She’s as still as a statue in the near dark, but Ed can make out the expression on her face: a stoicism that she must have cultivated during her years in the NICU. “This isn’t real,” she says. “Coco missing is not a thing. She would never have fallen off the boat—that’s ridiculous—and she didn’t set a fire and then run. That’s like something that happens in the movies.”

Ed hopes Kacy is right, that Coco isn’t missing—she was using the head in one of the suites or decided to take a swim in the harbor rather than go ashore, and by the time they find Dixon and the others, Coco will be among them, embarrassed to have caused such a fuss.

“Do you want to stay here or go with me?” he asks.

“Go,” Kacy says. “Obviously.”

Ed takes off his blazer and throws it in the back seat. One of the loveliest evenings in recent memory has been flipped on its head, but Ed can feel rotten about that later. Right now they have to find Coco.

A crowd of people are gathered in the Richardsons’ circular garden, which is protected from the worst of the smoke by tall, thick boxwood hedges, though the Chief sees everyone has been given a mask. He hears one woman’s cries above all the talking and catches a glimpse of Leslee Richardson in a long white dress that’s soaking wet. Dixon whistles and asks for quiet; he announces that, to start, he’ll need everyone’s name and contact information.

Is Lamont here? He must be, but before the Chief can look for him, Stu Vick, the Nantucket fire chief, finds him.

“Fire’s out,” Stu says. Beyond Stu is a charred, smoldering pile of debris. The Chief has been to this house enough times over the summer to know he’ll find the mangled, melted carcass of that exquisite jukebox and maybe a couple of intact pool balls among the ashes.

“Can you confirm no one was in the house?” the Chief says. It occurs to him only now that maybe everyone thought Coco was on the boat but she’d accidentally, or intentionally, missed the sail. He can’t quite bear to take this idea any further.

“No one was in the house,” Stu says.

The Chief exhales. He turns around and nearly bumps into Zara Washington, who on Monday will become Nantucket’s new chief of police. She’s in full uniform, and the Chief shakes his head. “Zara?”

“I was at the station when the call came in,” she says. “Jennifer Speed gave me the heads-up that you were out tonight, celebrating with friends, so I thought I’d better make an appearance. You can go on home; I’ll help Dixon with the questioning.”

The Chief isn’t sure how to respond. While shadowing him on the job for the past two weeks, Zara has proven to be intelligent, calm, steady, and thoughtful, and she has twelve years of experience as a chief over on the Vineyard, but that was one town, not an entire island. Fifty percent of the job—maybe more—is knowing the people you’re serving, and that can be learned only with time. Lots of time. The Chief also finds himself bristling at Zara Washington telling him that he can go home. Unless something has changed that he doesn’t know about, he’s the chief of police here until Monday.

“My daughter”—the Chief turns around to find Kacy standing among the party guests looking like a lost child—“is friends with the girl who’s missing. And I know the couple who own this house. They’re… acquaintances.”

“All the more reason for you to step away from this one,” Zara says. “It’s possible this investigation will take more than a few days, Ed. Just let me—”

“I’m going to lead this investigation, Zara,” Ed says, leaving no room for misinterpretation. “I don’t care how long it takes.”

Zara studies him for a second, and Ed feels exposed. Does he feel like he can assert himself because he’s a man, a white man? Is he (predictably) refusing to hand over power because he fears becoming irrelevant? He’s been training and prepping Zara so that, in a situation like this, he can get in his car and go home, maybe check in tomorrow morning, put Zara in touch with the Massachusetts State Police if a body is found.

A body, he thinks. He has to stay on this for Kacy’s sake. There’s no way she’ll want him to go home and let someone brand-new to the job figure out what happened to Coco.

“I’m sorry, Zara,” he says. “I’m not looking for a power struggle here, but I am the chief until the end of the day on Monday.”

Ed waits for her to ask him if he’s had anything to drink tonight. But instead, she says, “I’ll partner with you on this one, how about that?”

“Thank you,” Ed says. “You and Kevin should ask the guests the last time they recall seeing Coco and anything they remember about how she was acting.” He pauses. “Please.”

