Read Online An Island Christmas by Nancy Thayer - Free Book Online

been dark for hours. I don’t have any messages on my voice mail. Do you?”
    Felicia scrolled through her phone. “I don’t have any messages from Dad or Archie.”
    “I’m going to call Ed Ramos and see if George brought the boat back.” Jilly picked up the phone book and found Ed’s number. She punched it in. “Ed, I’m so glad I reached you. Has George brought the boat in yet?”
    Felicia didn’t have to hear Ed’s words to know what hisanswer was. Her mother went completely white and sat down hard on a kitchen chair.
    “All right, Ed, call me if you hear anything.” Jilly stared at her daughter with frightened eyes. “Archie and George took Ed’s boat out from Madaket Harbor around ten this morning. He hasn’t heard from them since.”
    Felicia nodded calmly, thinking fast. “Okay, Mom, let’s not panic. Let’s think this through. I’m going to run upstairs to see if Archie left his cell phone here. He hates carrying it. You look for Dad’s cell.”
    Felicia found Archie’s phone just as she thought she would, lying on the dresser. She hurried back downstairs to the kitchen.
    “I found George’s phone on his desk in his study.” Jilly tossed the device onto the kitchen table. “What did he think he was doing, going out on the water without his cell phone?”
    At that moment, Rex strolled into the kitchen, obviously awakening from his nap in the laundry basket. He rubbed around Jilly’s ankles, purring.
    Jilly picked him up and held him against her for comfort. “Oh, Rex, if only you could talk and tell us what you overheard. Where did they think they were going?” Helplessly, Jilly looked at her daughter. “What should we do?”
    The landline phone rang. Jilly set the cat on the floor and snatched up the receiver. “No, Sebastian, we haven’t heard from them. They left a note saying they were going out on Ed Ramos’s boat but they haven’t returned it. Howlong do you think we should wait before contacting the Coast Guard?”
    Felicia sat very still as her mother hung up the phone.
    Jilly was trembling. She clutched her hands together, in an attempt to calm down. “Sebastian thinks that, given the dark and the cold, we should contact the Coast Guard now and not wait. Also, he suggested calling the police and the hospital.”
    “You call the Coast Guard, Mom. I’ll use my cell to call the hospital.”
    The hospital had no record of any men brought in that day. As Felicia hung up, there was a knock at the door. She ran to answer it.
    Nicole and Sebastian stood there. “We came to see if there is anything we can do to help.”
    The three hurried to the kitchen. Jilly was leaning against the refrigerator wringing her hands. When she saw them, she gasped, “I spoke with John West, the commanding officer of the Coast Guard. They said a small motorboat has been anchored at Great Point for about four hours. No sign of”—Jilly couldn’t bring herself to say the word life —“people.”
    Everyone was silent, riveted by their own thoughts to various possibilities, most of them frightening. It was one thing to be out on the water in an open boat in this cold weather if you wore warm clothing. And if it was daytime. If it was night, when the temperature plummeted, it was dangerous to be out in an open boat. Ice floes were alreadyforming on the harbor water. Hypothermia was always a danger.
    Felicia’s thoughts swirled through her mind: her father. Her darling Archie. Her poor mother. Her sister. Christmas. The wedding. The cold night. Memories of people who had fallen overboard and drowned near the island. Stories of people who had jumped overboard to rescue someone else and both had sunk deep into the unforgiving water. Her legs felt like jelly under her.
    “Sit down,” said Sebastian. “You, too, Jilly. Let’s not go to the worst-case scenario. Let’s take a moment to think.”
    “I’ll make tea,” Nicole said.
    Jilly sat down. Immediately Rex jumped up into her lap, pressed