Ted and the kids followed Allison inside, leaving Nick and Kaye in the dark.

“For goodness’ sake!” Kaye yelled. She stomped off to the back deck, and paced, expecting Nick to come over and apologize. When he didn’t, she took the cover off the hot tub—which was not an easy job even though she worked out. She threw her clothes into the yard—coat, scarf, gloves, shirt, bra. They lay scattered in the snow, dark against light. When Nick appeared, she threw her jeans and panties at him. “What is the matter with you, Nick?”

“With me?”

“Yes, you. All I wanted to do was to make peace, and you have to go and ruin it.”

“I’m not the one who choked me.”

“You started it,” she yelled, shivering, as he walked across the deck, toward the house. “Don’t you walk away from me,” she called, but he already had.

Kaye, rattled, slipped into the hot tub. The hot water prickled against her butt and the backs of her legs. Wasn’t there fighting enough without him having to start a brawl? People had been mad at him plenty over the years and it had never bothered him before.

Maybe it was about money. She knew he was upset that the White Elephant hadn’t sold, but it would eventually. In spring, probably. Then he could pay back his loans or what all. The ban on building would end in a couple of months, and he could tear down the split-levels and build homes on those lots, and design something nice for Suzanne and Grant. Why did he have to make such a stink about everything? If he wanted the new house to sell more quickly, he ought to fix it up, put in floors and fixtures so the buyers saw a home instead of a work in progress.

Kaye had told him so herself not long ago. He didn’t immediately quash the idea. She’d been so excited she went over to the new house the next day with a paint-sample fan, a notebook, and some decorating magazines. She imagined yellow walls in the kitchen—Amber Waves, perhaps—and Palladian Blue in the living room. Blond wood floors were popular now; she’d scatter some thick area rugs around to make it cozy. She went up the unfinished steps to the second floor gingerly. One of the rooms smelled surprisingly lemony. That room, too, would be yellow or even toward orange—possibly Sunflower! It would be a sunny house even on dark days. Even the basement had possibilities. You could put in a little kitchen and turn it into a mother-in-law suite or even an Airbnb.