Page 1 of Wildwood

Chapter 1

The porch light is out when I arrive home. Again. It’s always going out. Something about a loose wire. Normally, it would simply annoy me, and I’d grumble about it to my husband, vaguely insinuating it’s his fault, though I know it’s not. But today, arriving home to darkness, with an enormous cardboard box in my arms, my bag overstuffed and digging into my shoulder, it feels like the dead light bulb is mocking me. Like it simply couldn’t be bothered to hang on for one more day.

And so I drop the box, which contains sad relics of my professional life—half-used notebooks, a half-dead plant, half-read books on data analytics—and lean my head against the door. It’s fine, I tell myself, breathing deliberately. It’s going to be fine.

I allow myself a few minutes of this, a quiet interlude in the dark. Then I sigh and pull out my phone to use it as a flashlight. There’s a message from a colleague. Former colleague, to be precise. The message simply includes the barfing emoji and a link to a YouTube video, which I’ve already seen, yet I can’t help but press play.

A man with strategically disheveled hair, wearing a sports coat over a white T-shirt, is walking through a crowd of reporters. He slides on a pair of expensive-looking aviators before getting behind the wheel of an expensive-looking car and driving away. The banner reads “Alex Bromley settles for $100M in fintech company’s fraud scandal. No admission of guilt.” I stare at the screen for a moment, after the short video ends, as though there has to be something more to the story. All employees let go with generous severance! Alex Bromley forbidden from leading future businesses! But no, the video just rolls into an ad for car insurance.

I had been a data analyst at FiPlan, Alex Bromley’s financial technology company, which for years had been a darling of the investment world, until it was revealed that the unheard-of returns clients were promised never in fact materialized. The whole company was officially shuttering, and today we were abruptly informed that we should not come back to work tomorrow. But Alex Bromley will be fine. The court of public opinion will move on, and he’ll find a way to woo Wall Street and go on to the next big thing. Men like him always do.

Frustrated, I shove the phone back into my bag and fish around for my house key. Yes, Alex Bromley will be fine. Most of my former colleagues will be fine. They’ll have good stories to share at the bars tonight and will network their way into another gig before the week is over. But it’s different for me. Unlike most of my peers at FiPlan, I am not wealthy and well connected, and I am nine weeks pregnant. My husband, Topher, is completing his fellowship as an emergency room doctor, and while he’ll eventually make good money, for years he’s been bringing home meager student paychecks. So, we have some savings but no real safety net to fall back on.

Cry, I tell myself. I’ve been on the verge all day, my face prickling with anger and embarrassment. But now, of course, the tears don’t come. I shouldn’t be upset if I’m being honest with myself. The job was rather soul crushing and I had contemplated quitting nearly once a day. But still, I wish it had been on my terms and not as part of a very public scandal. The urge to call my mother and talk to her about this is palpable.

Finally, my fingers grasp the key and I jam it into the keyhole. I slide the box out of the way with my foot, no longer caring about the contents, and grab a stack of envelopes from the mailbox before finally stepping inside. Hugo, our German shepherd, greets me at the door with his usual unabashed enthusiasm. He jumps and delicately puts his enormous paws on my chest, leaning in for a nuzzle.

“Hey there, Bubbah,” I say, scratching his head. Hugo has been our baby for five years. I wonder how he’ll adjust when the human baby arrives. “Let’s get you a treat.” I kick off my shoes and give Hugo a biscuit, which he takes with such relish you’d think he hadn’t eaten the same snack every day for five years. God, I love this dog.

I stand in the kitchen for a moment, simply staring off into space, hand absentmindedly stroking Hugo as he leans against me. Normally, my home feels like a sanctuary, cozy and welcoming. But lately I can feel the walls closing in. The room that will be the nursery is going to be cramped, barely big enough for a crib and changing table. The paint in the kitchen is dirty and scuffed and the dishwasher clogs on a regular basis. And, of course, there’s that damn porch light.

How are we going to raise a family in this place? And what are we going to do for money? Topher is still paying off enormous medical school bills, and we took out a big mortgage for this condo in Cambridge. So now I’m faced with the daunting prospect of finding something new before my belly begins to show. When I’d texted Topher this very concern earlier in the day, he’d tried to comfort me. Wouldn’t it be illegal for employers to discriminate based on pregnancy? But what’s legal and what actually happens aren’t always the same.

Hugo licks my hand and wakes me from my reverie. I make a cup of peppermint tea and begin to pick through the mail, tossing advertisements for maternity wear directly into the recycling. How do they already know I am pregnant? It’s uncanny.

I hear my cell buzzing in my purse and pull it out. It’s a number I don’t recognize coming from Newfield, Vermont. Newfield sounds vaguely familiar, but I silence it, assuming it’s some sort of spam, and continue flicking through the remaining items. I am half-heartedly scanning an L.L.Bean catalog when my cell lights up a second time, the same 802 area code flashing.

“Hello?” I am curt, expecting the telltale pause followed by the staticky accented voice.

“Hello, I’m looking for a Ms. Elinor Leighton?” The voice is warm, older, and male.

Pulling my gaze away from the catalog, I say, “This is she.”

“Ah, Elinor, I’m so glad I was able to track you down. My name is Matthew Warnick. I’m an estate planning attorney, and I’m also the executor of the will for Mr. Ezra Bishop, your great-uncle.”

Ezra Bishop? It takes me a moment to process the name. I haven’t seen Uncle Ezra since I was a young girl.

“I’m afraid I have sad news, which I realize I might be the first to convey. Mr. Bishop passed away about a month ago. Cancer. Did you know this?”

“No. I . . . no.” I feel a pang of guilt that this stranger is telling me of Uncle Ezra’s passing, but then again, who else would have told me?

“My condolences then. I apologize you are only just learning of this now. I had a bit of trouble tracking you down, given your name change and the fact that your great-uncle’s family is rather scattered. Anyway, I got to know Ezra a bit over the years, and he was certainly an impressive man.”

He pauses, as if waiting for me to chime in with my own expressions of admiration or love, but when none come, he continues, “As you know, he never had children of his own, and you’ve been named a beneficiary in his will. It’s a bit complicated so perhaps we can schedule a time for you to come to my office and we can go over everything in person?”

Considering I no longer have a job, a drive up to Vermont actually sounds fantastic. But I’m feeling a little raw after this dumpster fire of a day, and I realize I don’t have any evidence that this caller is who they say they are. I don’t want to end up scammed out of the little savings we have. I walk quickly into the bedroom to grab my laptop, which, against all advice, sits on my bedside table.

“Can you remind me of your name?”

He repeats it and I flip open the Mac to look up his information. As I type, I say, “It’s a bit of a drive and we live outside of Boston. Is there any way you can give me some detail now?”

“Well, the long and short of it is that your uncle has left you the family estate, Wildwood, as well as his investments.”

The sentence hangs in the air. It takes me a moment, but an image comes to me whole. Wildwood. The rambling property I used to visit as a child. Suddenly, I can see it. A sprawling farmhouse, a sugar shack, a skating pond, fruit orchards, endless woods to explore.

“Hello? Did the line get dropped?”

“No . . . I . . . just a moment.” My throat feels dry as I glance at the computer screen. I see the website for Warnick LLC located in Newfield, Vermont, and the contact information matches the number on the line. At least that much checks out.