No! he thinks. I want you to come home. I want to wake up tomorrow and have things back to the way they were before Duncan Huntley walked into Extra Virgin and ordered his pretentious Australian wine.
Yes, Cash types. Sorry. His finger hovers over the Send button.
Picnic at a waterfall, like something out of a fairy tale?
He squeezes his eyes shut and presses Send, and the swoosh sound marks the end of his relationship with Tilda Payne.
Tilda called to accuse him of drooling over a social media influencer? That wasn’t jealousy, he sees now. That was a manifestation of her own guilty conscience! Cash was the one who did the right thing; he stayed on St. John to work so that he didn’t leave Treasure Island in the lurch. Why is he getting kicked in the balls?
Dunk arranged for a seaplane? Bah! What Tilda means is that Dunk is rich and ordered a seaplane as a flex, whereas Cash swabs the deck and doesn’t know the meaning of the word obsequious.
First thing in the morning, Cash calls Baker.
“Does your new place have a sofa?” Cash asks. “Because I need to crash with you for a while. This thing with Tilda blew up.”
“It has two sofas,” Baker says. “Which is a good thing, because one sofa is already taken.”
“What?” Cash says. “By whom?”
“Our mother,” Baker says. St. John
The Gifft Hill mothers among us are the first to notice the black Jeep with the tinted windows. It drives slowly past the school at drop-off one morning, then the next. None of us have ever seen it before, but for a second we think maybe it belongs to Janine Whittaker. She and her husband own the Beach Bum Car Rental company and it feels like she gets a new Jeep every week.
The Gifft Hill School mothers who are romantically available—Swan Seeley (divorcing), Bonny Kizer (divorced for years), and Paula Morrow (open marriage)—have taken to loitering in the school parking lot, pretending to share parenting woes while they wait for Baker Steele to drop off his son, Floyd. Swan is a natural flirt so she always finds a way to engage Baker in conversation, and Paula Morrow is a pleaser, a flatterer, and touchy-feely—on those occasions when Baker climbs out of his Jeep to chat, she squeezes his biceps and compliments his legs. We can all agree: Baker Steele has very fine legs. Bonny Kizer inevitably mentions that she is the only one of the three who is technically free. Swan and her husband, Brent, are in the throes of a nasty custodial and financial battle (Swan has family money and Brent has a gambling problem), and Paula Morrow has a husband who lives with her on Pocket Money Road (although he travels to the States for work and they have an “arrangement”).
Swan, Bonny, and Paula are all standing in the school parking lot on the day that the bluebird Jeep pulls in and it’s not Baker driving but rather some other man—cute, with blond surfer hair.
When Floyd gets out of the car he fist-bumps this man and says, “See ya later, Uncle Cash.”
“That must be Baker’s brother,” Paula says.
“Maybe he has two brothers,” Bonny says.
“I’ve seen that guy before,” Swan says, and Bonny and Paula mentally roll their eyes. Swan has an acute case of Been There, Done That. “He goes out with Tilda Payne from La Tapa.”
“I don’t think so,” Paula says. “Mark and I were out to dinner at the Terrace over the weekend and we saw Tilda there eating with someone else. Mark said it was that Australian guy, Duncan Huntley, who just bought Lovango Cay.”
“Is that guy single?” Swan says. “I could use a boyfriend with money.”
The three of them watch Floyd’s uncle Cash back out of the parking lot. He notices them and waves—he’s friendly!—but then Julie Judge pulls into the lot in her falling-apart RAV4 with the duct-taped soft top to let Joanie out, and the three women disperse. “Judgy Julie” is a marine biologist and a vegan and a stick-in-the-mud. She wouldn’t approve of them checking out Baker Steele or his cute brother.
But who cares what Judgy Julie thinks?
A few days later, the three women are once again gathered, drinking chai lattes from Provisions, when the bluebird Jeep pulls in and a woman is driving. She’s too old to be Baker’s love interest, they think (though look at Emmanuel Macron!).
Floyd says, “Bye, Grammy!”
“It’s Baker’s mother?” Bonny says.
Grammy Steele is just about to pull away, when Captain Huck’s truck swings in and lets Maia out. Maia notices the bluebird Jeep and waves to Floyd’s grammy. Captain Huck calls out, “Irene!” Grammy Steele throws the car into reverse and hightails it out of there.
“That only makes sense,” Swan whispers. “Because you know, girls, that Baker is the Invisible Man’s son, which means Irene was the Invisible Man’s wife…”
“And Rosie was the Invisible Man’s lover,” Bonny says. “No wonder Grammy doesn’t want to talk to Huck.”
“For some reason, I thought they were friends,” Paula says. “I thought they worked together?”
“Take off the rose-colored glasses, Paula,” Bonny says. “Would you work with the father of your husband’s lover?” Then Bonny realizes she’s talking to Paula Morrow. Who knows what kind of rules are bent in that household? “Never mind. Don’t answer that.”
None of those mothers are in the parking lot when the little green truck named Edie pulls in to pick up Maia from school—but Julie Judge is there and she goes over to say hello to Ayers. The poor woman has been through so much—losing Rosie, taking over mom duties with Maia, breaking up with Mick from the Beach Bar, and enduring his antics at Cruz Bay Landing.
“Ayers,” Julie says. “How’re you doing?”
Ayers places a hand on her abdomen. “I’m pregnant,” she says. “Due in September.”
Ayers Wilson is pregnant? No wonder Mick is so despondent! He’s losing not only a fiancée but also a child.
No, no, no, Brigid tells first her coworker Lindsay, then Skip
