Page 1 of Footprints in the Sand (Coleman #13)

Chapter One

I t was Aunt Oriana’s idea to go for a hike.

“It’s a beautiful day!” she announced to Eva, Theo, and their mother, Meghan, as they trudged through the outrageous eighty-plus-degree heat.

It was unseasonably warm for late May, and the turquoise Vineyard Sound was dotted with white sailboats filled with islanders eager to celebrate the late spring day.

Eva wished she were in the water instead and couldn’t remember how she’d let Aunt Oriana convince her to head out in this.

Eva had the day off work, and she’d rather be at the beach with her boyfriend, Finn.

Heck, she’d rather be cleaning the kitchen or organizing her office! At least there was air-conditioning.

She’d invited Finn, but he’d known better, kissing her goodbye and saying, “Have a great time with your crazy family! See you when you get back!”

As they went along the trail, Aunt Oriana talked a mile a minute about her most recent trip to Manhattan, where she’d sold several paintings and met up with old friends.

Normally, Eva was fascinated by Aunt Oriana’s career in the arts and loved hearing about the multimillion-dollar deals and the celebrities who contacted Oriana for help decorating their places.

Her mother, Meghan, was responding with “uh-huh” and “oh wow” in a way that suggested she was just as exhausted and unable to talk as Eva was.

Theo asked, “What’s Finn up to today?”

Eva rolled her shoulders back. “Probably shivering on the sofa and watching television?”

“The dream.” Theo shook his head.

Their mother, Meghan, overheard Finn’s name and turned to ask, “What’s that I hear about Finn?”

Aunt Oriana stopped her monologue, and her ears perked up. “Goodness, when is that boy going to get the hint? How long has it been, Eva? Ten years?”

Eva’s already hot cheeks were burning. It’s true that she and her boyfriend, Finn, had been together for nearly eight years, and getting engaged had felt “on the cards” for a very long time.

They talked about the details of their wedding.

They discussed the catering they wanted to hire, the outfits they planned to wear, and the music they envisioned playing.

They’d talked about it so much, in fact, that it almost felt as though it had already happened, that they’d gotten married a long time ago and liked to live in the past.

But there was no ring on Eva’s finger. She was twenty-eight years old and not getting any younger. But she and Finn were a team. They did everything together.

“They’ve been together eight years,” Meghan supplied to her sister. “We always think it’ll be next summer. Every year we say that.” She tried to laugh.

Eva couldn’t meet her mother’s eye.

“Maybe you should be the one to ask him,” Aunt Oriana suggested with a crooked smile. “Things are different nowadays. You can take charge if you want to.”

“She doesn’t want that,” Meghan said nervously. “I mean, don’t you want the big, romantic proposal?”

Eva was sweaty and woozy, and she was drinking so much water that she thought she might explode. She wasn’t sure how to answer any of this. Theo kept glancing over at Eva, wondering how they were going to get out of this.

But then, a miracle happened. Aunt Oriana’s phone rang, and she stopped hiking and badgering her for answers and picked it up with a happy singsong, “Hi, Dad!”

Eva and Theo halted and grabbed their knees for support, gasping for breath.

Eva muttered to Theo, “I’m twenty-eight going on seventy-seven. I swear, Grandpa could probably hike faster than me!”

“Nobody should hike in this heat,” Theo said. “I need a cold beer, stat.”

Eva giggled and watched Aunt Oriana’s face as she spoke to Grandpa Chuck, a man Eva adored, a man with the best sense of humor and the smartest sense of the world.

It was often strange for Eva to remember that the only reason she existed at all, the only reason Aunt Oriana and her mother had been born, was because of Grandpa Chuck’s long-ago affair.

In breaking up his first marriage and family, he’d shattered so many hearts.

Was that a good reason not to get married at all? she wondered. Maybe Finn was worried about that kind of commitment. Perhaps he wanted things to stay the same.

“That’s wonderful news!” Aunt Oriana said into the phone. “We’ll wrap up here and head there soon.”

Eva’s heart jumped, and she and Theo performed a little jig right there on the hiking trail. Aunt Oriana hung up and smiled at the three of them, announcing, “Apparently Rachelle’s home for a surprise visit! We’re all invited to Nantucket for a barbecue. Should we go?”

Eva and Theo high-fived, and Meghan threw her arm around her sister and said, “I don’t know if I would have survived this hike anyway.”

Aunt Oriana wiped her brow and admitted, “I was pretending to like it. Let’s hit the road and enjoy ourselves for a change. Who needs hiking when there’s barbecue and sunshine?”

Eva breathed a sigh of relief and followed her aunt, mother, and brother back to the parking lot.

They decided together to take the two thirty ferry from Martha’s Vineyard to Nantucket and worked on a list of things to bring along the way.

Eva would head home, pick up Finn, and buy a few bottles of wine and bags of chips.

