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“I mean,” Amy paused, “that Mac and Truman would be the ones making the call. They’d be the ones initiating the takeover. For their own business.”
“They’d be doing it because of me,” Kelsey countered.
“Maybe partly.” Amy set the pickaxe down and crouched to tug at the stump. “But they clearly have their own history with the Prescotts. Their own scores to settle.”
Kelsey helped her sister pull, feeling the wood begin to give way. “That doesn’t make it right.”
“No, but it also means it’s not entirely on your conscience.” With a final heave, they freed the gnarled stump, falling backward from the effort. Amy laughed, raising her dirt-covered hands in triumph. “Victory!”
Kelsey smiled despite herself and retrieved their wine glasses from where they’d set them. She handed Amy hers, and they clinked them together in celebration. “To conquering stubborn obstacles.”
Amy settled onto a nearby garden bench. “If Mac and Truman did ruin Jason…”
“Yes?”
“What happens when Mac sails away? When Truman…” Amy gestured in the direction of the old man’s cottage on the other side of the estate. “When he’s gone?”
Kelsey’s stomach tightened. “What do you mean?”
“I mean,” Amy said carefully, “that their protection is temporary. Mac’s made it clear to you he’s leaving once his grandfather passes. If they destroy Jason now, who’s going to protect you when they’re gone? The Prescotts have been in Boston society for generations. Even if Jason’s broke, he still has connections, influence. You’d be facing a vengeful man with even more reason to go after Noah’s inheritance—but alone, this time.”
The realization hit Kelsey like a punch. “I hadn’t thought of it that way. But you’re right. It would just postpone the problem, maybe even make it worse.”
“Not to mention,” Amy added, “if Mac is truly going to sail away and leave all this behind, what’s to stop him from using this takeover power for himself? They both care about you, sure, but business is business.”
“I don’t think they’d do that,” Kelsey said, though a seed of doubt had been planted.
Amy shrugged. “Maybe not. But my point is, any solution that depends on their continued protection is temporary at best.”
They sat in silence for a moment, the crickets beginning their evening chorus around them. Amy brushed dirt from her jeans and stood to retrieve her tools.
“You know what you need?” she said suddenly. “A permanent solution. Something that doesn’t depend on Mac or Truman to stick around.”
“And what would that be?” Kelsey asked, helping her gather the garden implements scattered over the ground.
“I have no idea.” Amy grinned. “But that’s what sisters and wine are for. To figure these things out together.”
As they walked back toward Amy’s cottage, Kelsey glanced over her shoulder at the massive silhouette of the mansion against the darkening sky. Its empty windows watched them, keeping century-old secrets in its silent halls.
The island suddenly felt smaller. Its boundaries confined more than protected, the surrounding ocean less a buffer against the outside world than a keeper of the island’s own dark history and the mournful ghosts that still kept watch.
“I still think it’s weird how much Truman’s wife wanted this place,” Amy said, following her gaze. “What could have happened here that made her so determined to keep it empty?”
“I don’t know. But maybe her dementia had a part in it after all?”
Amy gestured toward the overgrown gardens she’d been working to restore. “This place has such potential for use. It’s just a shame to leave it. I wonder what will happen to it after he dies?”
Kelsey rolled her eyes, she’d heard her sister’s ideas on this place so many times that it was old news, but she still couldn’t suppress a shiver as they passed a particularly tangled section of garden that hadn’t yet been cleared. Something about the dense undergrowth seemed almost deliberately concealing.
“Come on,” Amy said, looping her arm through Kelsey’s. “Let’s finish this wine inside where it’s warmer. And we can strategize about how to keep Noah without relying on billionaire ex-boyfriends.”
“He’s not my ex,” Kelsey protested automatically. “He’s not even my boyfriend.”
Amy’s laugh echoed across the garden. “Keep telling yourself that, sis. Keep telling yourself that.”
As they walked away, Kelsey caught a glimpse of Amy’s little dog with a bone in its mouth. Clearly, she’d been digging in the dirt near a corner of the garden, revealing the edge of something pale and curved beneath the earth.
More roots for Amy to tend to for certain.
