45. Hiding in Plain Sight
Hollis drives the Bronco home as fast as she can without attracting the notice of Kevin Dixon or any other Nantucket police officer.
I met you with Matthew in Atlanta, Electra said.
The words Hollis has overlooked until just now are in Atlanta. How would Electra have known Gigi lived in Atlanta? It wasn’t written anywhere
on the itinerary.
They were together, Electra said.
Maybe Gigi left the restaurant, fled it, because she’d been caught.
Matthew and Gigi?
When had Gigi started posting on the Corkboard? Six months before Matthew died? Nine months? Had Gigi endeared herself to Hollis on purpose? Had she commented so often in order to get Hollis’s attention?
Did this explain why she came to Nantucket?
Hollis replays the things Gigi said on the beach: The man I was with… we weren’t married and we didn’t have children together. But in a way, that makes it harder. I don’t have much to hold on to now that he’s dead except my memories. Had she been talking about Matthew? Hollis thinks about Gigi studying their family photos in the library. And then there are smaller, sillier things: Gigi asking who faked their orgasms; Gigi wanting to hear the story about how Hollis and Matthew met.
Hollis hits the gas. The wind lifts her hair like a cape, and her eyes water behind her sunglasses. She’s going to spin out and wind up dead herself, but she can’t get to Squam fast enough. Electra is a poison—but as the ponds and fields of Polpis Road rush by, Hollis becomes more and more convinced she was telling the truth.
Matthew and Gigi. It sickens her. Hollis confided in Gigi! Hollis described how she and Matthew had quarreled before he left for the airport and then how she’d had breakfast with Jack. Gigi had seemed like a safe spot for Hollis among all the dramas of the weekend.
The twist: Gigi is the drama.
Hollis wants to scream. She does scream, at the top of her lungs, into the bright Nantucket afternoon. She screams a profanity over and over again, stopping only when she sees two women riding their bikes on the Polpis Road path.
The two women are Blond Sharon and her sister, Heather. Sharon comes to a sudden stop, and Heather nearly runs her over.
“Whoa!” Heather says as she veers out of the way. Sharon laughs.
They’re like a female Abbott and Costello.
“Was that Hollis Shaw who just drove by screaming the F-bomb?” Sharon says.
“She was probably singing,” Heather says. “And next time you stop like that, how about some warning?”
Hollis wants to believe there’s a reasonable explanation for all this. Maybe Gigi’s boyfriend had some rare heart problem that only Dr. Matthew Madden at Mass General could fix, and despite Matthew’s best efforts, the boyfriend died on the operating table, and Matthew remembered that Gigi lived in Atlanta and took her out to dinner to see how she was doing.
Maybe Matthew or Gigi took a DNA test and discovered they were cousins or even half siblings.
Hollis is, of course, fooling herself. She and Matthew had grown apart; he was away all the time, and when he was home, he was distracted. There had been countless moments when Matthew was looking right at Hollis, but she
knew he wasn’t seeing her.
He was seeing Gigi.
Hollis pulls into the hydrangea-lined driveway, and its beauty mocks her. She had been so comfortable, so complacent, that she hadn’t seen what was right in front of her.
What’s right in front of her now is Gigi, who’s carrying her suitcase and her tote down the front steps of First Light. She’s checking her phone, no doubt waiting for an Uber. When she sees the Bronco, a frightened expression crosses her face.
No, not frightened, Hollis thinks. Guilty.
Hollis gets out of the car and slams the door so hard, people can probably hear it in Quidnet. She points to the house.
“Inside,” she says through clenched teeth.
“I’m leaving,” Gigi says. “I won’t cause you any more trouble.”
“Inside!” Hollis says, walking up the front steps. She opens the door to find Henrietta, who starts growling at Gigi.
Of course, Hollis thinks. Henny knew all along.
