The New Husband(79)

Ben looked confused. “Why does he care if she’s working?”

I laughed because I lived it and Ben didn’t, but still, he’d picked up on something that had never made sense to me.

“He says it’s because of me—I need my mom around more, I’m really fragile right now, and I need her full attention.”

“You seem to be doing fine,” Ben said. “More than fine. Like, you dealt with Laura Abel and all that stuff while your father was missing. That doesn’t make sense. Maybe Mr. Fitch thinks he should be the one to make all the money.”

“Maybe,” I said.

“But Seabury’s not cheap,” Ben added. “You’d think he’d be psyched your mom was making extra money.”

That was a head-scratcher for me, too. We all knew teaching wasn’t a path to riches.

“Could be he has family money,” suggested Ben.

“Possible. My dad said he was going to check into Simon. Maybe he did. Maybe he found out Simon’s rich and that’s why he wants me to make the peace.” I paused because something wasn’t sitting right with me. “But Simon has to rent out his house to afford ours,” I added.

A surprised look came to Ben’s face. “Really? That doesn’t sound rich to me. We have a ski condo that we rent, and it’s like a super-big hassle. My dad is always complaining about renters, cleaning, maintenance, all that stuff. If he had the money, he wouldn’t rent it to anybody.”

“Well, Simon rents his,” I said, not really seeing Ben’s point. “It’s got access to the lake and is close to skiing, so he says it’s filled up pretty much all the time.”

“How much is the rent?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” I said, annoyed now, because what did rent have to do with my father? “We don’t really talk about it.”

“You’ve been there?”

I nodded. “We went swimming there once or twice, back when he was getting ready to move in with us.” I pursed my lips together like I had sucked on a lemon.

“So you know what it looks like?” he said.

“Yeah. Sure.”

Ben went to work on my phone. “What are you doing?” I asked.

“Trying to figure out how much rent he gets,” Ben said.

“Why?”

“We’re trying to get a sense of how much money he’s got, right? So this rent, plus his job, minus what your house costs, should tell us something.”

I didn’t get a strong feeling that Ben knew exactly what he was talking about, because as kids we didn’t deal with money. Even so, it was an interesting exercise, so I went along with it. Ben had pulled up all the rental properties in Seabury listed on Airbnb, which was one of the websites his parents used to rent their ski condo.

I looked through the pictures from the search results, but none of them were of Simon’s place. He had a small ranch home with an attached garage and a nice green lawn. The listings here were cottages mostly, or places that looked like ski lodges, or extremely small houses that were right on the lake. Simon’s place had a short walk down a narrow path to a small rocky beach where you could swim or launch a kayak or a canoe, neither of which Simon owned.

“So, none of these?” Ben said, as he scrolled through the list again.

“No, none.”

Next, Ben checked out VRBO, another rental website he knew about. The properties here were similar, some were the same, but none were Simon’s robin’s-egg-blue ranch home. We checked Craigslist and a few other sites Ben found using Google, but again not one of them listed Simon’s home.

“Maybe he is rich,” I said. “I mean rich enough that he doesn’t have to rent out his place.”

“Yeah, sure,” said Ben, a bit absently, because he was thinking of something. “But why bother lying about renting it?”

I fell silent until a thought struck me.

“I don’t know why,” I said. “But I may know someone who might help us figure it out.”





CHAPTER 43


Unable to sit still, Nina paced the tiled floor in the main lobby of Lakes Region General Hospital, waiting for Ginny and Susanna to arrive. Ginny cried upon learning the horrible news from Nina. She was Dr. Wilcox’s patient as well, and Susanna had asked to join the quick noontime visit as a supportive friend.

She called Simon to share the terrible news. He stammered before he spoke—shocked, she thought, like everyone.

“So, she’s … she’s definitely going to make it?”

Nina found his phrasing odd. He did not sound hopeful, but more like he couldn’t believe it was possible.

“The doctors aren’t sure,” Nina said. “I’m at the hospital now. Ginny and Susanna are on their way.”

There was a long pause.

“Okay,” he said, lengthening the word as if in thought. “That’s just awful. I’m really sorry. Keep me posted, will you?”

Nina told him she would and said her good-byes.

As she waited, a recurring question spun a web through her mind, trapping her thoughts: Who would have done this? Was it a patient? Someone with a grudge? Or was it simply a random attack? Nina pushed aside those questions to focus on her friends. She realized it was the first time in ages that Las Tres Amigas had been together, but the grim circumstances made it a joyless reunion. They hugged, Ginny dabbing at her eyes, causing Nina’s eyes to fill as well.