with you.”

I’d already seen enough of the lodge to know I could find my way to the third floor—but still I hesitated, afraid of doing something inappropriate. “I’ll wait for Maggie to introduce us.”

“She’s too busy. Trust me, Frank. Catherine’s a total sweetheart and she’ll be thrilled to meet you. Don’t be shy!”

I guess I didn’t need that much of a push. I knew I wouldn’t be able to relax until I met Catherine Gardner and properly introduced myself. So I stopped by the dessert table, arranged a small assortment of cookies on a plate, and walked up to Osprey Lodge. I retraced my route from earlier in the afternoon, through the massive front doors and into the house. The foyer was bustling with behind-the-scenes activity—lots of caterers wheeling boxes and trays to the refrigerated truck parked outside—so no one noticed me slipping inside and climbing the grand spiral staircase.

I paused on the landing where I’d met Errol Gardner and then continued to the third floor and a short darkened hallway. I waved my hand over the walls, feeling around for a switch, until motion sensors registered my presence and some lights in the ceiling flickered on.

I passed a bathroom and a kind of utility closet and a pair of darkened guest bedrooms before arriving at the final door. I gathered it was the master suite, so I screwed up my courage and knocked.

“Hello? Catherine?”

There was no answer. I knew there were probably multiple rooms in the suite and Catherine could be in any one of them; she probably hadn’t heard me. So I tried the doorknob but it wouldn’t budge. There was a Bluetooth sensor above the lock, and I remembered Aidan’s promise to me—he’d said he put my phone on the family’s network, so I could access all the main buildings. But even after I pressed my phone to the sensor, the door wouldn’t open.

I knocked again, louder, and this time I was answered by sounds of movement. Soft, rustling footsteps.

“It’s Frank Szatowski. Maggie’s father? I was hoping to introduce myself. If you’re up for having visitors.”

More silence. I was beginning to think I was talking to myself. But just before I turned to leave, I heard the quiet squeak of a floorboard. As if someone was standing on the other side of the door and watching me through the peephole.

“She’s not going to answer.”

I spun around and saw a young woman in a long green skirt and brown leather sandals. Aidan’s friend from art school, Gwendolyn.

“What are you doing here?” she asked.

I don’t know why I felt guilty. I could have easily posed the same question to her. Instead, I told her the truth: “I came to see Aidan’s mother. I wanted to introduce myself. See if she’s feeling any better.”

Something about my reply amused her. She smiled in a way that seemed gently mocking. “She’s not feeling better. And she’s definitely not going to open that door.”

“How do you know?”

“Ask your son-in-law.”

She turned and started down the hall, and I went after her.

“Wait, hold on, what are you talking about?”

“I’ll be honest with you, Frank. When I met you earlier this afternoon, I thought you knew what you were getting yourself into. But apparently you don’t. Because if you still haven’t met Catherine Gardner, then you don’t know anything.”

“Tell me. What do I need to know?”

She didn’t answer, just kept descending the stairs. I followed her past the second-floor landing and into a busy foyer full of catering staff.

“Gwendolyn, come on. Talk to me.”

She shot me a stern expression that clearly meant “Not here.” So I followed her outside into the night, past the large refrigerated truck and across the driveway. She walked into the darkness, heading toward a tall hedge of pine trees. Then she angled her body sideways and slipped through a gap, and I followed her into a small, private copse. She’d all but vanished into the night—but then a tiny orange flame illuminated her face as she lit up a cigarette.

“I followed you and Aidan this afternoon,” I told her. “I was listening outside his studio, but I couldn’t hear all the details. Why did he threaten you?”

“He doesn’t want Margaret to know what I know.”

“And what’s that?”

She shook her head and smiled sadly, as if to say, Nice try but not gonna happen . “My advice to you is: Take your daughter and get the hell out of here. Convince her to call off the wedding before any more people get hurt. Because something awful is happening here. You can feel it, right? Don’t you sense it?”

“Is this about Dawn Taggart?”

Gwendolyn took a long drag from her cigarette. “Dawn Taggart is the least of your worries. This is all so much worse than Dawn Taggart.”

She was being so damn cryptic I wanted to shake her. “Just tell me the truth.”

“You’d never believe me. I can see it in your face, Frank. You seem like a fundamentally nice person. You’re not ready to hear it.”

I yanked the cigarette from her lips, dropped it in the dirt, and stubbed it out with my shoe. “Listen to me, Gwendolyn. I’m not as nice as you think I am. I spent six months in the Middle East when I was barely out of high school. During this little thing no one remembers anymore called the Gulf War. And believe me: I saw things you cannot possibly imagine. So why don’t you just tell me your big scary secret?”

Gwendolyn’s face lit up with a harsh white glow—the narrow laser-like beam of a headlamp slashing through the night. Two guards dressed in black were off in the forest, trampling along a path on their nightly patrol. Gwendolyn stole an anxious glance in their direction and then lowered her voice.

“Tomorrow morning at eleven there’s a group hike. People are walking up to Cormorant Point. Tell them you’re not feeling well. I’ll come find you and tell you everything. But until then you need to keep quiet. Don’t mention this conversation to anyone.”

The guards were walking in our direction, and Gwendolyn slipped away without another word. One of the men shined his flashlight directly into my eyes.

“Mr. Szatowski!” I recognized the voice as Hugo’s. “You appear to have lost the trail. Is everything okay?”

With his cheerful demeanor and singsong accent, he could have been a kindergarten teacher addressing a classroom full of children.

“I’m fine. Just taking a walk.”

Surely he had seen me talking to someone—but he didn’t inquire who the person might be. He simply encouraged me to return to the dinner party so I wouldn’t miss s’mores on the beach. “There’s a beautiful bonfire going and all the young people are enjoying it. You should hurry and go now, before they run out of marshmallows.”