Troubles in Paradise

by Elin Hilderbrand

  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 from La Tapa, then anyone who will listen—Mick isn’t the father of Ayers’s baby. Baker Steele is.

  “What?” Swan Seeley yells when she hears this. “Are you kidding me?”

  “There’s always his brother,” Paula says dreamily. “Uncle Cash.”

  With all this drama and excitement going on, it’s a wonder they notice the black Jeep with the tinted windows. But they do, and then there it is again a day or two later, rolling by the school—at pickup this time.

  “Creeper,” Swan Seeley says. She cups her hands around her mouth. “Take a picture, it lasts longer!”

  “It looked like a woman,” Bonny says.

  Maia

  The group has fallen apart; nobody wants to meet anymore. Maia and Joanie can occasionally talk Huck into dropping them off in town, and they get ice cream from Scoops, then hang out in Powell Park until the Antilles kids get off the four o’clock ferry. Maia sees Shane climb into his dad’s truck but she’s never brave enough to call out to him. One awful day, both Shane and Lillibet get off the ferry and hop into his dad’s truck. Maia still Snapchats with Shane at night and he hasn’t said anything about Lillibet being his girlfriend, but he also hasn’t asked to hang out with Maia after school.

  Things between Joanie and Colton aren’t much more promising. All Colton wants to do is play Fortnite at Bright’s house.

  Boring.

  They need to arrange another meeting, but where? Par Force is too hard to get to, and although it’s private, it’s just an old abandoned house where there’s nothing to do but think about the people who lived there who are now dead and maybe ghosts.

  Maia has an idea for a meeting spot but she’s not sure she’s brave enough to go through with it.

  She has more freedom than ever. Irene has moved in with Baker and Floyd at the Happy Hibiscus in Fish Bay. Huck said that Irene wants to be with her family—yes, this makes sense—but what he hasn’t explained is why Irene is no longer working on the Mississippi. Huck is in such a foul mood all the time that Maia’s afraid to ask. He says he doesn’t want to find another mate; he’ll just do all the work himself. He’s almost never around to give Maia a ride home from school, but Joanie’s mom and Ayers pick up the slack.

  The good news is that Huck isn’t paying much attention to Maia. He still makes her eggs and toast in the mornings but the eggs have been dry, which is no bueno. He doesn’t bother checking one Sa
turday when Maia says she’s going to Cinnamon Bay to swim with Joanie and a few other friends. They all meet in the parking lot—Maia, Joanie, Colton, Bright, and Shane (but happily, happily, not Lillibet; she’s been grounded for talking back to her parents)—but instead of heading to the beach to swim or watch the volleyball game that is always happening on the eastern end, they walk down the Centerline single file to the turnoff up the hill to Little Cinnamon.

  This is how Maia persuaded the boys to show up: they’re going to hang out at her father’s villa, the one with the two-story pool.

  The one that has been seized by the FBI.

  Shane says he can’t believe Maia is letting them do this. She’s too clever to show her hand; if she wants to get Shane back, she needs to come up with something irresistible. Which in this case is also something illegal.

  Maia feels anxious on the Centerline Road. It’s a short walk, but at any moment, one of their parents or teachers could drive by and see the five of them. Once they turn onto Lovers Lane, Maia’s nerves fray with anxiety. The FBI have seized the house. There’s no way Maia should be going anywhere near the place.

  They climb up the hill past the dummy driveways, and Shane grabs Maia’s hand.

  This makes the whole plan worth it. Maia doesn’t care if she goes to federal prison!

  At the top of the hill is the villa. The gate is wide open. Maia had assumed it would be closed but she knows the code—her mother’s birthday—and if that didn’t work, she knows a way around the gate through the dense landscaping, which isn’t great but would work as a last resort.

  They walk up the empty driveway. A piece of yellow police tape hangs limply across the stairs up to the deck. Maia ducks under it and the others follow suit. Colton and Bright, who usually never shut up, are silent.