The Chief has been to a number of parties at the Richardsons’ house this summer, but from the looks of things, the usual guest list has drastically changed. (What did Kacy say? Everyone has abandoned the Richardsons.) Ed doesn’t recognize a soul except Busy Ambrose, a bigwig at the Field and Oar Club. Ed weaves his way through the crowd. Kacy has found Lamont Oakley, and the two of them are sitting on the stone wall at the back of the garden. Lamont has his head in his hands and Kacy has her hand on his shoulder as she talks in his ear.

The Chief approaches. “Lamont?”

He jumps to his feet, shakes the Chief’s hand. “She was on the boat, but when we got back here, she was gone.”

Gone, the Chief thinks. There are three options: She fell off the boat. She jumped off. Or she was pushed off.

“Let’s start at the beginning,” he says.

9. Meet-Cute II

Nothing makes Kacy happier about being back on Nantucket than going for a run out to the ocean, then grabbing doughnuts from the Downyflake, still warm in the box. When Kacy gets home, she finds her parents sitting at the kitchen island.

“Is Coco awake yet?” Kacy asks.

“Haven’t heard her,” Andrea says. She waggles her fingers at the bakery box. “Bring those over here, please, darling.”

Kacy sets the box down, Andrea eagerly breaks the tape and helps herself to a sugar doughnut while saying to Ed, “I’d suggest having half of one, Ed, and not the chocolate.”

“Oops, sorry, Dad,” Kacy says. “I didn’t mean to bring temptation into the house.” She selects a chocolate doughnut so there’s one less for her father to stare at. “By the way, Coco moves into Triple Eight on Monday.”

“I’m glad the Richardsons were true to their word,” Andrea says.

“Why wouldn’t they be?”

“Well,” Andrea says, “nobody knows them.”

“Phoebe and Addison know them.”

“As clients, sweetheart, not as people.”

“Do you hear yourself?” Kacy asks. “God forbid this island should have some new blood. Would it kill you to welcome them?”

“As a matter of fact,” Andrea says, “Phoebe, Delilah, and I are having lunch with Leslee Richardson next week.”

Kacy isn’t sure why she’s picking a fight with her mother; it’s as though the house is turning her back into a teenager.

Ed breaks a plain doughnut in half and stands up. “I’m going to work,” he says.

When Coco finally comes downstairs at ten thirty, Kacy makes her coffee and offers her a doughnut. She feels bad about sending those pictures of Coco to Isla. It was pathetic.

“I thought we’d go to Great Point today,” she says. “I’ve packed a picnic.”

Coco dunks her sugar doughnut into her coffee and takes a bite. “My god,” she says.

“Downyflake,” Kacy says. “Best in the world. So anyway, I made chicken salad and BLTs—I hope those are okay? And I packed two bottles of rosé, but do you drink rosé? It’s kind of a Nantucket summer thing. I also have beer if you’d rather—”

Coco waves a hand. “I eat and drink it all, but, Kacy, please stop catering to me.”

“It’s no trouble,” Kacy says. “I just want to make sure this weekend is fun for you. Before you start working.”

Coco wipes the sugar from her fingers and reaches for Kacy’s hand. “You’re amazing, Kacy Kapenash. What would I have done if I hadn’t met you?”

“Thankfully,” Kacy says, “we don’t have to worry about that.”

They drive out a winding road, rolling past a farm on the left with fields of flowers and knee-high corn. It’s country, Coco thinks, like Rosebush (but minus the hot rod up on blocks in her next-door neighbor’s yard; the screen door falling off its hinges at her friend Tash’s grandmother’s house; the Rawleys’ Doberman chained up in their yard). Here, they pass weathered split-rail fences, round ponds that glimmer like green glass, a girl riding a bike with a basket on the front and, in the basket, a chocolate Lab puppy. They’re headed out to a lighthouse, Great Point, which is at the end of a long curved arm of sand. It’s a nature preserve, a big deal, apparently, Nantucket’s only true destination. The top of the Jeep is down; the wind is rushing through their hair. The music on Kacy’s playlist—“Love on the Brain,” “Anti-Hero,” “Waking Up in Vegas”—isn’t quite Coco’s taste, but she sings along like a teenage pop queen.