Chap­ter 2: The morn­ing began at sev­en-thir­ty, with the com­fort­ing smell of a full break­fast spread fill­ing the kitchen of the cot­tage. On the counter, an assort­ment of fresh­ly baked muffins, bagels, pas­tries, yogurt, and oat­meal was laid out, along with a large urn of cof­fee. Grate­ful for the warmth, I poured myself a cup before step­ping out onto the porch. There, my sis­ter, Tam­my, sat in a robe, sip­ping tea as she took in the serene sun­rise over the calm lake. Our con­ver­sa­tion was light and easy, with Tam­my express­ing her joy after hav­ing a con­ver­sa­tion with Errol Gard­ner, an afflu­ent and some­what intim­i­dat­ing fig­ure she had always known. To her sur­prise, he turned out to be much more approach­able than she had expect­ed. He even offered to teach her fos­ter daugh­ter, Abi­gail, how to water-ski, which Tam­my took as a ges­ture of gen­uine gen­eros­i­ty amid the often pompous atmos­phere of high-soci­ety gath­er­ings.

As we enjoyed our break­fast togeth­er, I casu­al­ly men­tioned that Errol had also offered to find me a “com­pan­ion.” Tam­my, always quick with a teas­ing remark, joked that Errol must know some attrac­tive wid­ows. I brushed it off, reply­ing that I was much more inter­est­ed in spend­ing qual­i­ty time with my daugh­ter, Mag­gie, and her fam­i­ly rather than enter­tain­ing the idea of a roman­tic match. It was then that Abi­gail, still in her mis­matched paja­mas and scratch­ing away at her­self, wan­dered into the room. Tammy’s quick response to the sight of Abigail’s dis­com­fort was to inspect her close­ly and con­firm that Abi­gail had lice. The rem­e­dy she insist­ed on using—mayonnaise—filled the air with a strange odor as she worked it into Abigail’s hair. As much as I tried not to show it, I found myself appalled by the smell, but at the same time, I had to focus on the fact that I was already run­ning late for my planned canoe ride with Mag­gie.

Hav­ing to put my dis­com­fort aside, I declined Abigail’s eager request to join us, explain­ing that I had pri­or­i­tized time with Mag­gie and her moth­er for the day. After exchang­ing a few brief words of reas­sur­ance with Tam­my and Abi­gail, I promised to take Abi­gail out lat­er once the lice sit­u­a­tion was tak­en care of. When I final­ly met Mag­gie, she hand­ed me a cup of cof­fee as a sur­prise. We launched the canoe into the lake, head­ing toward Cor­morant Point, a scenic spot where a group of campers had gath­ered for lunch. As we pad­dled, my thoughts kept return­ing to Aidan, Maggie’s fiancé, and the trou­bling dynam­ics I had noticed in their rela­tion­ship. I couldn’t help but feel increas­ing­ly con­cerned, espe­cial­ly with my past expe­ri­ences and the trou­bling behav­ior I had wit­nessed in Aidan’s fam­i­ly. Although Abi­gail had to stay behind due to her lice issue, Mag­gie assured me that her moth­er, Cather­ine, was there to take care of her, offer­ing me some com­fort. Still, my wor­ries about Aidan and his influ­ence on Mag­gie refused to fade.

Despite my grow­ing unease, Mag­gie con­tin­ued to brush off my con­cerns, urg­ing me to focus on the beau­ti­ful adven­ture we were expe­ri­enc­ing instead. But as we con­tin­ued to pad­dle, the sense of dis­com­fort I felt only inten­si­fied. When we returned to Osprey Lodge, the fes­tive mood that had accom­pa­nied our trip quick­ly dis­si­pat­ed. A group of guests was wait­ing for us near the shore, but some­thing felt off. As we approached, the urgency in the air was pal­pa­ble. Guards were wad­ing toward us, sig­nal­ing for us to dock imme­di­ate­ly. Some­thing was wrong, and the feel­ing inten­si­fied as we final­ly docked. The scene that await­ed us was unsettling—there, float­ing life­less in the water, was a body. The peace­ful morn­ing had van­ished, and a sense of dread took its place. Mag­gie and I exchanged wor­ried glances, know­ing that this dis­cov­ery would change every­thing. The care­free atmos­phere we had been enjoy­ing just moments ago was now shat­tered, replaced by a deep unease that lin­gered in the air.