Free The Castaways by Elin Hilderbrand

then be saved; they didn’t know about affairs or love realigning; they didn’t know about a girl named April Peck or the shitstorm she would create; they didn’t know they were going to leave and be left. They didn’t know they were going to die.)
    They screamed. Back then, they had all been happy.

ADDISON
    F or maybe ten years now, Addison Wheeler had considered himself a rich man. He had a beautiful home, four cars, membership in two private clubs, a case of 1967 port in his wine cellar, and eight figures invested with his broker in New York. He had a sixteen-year-old daughter in the best private school in southern California, and an ex-wife who was so wealthy on her own that all she asked Addison for were special favors. (He had a client who could get him tickets to anything, anywhere—the Super Bowl, the Academy Awards.) But from now on, money would mean nothing. Money couldn’t help him. Money didn’t matter.
    Tess was dead.
    They gathered at the Drake house, because they always gathered at the Drake house. Greg and Tess’s house was too small, Andrea and the Chief’s house was too police-chiefy (there was a scanner in their house that squawked all the live-long day, and somewhere in the house, everyone knew, the Chief kept guns). Addison and Phoebe had the biggest house, with views over Sesachacha Pond. From their widow’s walk, you could see all three of Nantucket’s lighthouses. Addison and Phoebe had tried to host gatherings in the past, but these gatherings were never quite right. Phoebe raided the fancy Italian cheese store for hundreds of dollars’ worth of asiago and salumi, and Addison, hands down, had the best wine, not to mention the most sophisticated stereo and TV, but something was missing. Their house was too cold, too formal. They had no kids; that might have been the problem. And yet in their basement was a home theater with every DVD from
The Breakfast Club
to
Bee Movie
, as well as a pool table. They had beanbag chairs, a basketball hoop, and a swimming pool, half of which was only three feet deep. It was heaven for kids, so that wasn’t the problem. The problem was something else.
    Or maybe this was just Addison’s insecurity talking (he was rich, yes, but not rich enough to quiet the voice in his head that constantly reminded him of his shortcomings). Maybe it wasn’t that there was anything wrong with Addison and Phoebe’s house; the Drake house was simply better. It was warmer. It was, in essence, a farmhouse, with a captivating mix of woods and woven rugs, bright fabrics, copper pots, a fire in the fireplace or the grill smoking on the deck. Delilah made everything from scratch rather than buying it prepared; she was an easy, natural hostess, pouring your drink before your coat was off. She made the most delicious cocktails, she had the funniest cocktail napkins, she cooked with cream and butter, herbs and just-picked produce. She had the best mixes on her iPod, and she was always, always ready to turn it up a notch. Addison loved it at the Drake house, and Phoebe would have put their own house on the market and moved in with the Drakes at the drop of a hat. There was just something about it. It was happy, balanced.
    But not, of course, today.
    Addison and Phoebe arrived at ten minutes to seven, though it felt much earlier. It was the longest day of the year. The Chief and Andrea had arrived, and instinctively Addison looked for Tess’s Kia. For the past six months, when he had pulled into this driveway, he had looked for Tess’s car. He had her license plate memorized: K22 M3E. He had waited, dozens of times over the past winter, for that car to pull into the driveway of the cottage in Quaise, an exclusive listing of his, where they used to meet.
    Tess’s car wasn’t there. It was in the lot across from the town pier.
    Next to him, Phoebe was as still and quiet as a statue in a garden. She had self-medicated, which was dangerous after an event like this, but Addison hadn’t