What? he mouths.

She points to the partition between their two desks. Eddie peeks around the corner and sees Bull Richardson sitting in the chair meant for clients.

Eddie is spooked. Everyone on earth has a cell phone; there’s no excuse for showing up anywhere unannounced. This is an ambush. Bull is here to tell Eddie that he’s out of the deal.

Eddie is about to back out of the office when Bull spins in his chair, cranes his neck, and sees Eddie. He jumps to his feet. “Edward!” he says, thrusting out a hand.

What can Eddie do but shake it? “To what do I owe this pleasure?”

“Please sit,” Bull says and Eddie thinks, This is my office, I’ll sit when I’m good and ready. Also, he hates being called Edward; it reminds him of his grandmother and his high-school principal, Dr. Lewicki.

Eddie takes off his panama hat and settles into his chair. Sexy indifference, he thinks. The original idea for purchasing Jeanne Jackson’s property was his, but no biggie. Easy come, easy go. He’ll be glad to be rid of the stress because, you know, in real estate development, there’s always stress. It’s almost worth the eight million he would have made to have it go away, ha-ha-ha. He’ll handle this with grace. Bull will not be able to call him inelegant.

Bull leans forward in his chair and lowers his voice to a stage whisper. “I think we should cut Addison out of the deal.”

Eddie blinks. “Addison?”

“There’s something a little slippery about the bloke,” Bull says. “Are you aware that his nickname around town is Wheeler Dealer?”

Of course Eddie knows this. It was Eddie’s brother-in-law Glenn Daley who gave Addison the nickname a million years ago. These days, Wheeler Dealer is a term of affection and respect for Addison.

“What am I missing?” Eddie says. “Did something happen?”

“Phoebe and Addison just aren’t the people I thought they were,” Bull says. “Leslee and I made a large financial gesture that would benefit their son—”

“The donation to the boarding school,” Eddie says, thinking, See, Addison does tell me things.

“Precisely,” Bull says. “But when it came time for Phoebe and Addison to reciprocate, they didn’t deliver. I’m sorry, but I don’t want to do business with a fella like that.”

Eddie isn’t sure what the Wheelers promised the Richardsons and he doesn’t care. “Addison and I are a package deal,” Eddie says. “I heard you at the garden party last week telling Addison the two of you should dump me. I heard the things you said about me, Bull.”

Bull says, “Well, then, I guess the person who’s leaving the deal is me. Have fun financing this by yourself, mate. You can kiss my money goodbye.” Bull gets to his feet so rapidly, his chair topples over behind him. Inelegant, Eddie thinks.

Barbie appears in the doorway, resting-bitch face in place. “I’ll see you out, Mr. Richardson.”

Eddie sets Bull’s chair upright, then all but collapses into his own. Addison—he has to call Addison! They can get a loan from Nantucket Bank as long as they’re partnered up. They should have done this in the first place; what were they thinking?

But before Eddie calls Addison, there’s someone else he needs to talk to. He dials Blond Sharon.

“Hey, bae,” he says. “Do you know what happened between the Richardsons and Phoebe and Addison?”

There’s a pause. “It’s confidential,” Sharon says. Then she laughs. “But it’s too good to keep secret. Sit down.”

35. Cruel Summer

When Coco steps in the door from Meat and Fish with a pink drink for Leslee and a container of sesame noodles for Bull, she hears Leslee screaming for Bull, and not just screaming but crying.

Someone is dead, Coco thinks, and her stomach drops even though the last thing she wants to do is feel sorry for the Richardsons. Who could it be? Neither Bull nor Leslee has ever mentioned brothers, sisters, or cousins. Coco has mentally placed Leslee’s family members on some dusty acres in Nevada with the sound of machine-gun fire reverberating in a tin building. Bull’s family she pictures in a similarly dusty Australian outback, two elderly parents waiting for the tour bus to pass through. They don’t talk about friends they grew up with, college roommates, work colleagues, people they’ve met on vacation. They’ve had no houseguests. The Richardsons seem to exist in a bubble, the here and the now, this house, the connections they’ve made this summer.

Has something happened to someone Coco knows? She moves to the plate-glass window and sees Lamont bent over the stern of Hedonism; he’s fiddling with the back gate, which he complains is janky. He ordered a replacement but it won’t arrive for six weeks. The broken gate technically makes the boat unsafe, though Bull told Lamont not to worry about it. When Lamont told Coco that he was indeed worried about it, Coco said, “I know I should be a good girlfriend and commiserate. How about this—the Meat and Fish Market is once again out of Bull’s favorite pretzels. They won’t have more until Tuesday.”

Lamont stared at her. “You just called yourself my girlfriend.”