  Maia climbs the stairs. The deck looks…the same. The furniture is all there. The pool is full but the water down the slide has been shut off. Maia goes over to the control panel and flips the switch, and water starts flowing down the slide.

  She’s going to get arrested for sure.

  “Can we go in?” Bright whispers.

  Maia holds up a finger. “Let me check out the house first.” The outdoor kitchen is the same; there are fancy Italian sparkling waters in the fridge—and they’re ice-cold! “Help yourself,” Maia says.

  There’s a sign on the sliding glass door into the kitchen: PROPERTY OF THE UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT. NO TRESPASSING. VIOLATORS WILL BE PROSECUTED. The door is locked. Maia cups her hands around her eyes and peers inside.

  It looks…the same. The kitchen counters, the sink, the cabinets, the fridge, the living-room furniture, the television. Everything is exactly where it was. But what about her room?

  “Do you know where there’s a key?” Joanie asks.

  Maia says, “Follow me.” They go across the deck, past the hot tub, and down the stairs to the shuffleboard court. The cues are hanging on the rack and the black and red disks are stacked in a milk crate. Maia reaches around to the back of the crate and feels the key taped just under the lip. Ha! She pulls the key loose. This is the key her mother used when she and Maia arrived before Russ got here (sometimes Rosie brought home-cooked meals—her jerk chicken with beans and rice—or pints of coconut ice cream from Scoops, which was Russ’s favorite), and this was where they put the key when they stayed after Russ left (which was sometimes very, very early in the morning). This means the last person to touch this key was Rosie. Maia brings the key to her lips.

  She leads Joanie to the door that the key fits. It pulls right open, and seconds later, they’re up in the kitchen, opening the slider.

  “Hey, guys,” she says to Shane, Colton, and Bright. “Who’s hungry?”

  There’s still food in the fridge, though all of the fresh stuff has grown mold or gone bad. The cabinets and pantry, however, are a treasure trove. The boys dive on the bags of chips while Joanie unearths a package of hot dogs from the freezer (Joanie’s parents are vegan; for her, a hot dog is the ultimate forbidden treat). Maia opens three cans of SpaghettiOs and dumps them in a pot.

  Ten minutes later, they have a feast: bowls of SpaghettiOs, hot dogs with yellow mustard and relish, Cheetos and dill-flavored potato chips—all washed down with Italian sparkling water.

  Maia thinks maybe now is the time to start a conversation. “Does anybody have anything they want to talk about?” She looks at Colton; it was his parents’ divorce that brought the group together. But Colton and Bright are tussling on the banquette; Colton bumps up against Joanie, who must love it.

  “Let’s go back in the pool,” Bright says.

  “Should I turn on the hot tub?” Maia asks.

  “Yeah!” they all say. The afternoon is sunny and very hot but there’s still something alluring about the bubbles and all of them close together.

  “I’ll do it after I clean up,” Maia says.

  Colton, Bright, and Joanie head outside. Shane stays to help Maia bring the plates and the bowls to the sink. He throws the empty bags and cans away.

  “The FBI owns this house now?” he says.

  Maia shrugs. “I guess so.”

  “It doesn’t look like anyone’s living here.” He gazes upward. “Do you think they installed cameras?”

  “I think…” Maia tries to remember if she overheard Huck and Irene saying anything about the fate of the villa. Gone was all they said. It’s gone. “I think maybe the government will sell it? And take the money and put it into their budget?”

  “Yeah,” Shane says. “You’re probably right. When do you think the new owners will move in?”

  “Probably not for a while,” Maia says. “Everything looks the same. It’s almost like the FBI locked it up and then forgot it was here.”

  “So maybe we can use it again?” Shane says. “Because this is an awesome hangout. What’s upstairs?”

  “There are nine bedrooms,” Maia says. She knows this is an outrageous number because she heard her mother say so. “Want to see my room?”

