being as good as any on the island. Not as spectacular as those views from the Grace estate, but pretty impressive nonetheless.
Her last appointment of the day had left and it was late, almost six o’clock. Rain came down in mists, driven by the wind skimming in over the rough waters of the sound. She’d thought about Ethan Grace off and on during the day and had even considered calling the estate to make sure he was okay. Then she remembered the woman she’d finally found at the main house and her assurances that “Mr. Grace would be well taken care of.” That someone called James would take care of everything.
Ethan Grace had a staff and he had money, which was certainly more than she had. She was the lone doctor on the island right now, and as far as money went, if she had enough she would have helped her father update his equipment, and maybe figured out how to start a four-bed clinic that he’d only dreamed of for years on the property next door. There was no hospital on the island, and when a medical emergency came up, patients were transported either by ferry or by helicopter to the mainland. Sometimes that wasn’t good enough. Her father, a pure idealist, dreamed of being able to offer decent emergency care. She’d never understood how he could, given the money it would take to build the clinic, but he’d never given up on the idea over the years.
Dreams came easily, but reality with her father was another matter. She’d always known she’d come back here sooner or later to help her father and possibly take over for him. Somewhere in the future, the very distant future. Having the new clinic would be terrific, if it could happen. Until then, they had to make do with what was here, but she knew her father wasn’t at all comfortable with the current limitations of his equipment and facilities. She wouldn’t have been, either, if she’d had to practice here instead of just visiting.
More staff would have been nice, she thought as she sat forward and reached for the thick stack of mail that had been piling up over the past few days. She sorted through the envelopes, more than aware that quite a few were bills. A couple could have been payments, but a certified letter that Sharon Long, her nurse/receptionist, had signed for that day stopped her. Morgan noted the return address, E.P.G. Corporation, Development and Acquisitions Division, along with a Seattle address that she knew was in the business district. She hesitated before she finally opened it and scanned the correspondence.
It was a very formal letter with wherefors and forthwiths sprinkled liberally through it. From what she could gather, the lease on the building that housed her father’s offices and all other structures wouldn’t be renewed in March. Her throat tightened. Their home was included. She was stunned. She’d never known that her father rented the property. He’d built the offices, she thought, or maybe that was just what she’d assumed. Maybe they’d been there when they moved here and he fixed them. She didn’t really know; she’d been a baby when he’d opened the offices.
Morgan stared at the letter, but the words didn’t change. The E.P.G. Corporation was putting her father out. She knew that he couldn’t have known about this before he left last week. If he had, he never would have gone, and he wouldn’t have talked about the possibility that the land next to them might be going up for sale in the near future. “We just have to get the money,” he’d told her the night before he left. “I have some saved, and I’ve got a good enough reputation to get a sizable loan, but getting all of the equipment will be hard.” He’d grinned at her. “But we’ll do it someway or another.” Always the optimist, whether reality bore it or not.
Her mother had been the grounded one, and her father the dreamer. A terrific doctor but still a dreamer. And he’d signed a simple lease for all of this, including their home.
Morgan reached for the phone to call her dad, but drew back suddenly. She couldn’t call him and give him the news. He’d barely arrived at the house he’d rented in Arizona for the month. She looked down at the letterhead on the notice, then reached for the phone again and dialed the first number listed.
A very pleasant female voice announced, “You have reached the offices of Development and Acquisitions for the E.P.G. Corporation. Our offices are closed now, but if you know the extension of the party you wish to contact, please enter it now or leave a message after the tone.” Morgan hung up and dialed the second number. This time a man answered. “You’ve reached the main offices of the E.P.G. Corporation. How may I help you.”
Morgan tried to explain the contents of the letter, but the man politely but firmly cut her off. “Ma’am, that’s a matter for our development and acquisitions department. I can give you their number if you’d like?”
“I have it,” she said. “I just need to talk to someone and not a recording about a property on Shelter Island.”
“You’ll need to call back during office hours and I’m sure that someone can help you then.”
“What office is this?”
“Corporate towers, ma’am. And everyone is gone for the day.”
“There’s no one—?”
“Ma’am, even if Mr. Grace was in town, he’d have left by now.”
Mr. Grace? She felt the blood drain from her head and she asked, “Ethan Grace?”
“Yes, ma’am, but he’s not here, and even if he was—”
She put the phone down, cutting off his polite response. Ethan Grace. She wasn’t sure what the P stood for, but now she knew what the E and the G stood for in the company name. It was his corporation. The Graces owned a lot of the island, she knew that, but she’d never suspected that they owned this place and she’d never known his company’s name. Or that the building and home could be pulled out from under them this way.
If she’d known about the letter yesterday, she could have spoken to Ethan when she’d found him half-conscious in his bedroom, but now he was “being taken care of,” and there was no way she could go back there again. She stopped that thought. She’d walked onto the beach yesterday without any trouble. She’d gone up the stairs and entered the house without anyone stopping her. If she did it once, she could do it again. And he was the boss, injured or not, over everything.
Speaking directly to him, instead of someone in one of his many corporate divisions, sounded sensible. That was another thing she’d learned at the clinic—the fewer people between you and what you needed, the better everyone was in the end. If she could convince Ethan to renew the lease, her father wouldn’t have to know about the notice. If she was incredibly lucky, she might even be able to convince Ethan to sell the complete property to her father, if they could get the money somehow. Besides, it would be bad PR for the company to just shut them down.
She stood and placed the letter back in the envelope. After slipping it into her pants pocket, she braced herself to face Ethan Grace again. The man she’d found last night had been vulnerable and in real pain. And when she saw him again, she knew it would be a different situation completely. He was regarded as a genius in the business world, but he was also known to be hard-hitting, bordering on ruthless and giving no quarter to anyone. Traits, she was sure, he shared with his pirate ancestor. But instead of sailing to the south and pillaging and plundering small settlements, he was headquartered in Seattle and he used, from what she heard, a corporate jet or helicopter to pillage and plunder floundering companies. He would be a formidable match.
A knock sounded on the office door and Sharon peeked inside. Middle-aged, she was dressed in jeans, a T-shirt worn under an open blue smock and tennis shoes. She had a pleasant face and was usually smiling, but this time she looked a bit contrite. “Sorry, I forgot to get this to you,” she said as she handed her an envelope.
Morgan took