Coco tucked her hair behind her ears; it was finally long enough to do that. What she nearly said was that she liked him so much, she felt like more than a girlfriend. But because their relationship was secret, she also felt like less than a girlfriend. She almost wanted to get caught by Bull and Leslee. Would they really fire them? Coco doubted it. Bull and Leslee and Lamont and Coco were like a family, one no more dysfunctional than the family Coco grew up in.

Coco checks the Nantucket Current to see if there’s any breaking news about an untimely death or accident—nope. She heads downstairs—she has books to switch out in the library—and hears Leslee sobbing and Bull murmuring, then Leslee lets out a blood-freezing shriek and Coco thinks, I will not get pulled into their drama.

In the library, she replaces Life After Life by Kate Atkinson and takes May We Be Forgiven by A. M. Homes, geniuses both, in her humble opinion. When she’s back in the hall, she hears a door close. She turns around to see Bull leaving the primary suite.

“Everything okay?” Coco asks.

He shakes his head. “We didn’t get into the Field and Oar Club.”

That’s why the world is ending? Coco thinks. Spare me.

Leslee doesn’t come out of her room at all on Thursday; Coco reads on the curvy white sofa in the party room, listening for signs of life downstairs. She gets a text from Kacy asking if Coco can go to the Chief’s retirement dinner. Coco is surprised at how happy the text makes her. Time is a miracle worker; Coco’s feelings about the selfies have mellowed. But before Coco can say she’ll go, she has to check with Leslee. Can I let you know? she texts back. It’s crazy around here right now.

Friday, Bull leaves the house in the G-Wagon, and when he gets home, Coco is unpacking yet another wooden crate stuffed with straw that cushions yet another dozen Amalfi lemons.

“Those should cheer Leslee up,” he says and Coco checks to see if he’s kidding. “Listen, will you keep an eye on her, please? I have to travel for the next few days—a car is coming to get me in a minute.”

Coco wants to tell him he can’t just pawn his pathetic excuse for a wife off on her while he gets a hot-stone massage in Ubud. “When will you be back?”

“Tuesday night,” he says. “I’m sorry. This situation in Indo is proving to be a sticky wicket.” He claps Coco on the shoulder like they’re best mates.

Leslee doesn’t emerge from her room on Friday. What is she doing about food? Coco wonders. When Lamont sneaks up to her apartment early Saturday, Coco fully expects him to tell her that he’s taking Leslee out on the boat. Coco steels herself for this news, but he says he hasn’t heard from her.

Coco waits until noon and then taps on Leslee’s door. “Hey,” she calls into the dark bedroom. “Can I bring you anything?”

“Go away,” Leslee says.

Oh, how Coco would love to take these words to heart so she can go out onto the beach and read, but she can’t let Leslee continue her hunger strike. She thinks back to her own worst story: the time she stole money from the diner in Rosebush. Coco arrived in the pinkish-gray light before sunrise, let herself in with the keys Garth had entrusted her with, opened the register, and took what was there. She was pulling money out of the safe when Garth walked in and caught her. He could have called the police or fired her, but instead, he said, “Are you really that desperate to get out of this town?” And when she nodded, tears of shame rolling down her face, he made her breakfast.

Coco preheats the oven, lines a baking sheet with tinfoil, pulls out the waffle iron and gets it smoking hot, beats eggs with some heavy cream. She melts butter in a pan.

Twenty minutes later, she has scrambled eggs, a tray of bacon, and—thanks to some wizard on Instagram—golden hash-brown waffles. She’s about to take a plate down to the primary suite when she hears a shuffling on the stairs. It’s Leslee—or, maybe more accurately, the woman who used to be Leslee. Her skin is the color of putty; her hair is straight and frizzled at the ends; she’s wearing a pair of hideous purple drawstring shorts and one of Bull’s undershirts.

“I smelled bacon,” she says.

Coco sets the plate down at the kitchen island. She pours Leslee a cup of black coffee and a glass of ice water.

Leslee digs into the food with such naked appetite that it feels almost indecent to watch her. She shoves a bite of one of the hash-brown waffles in her mouth, then mumbles something, and Coco pulls ketchup from the fridge. As Leslee is shoveling in the eggs, Coco toasts two pieces of sourdough, butters them, then replenishes Leslee’s eggs. Half a pound of bacon is consumed in seconds. Leslee eats every bite of food down to the bread crusts, which she swipes through the remaining ketchup. She finishes the coffee and the water and burps.

Leslee’s eyes, which resemble small dull pebbles in their swollen sockets, fill with tears. “Thank you.”

“Bull told me about the Field and Oar. I’m sorry, I know how much you wanted to join.”

“I can’t believe we didn’t get in,” Leslee says. “I just don’t understand it.”