  Shane’s eyebrows shoot up. “Sure.”

  Sure, sure, sure, Maia thinks. Is this happening? She should not be doing this, she’s twelve and a half, too young to have a boy in her bedroom. If you listen to Huck, twenty-five is too young. But this is an opportunity she may never get again. What if the new people move in next week, or tomorrow?

  The upstairs is unpleasantly hot and stuffy; the air-conditioning is off. Maia leads Shane down the long hallway past the other bedrooms, all of them the same as Maia remembers, with their camel cashmere blankets and fluffy white duvets folded at the bottom of each bed and the arrangement of six pillows plus bolster at the head. She wonders briefly about the people who will end up buying this villa. Will they be older with a lot of children and grandchildren? Will they be young with a lot of friends they invite for weekend house parties? Will they ever learn anything about Maia—or Russ and Rosie?

  Maia reaches the end of the hallway and opens the door to her room. It’s a swirl of turquoise and purple tie-dye; pillows that spell out her name hang on the far wall.

  “Wow,” Shane says. “This is way cooler than my room.”

  “It’s way cooler than my room at home.” Maia feels disloyal to Huck in saying this, but it’s undeniable. Here, she has beanbag chairs and a dressing table with a lit mirror. She remembers her mother handing her the Pottery Barn Teen catalog and telling her to “go crazy.” Maia had pointed to her favorite picture in the catalog, and the next time Russ came back to the island, her room looked like this. He had thought of the name pillows himself, he said. Maia picks up her copy of The Hate U Give. “I forgot I left this here. I’m taking this home.” She sits on the bed and Shane sits next to her. He kicks at her foot and then their two legs are intertwined. She’s afraid he’s going to kiss her. But isn’t that what she wants? The door is halfway open. She’s safe here, safe with Shane.

  She falls backward on the bed and he does the same. When she looks at him, he smiles. He’s so cute without h
is braces. He inches his face closer and she thinks, This is it. She closes her eyes. His lips touch hers and they kiss. He lingers and she thinks, Is this where we open our mouths? Yes; yes, it is. They are, suddenly, tongue-kissing, which makes Maia feel like she’s flying down the pool slide upside down and backward.

  “Maia!” Joanie shouts from somewhere.

  No, Joanie, please, Maia thinks. Go away! Don’t ruin this!

  “Maia, where are you?” Joanie calls. “Someone’s here!”

  Shane jumps to his feet. “Someone’s here?” he says. “Should we hide?”

  Should they hide? Maia opens her bedroom door wide and sees Joanie’s stricken face; Colton and Bright are right on her heels, trailing pool water down the hall.

  “There’s a woman here,” Joanie says. “She pulled up in a black Jeep.”

  “With tinted windows,” Bright says. “It’s a four-door Sahara Limited, plate TP six-seven-five-six.”

  “She asked to talk to you,” Joanie says. “By name. She said, ‘Is Maia here?’”

  “What?” Maia says. She can’t hide if they know her name. “Did she show a badge? Is she with the FBI?” Maia can’t even fathom the massive amount of trouble she’s in. And maybe not only her, maybe Huck as well. She feels her SpaghettiOs repeat on her; she’s going to hurl.

  Shane comes up behind her and squeezes her hand. “I’ll go down with you.”

  “We’ll all go down with you,” Joanie says.

  “We’re just kids,” Colton says. “We can say we didn’t know we weren’t allowed to be here.”

  Maia is trembling when she gets down to the bottom of the stairs. “You guys stay here,” she says. She steps out to the deck.

  The woman is gazing at the view across the water to Tortola and Jost Van Dyke. She’s short and has brown hair that’s pulled back in a ponytail; she’s wearing white capri pants and a beige linen shell and sandals, and when she turns around, Maia sees she has a round, pale face with wide brown eyes. She doesn’t look like the FBI, but maybe this is how they trick you. They send someone who looks like the person who cleans teeth at the dentist’s office.