You’re not the only one he speaks to, she’d wanted to say. There are hundreds of Elvis sightings every day. He’s probably “speaking” to those lunatics, too. Rather than escalate a fight with no end, she’d pushed out her chair, scooped out the remainder of her cereal into the sink, and dropped her bowl into the dishwasher just as Jacob, Jewel-Anne’s only full brother, strolled into the kitchen without a word, found a toasted bagel, and walked out the back door, his backpack slung over one thick shoulder. Once an all-state wrestler, Jacob, with his curly red hair and acne-scarred fair skin, was a perpetual student who owned every electronic gadget imaginable. He was a full-blown computer geek and as strange as his sister.
Now Jewel-Anne, with her straight, waist-length hair and trusting, so-sincere blue eyes, didn’t have to utter a word but Ava knew she still believed she had a special connection to the King of Rock and Roll. Oh, sure, Elvis speaks to Jewel-Anne. Even in nonliteral terms, Ava doubted they had even the most tenuous of connections and quickly took the stairs two at a time.
Why should she worry about her own sanity when she was living with a group of people who, at one time or another, could have been certifiably nuts?
CHAPTER 2
The lights flickered twice as Ava stood under the hot shower spray. Each time darkness flooded the bathroom, she tensed and placed a hand on the tiled shower wall, but fortunately the power didn’t go out. Thank God. That was the problem with this island, which was set off the coast of Washington with no access to the mainland except by private boat or a ferry that ran twice a day to Anchorville, weather permitting.
It had been a haven for her great-great-grandparents, Ava knew, who had settled here, commanded the largest chunk of real estate, and somehow, through logging and sawmilling, had made a fortune. When other people had settled on the island, Stephen Monroe Church had offered them lumber and supplies and, more importantly, jobs.
Ava had always wondered about the population back then. Why leave the comfort of the mainland? What had the settlers been running to . . . or, more likely, from?
Whatever their reasons, they had helped Stephen and his wife, Molly, construct this grandiose home, complete with three sets of stairs, three floors above ground (not counting the attic), and a basement now used for storage and Wyatt’s wine cellar and Jacob’s apartment. Built in the Victorian style on one of the highest points on the island, Neptune’s Gate had nearly a three-hundred-and-sixty-degree view from its westerly turret, which rose over a widow’s walk. Hence it was a house of windows that winked and caught in the summer sunlight. This time of year, though, with the fog and rain, sleet and hail, the refracting rays were few and far between.
Scrubbing with lavender soap and some guaranteed-gentle shampoo, she washed the salt and grime from her skin and hair, letting the soothing water calm the fear that split her soul—fear and confusion about her son.
What had she been thinking earlier?
Noah hadn’t been on the dock.
It was just her willing, weak mind playing tricks on her, vestiges from her dream remaining to confuse her.
Yet the image of him standing in the rising mist, teetering on the edge of the dock, eerily real, still stayed with her.
It’s been two years . . . let him go.
She rinsed off, thinking that her son would be four years old now, had he survived.
Tears filled her eyes and her throat grew thick. She turned and faced the nozzle, letting warm water wash the damned tears away.
By the time she’d dressed and combed the tangles from her hair, she felt better. Rested. No longer balanced upon a mental precipice.
She was just walking out of the bathroom when she heard a tap on her bedroom door. “Ava?” her husband’s voice called softly as the door opened.
“I thought you were in Seattle,” she said.
“Portland.” His smile was thin, his features marred with worry, his sandy-colored hair rumpled as if he’d been forcing stiff fingers through it.
“Oh. Right.” She’d known he’d driven south. Wyatt’s client was from Seattle but had real estate holdings in Oregon and had some kind of lawsuit leveled against him.
“Doesn’t matter.” Wyatt stepped closer to her, and she tensed but didn’t back up, not even when he brushed an errant curl off her forehead, his fingertips warm and familiar as they