They said, “See you soon,” and sped off in separate directions.

Eva had the windows of her car rolled down and loved the feeling of the breeze through her hair.

The drive from the trailhead to the little house she shared with Finn was seven minutes of sensational landscape, with greens, whites, and blues, and sweeping sands.

She often had to remind herself to take it in, to really look at it, because she was so accustomed to beauty that she sometimes let it pass her by.

When she parked, she left her car in the driveway so she and Finn could exit quickly and didn’t even bother to open the garage door. For this reason, she guessed, Finn didn’t have a warning that she was coming in. It was why she caught him the way she did.

Eva found Finn in the office where he worked from home, punching the wall.

From the doorway, she watched him in horror, unable to comprehend what she was witnessing.

For the past eight years, she’d known Finn to be the kindest and most generous and softest man, and it was bizarre to see him so violent.

Tears sprang to her eyes. She didn’t know how to interrupt him.

Finally, she burst out, “Finn!”

Finn froze and turned slowly around to look at her, his fist still raised. His eyes were blotchy, and his face was as pale as snow.

For a moment, Eva wondered if he was going to attack her instead.

But Finn fell into the office chair and put his head in his hands.

There was a single sob, and then he was quiet.

Eva knew something bad had happened, but her first instinct was that maybe someone in his family had died or had been in an accident.

She hurried over to Finn and touched his shoulder and whispered, “Baby, what is it? Are you all right?”

Finn shook his head like a child. “I messed up. Babe, I messed up.”

Eva flared her nostrils. Her next thought was that Finn had cheated on her, and she felt a stab of horror and the crush of shame. People never believed they’d get cheated on.

Was it something she wanted to work through?

But before she could ask him who he’d cheated on her with (maybe that younger woman from work?

Bailey?), Finn burst into an explanation.

“I really thought it was for the best,” he began.

“Mike from work was saying that he made over three hundred grand in the first year, and I thought—heck—maybe after a few years, we could maybe finally buy a house, and we could set aside a nest egg for our baby, and, you know, we could really set ourselves up.”

Eva couldn’t fully fathom what he meant. “Finn, slow down,” she begged. “What did Mike from work do? Three hundred grand?” It was a lot of money for people like Eva and Finn, at the very beginning of their adult lives together.

“And maybe we wouldn’t have to work so hard to do it!” Finn spoke so quickly that he began to stutter. “Maybe we could have a nice life without all the mess of other people’s stress? You know? That’s what I was thinking. I really was thinking that.”

Eva was stumped and fearful. She crossed and uncrossed her arms and took a step away from him.

She knew this had the potential to be bad, really bad.

Was it better to stare the truth in the face?

Or was it better to run out and get in her car and proceed with the rest of the family barbecue without thinking about whatever this was?

Theo and her mother would be able to see she was upset, though. They would pester her till she admitted it.

“You’re not making sense,” she said to Finn.

Finn spread both of his hands across his thighs and stared out the window. Eva realized he smelled a little bit like he’d gotten sick in the bathroom.

“Have you been drinking?” She furrowed her brow.

“No,” he said. “I threw up when I found out.”

It was then Finn took a deep breath and admitted the truth. Eight months ago, he’d put more than 60 percent of their joint savings into a few key investments that had very spontaneously shown themselves to be corrupt that morning.

“Corrupt?” Eva asked, not computing.

“We lost all of it,” Finn explained. He looked like he was going to throw up again.

Eva fell to the floor. “Sixty percent of our savings?”

Finn nodded. Eva did a quick calculation and realized it was more than a hundred thousand dollars of money they’d saved over the years. It was so much.

It was money meant for their wedding, for their vacations, for their future house. It was money she’d ached for, money she’d put so much time into. It was their money.

It felt like there was a hole in her stomach.

The next question came out of her without a second thought. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Finn hid his eyes with his hands and sighed.

She pushed it. “Why didn’t you tell me you wanted to use our money? It was my money too. It wasn’t your decision alone.”

She was suddenly the angriest she’d ever felt. It was startling to feel this way, like she’d turned the knob of her emotions all the way up. Finn had both of his hands out in front of him.

He said, “I know what it looks like. But I’m going to get it back. I’m going to try to get all of it back.”

“How? With another stupid investment?” she demanded. “Are you going to ask what Mike from work thinks? Because it sounds like he has all the answers.”

Finn looked struck dumb. Eva felt steam coming out of her ears.

Before she said anything else she’d regret, she whipped out the door and slammed it behind her.

She hurried downstairs, jangling her keys as tears ran down her cheeks.

It was hard to fathom that Finn had done this to her.

She’d loved and trusted this man for years and years.

She’d wanted to spend the rest of her life with this man.

He’d treated her money and her belongings like they didn’t matter at all. He’d treated her opinions like they were less than and easily tossed aside.

She couldn’t forgive him. She wasn’t sure what to do next.