There were few decorations, but one picture drew her attention. It stood on an old sideboard whose veneer was peeling. Tara reached for the frame to take a closer look at the picture, when her hand collided with Jay’s. He’d reached for it, too.

She met his gaze.

“I was thirteen in that picture.”

Tara studied it. A boy sat on the stoop of the home, his mother, wearing an apron over her dress, sitting behind him. She looked tired and worn-out, but she smiled nevertheless.

“We didn’t know it then, but she already had cancer when that picture was taken.”

Instinctively, Tara closed her hand around Jay’s, squeezing it. “I’m so sorry.”

“We couldn’t afford regular doctor’s visits,” he explained. “Or they might have caught it earlier. But my mother was too concerned with putting food on the table. She always put herself last. She was a hard worker.”

“And your dad, did he not help?”

“There was no work in the area. At first he took out-of-town jobs and only came home on the weekends. But I think in the end it was too hard on him. He gave up. One day, he sent a letter with some money in it. He told my mother he couldn’t do anything else. He said he’d failed as a father and a husband and couldn’t bear seeing us anymore, watching how we had to live. He broke her heart.”

Tara felt tears well up in her eyes and tried to push them back.

“I did what I could. After school I helped out at a bait and tackle store. I gutted fish for a small cannery; I helped out at a dry dock. I took whatever job they would give a teenager. And at night, when my mother slept, I took my bike and went down to the harbor and watched the waves rock against the boats. And I wished I’d been born into a different family.” He ran a shaky hand through his hair. “And I hated myself for that, for wishing not to be my mother’s son, for wanting to be rich.”

His pain broke her heart. “It wasn’t your fault.”

A sad smile spread on his lips. “I betrayed my mother with my thoughts, because every time I looked out at the boats, I dreamed of getting onto one and leaving this place for good.”

“But you didn’t. You stayed with her,” she guessed.

“To the day she died.”

“What happened after that?”

“I slipped through the cracks of the social system. I was sixteen and could take care of myself. Charlie, the owner of the dry dock taught me everything I needed to know about boats. And whenever we repaired a boat, I got to take it out on the water and test it out. Those were the moments I lived for.”

“But how did you become successful? You own one of the largest boat building companies in the US. How did you even start? You had nothing.”

Jay shook his head. “I had determination. And luck.” He placed the picture back on the sideboard. “I knew everything about boats and what could go wrong. How one wrong move by a rookie skipper could put everybody’s life in danger. I saw it often enough: the young college kids who came down to the marina during spring break and partied on their parents’ expensive yachts. They didn’t even know what danger they were in. They had no clue how to operate a boat, how to keep their passengers and themselves safe.”

“What did you do?” Tara asked, curious.

“I developed an electronic system that would activate by itself when it sensed that a boat or its passengers were in danger. I presented it to the Coast Guard. They liked it, but thought it was too expensive to implement. So I talked to the yacht owners and asked them what it would be worth to them to protect their floating assets and passengers. One of them not only bought the device, he tested it extensively and then made me an offer: to patent and mass-produce it. He put up the money, I tossed in my expertise. The profits from that venture allowed me to go to college. I got into Princeton, where I met Paul, Zach, and the others. The gadget I invented generated so much profit that it became the foundation of my boat building business. I knew what made a good boat. And I had plenty of potential customers.”

“That’s genius.”

Jay smiled. “As I said, I had a lot of luck.”

“Hands up, both of ya!” a male voice with a thick southern accent threatened from the door to the hallway. “An’ turn ‘round. Slowly.”

Jay cast her a reassuring look as they both turned, their hands up in the air. The first thing Tara saw was the barrel of a shotgun. Then she lifted her head and looked at the man holding it.

25

Jay lowered his hands and grinned. “Is that any way to greet an old friend?”