Winter Storms by Elin Hilderbrand Read Free Book Online Page A

Winter Street Inn to play Santa Claus—parted on good terms. He also knows that George is now hot and heavy with Mary Rose Garth, a woman he met here on Nantucket last Stroll weekend during the Holiday House Tour. Who knew George was such a player? Kelley doesn’t feel threatened by George, not really; the attraction between him and Mitzi has run its course. And Mitzi is being very gracious in hosting Kelley’s ex-wife’s wedding.
    â€œSure, let’s invite George and Mary Rose,” Kelley says. George is fun at parties. And Kelley would basically do anything to keep Mitzi’s mind off Bart.
    A few days earlier, Walter Reed National Military Medical Center finally issued a press release about the status of Private William Burke. The soldier had regained consciousness but was still unable to speak. He could answer simple questions by blinking his eyes. Kelley and Mitzi had hugged each other in celebration, although they soon realized they weren’t any closer to getting answers about Bart.
    What kind of simple questions are the doctors asking the private? Kelley wonders. Is he alert enough to answer questions about what happened? About his fellow troops, still held captive? And what if…
    The next thought is too difficult to articulate, even in his mind. What if William Burke says that he’s the sole survivor? What if William Burke’s regaining consciousness is the end of hope?
    Again, Kelley considers driving ten hours south to Bethesda—but that won’t solve anything. He and Mitzi simply have to wait. They have to live their lives and concentrate on the family they do have.
    Margaret and Drake’s wedding will be held on the beach out at Eel Point. Catherine, the town clerk, will marry Margaret and Drake, and there will be a harp player, a trumpet player, and a cellist. But Margaret keeps adding surprises. At the beginning of August, Margaret and Drake had dinner at the Club Car. When they visited the piano bar in the back, Margaret met Gordon Russell, a man with a deep, resonant, nearly professional-sounding singing voice. He had been belting out “Oh, What a Beautiful Mornin’” from
Okla
homa!
Margaret (a lifelong sucker for show tunes) approached Mr. Russell afterward and asked him to sing at her wedding. And, because Margaret is an investigative reporter, she learned that Mr. Russell owned the Lilly Pulitzer store In the Pink, here on Nantucket, and that he was a twelfth-generation islander, descended from the Folgers and the Gardners. In all ways, Gordon Russell is a valuable, interesting addition to the group.
    â€œWhat song is he singing?” Kelley asks.
    â€œâ€˜The Wedding Song,’” Margaret says casually.
    This gives Kelley pause. “The Wedding Song”? The old chestnut sung by Paul Stookey of Peter, Paul, and Mary that was so in vogue forty years earlier when Margaret and Kelley got married? Hadn’t he and Margaret wanted Kelley’s brother, Avery, to sing “The Wedding Song” at
their
wedding? Yes, Kelley is pretty sure they had, but then the priest wouldn’t allow it, so one of the choir members had sung the Ave Maria instead.
    â€œBut that was our song,” Kelley says.
    â€œIt wasn’t our song,” Margaret says. “Our song was ‘Thunder Road.’ ‘The Wedding Song’ was only a song we considered for the ceremony. Don’t be sensitive.”
    Is Kelley being sensitive? Probably. What does it matter if Margaret is recycling their first choice of song? This wedding requires adult behavior from everyone.
    After all, Kelley will be giving Margaret away.
    Â 
KEVIN
    Q uinns’ on the Beach is a gangbuster success, a beyond-his-wildest-dreams moneymaking machine. Kevin hasn’t slept since Memorial Day, but by the end of Fourth of July weekend, he is able to pay Kelley and Margaret back the money they lent him to get the business up and running. From the time the shack