Emma Novak owns a demanding cat, one of a bonded pair that lost his brother when Emma lost her husband to a brain aneurysm. She has drawn comfort from the cat’s presence, but a year after her husband passed away, Emma is still fighting the urge to stay in bed and hide her head under the covers.
Her younger sister, Glenn, is also Emma’s best friend. Glenn is divorced and lives in Cherry Hill. Their love for each other is absolute. The women meet once a month and drive to a nursing home in Toms River to visit their mother, Vivian, who suffers from Alzheimer’s. While Vivian doesn’t recognize her daughters anymore, she does remember her Uncle Nathan, and worries about his future now that he lives alone in her house.
While Vivian’s daughter’s cope with the loss of their mother’s memories, they are also dealing with how they will pay for Vivian’s care. Their mother’s expenses exceed her income, and while Glenn is eager to sell the old house, Emma, who is fond of Nathan, understands her mother’s concern for his welfare. Nathan is quite attached to the old place and Emma fears it will be hard to convince him to leave the house.
While Glenn contacts real estate agents, Emma visits Uncle Nathan and explains to him that the two-hundred-year-old house, which suffered terrible damage during Hurricane Sandy, will have to be sold so that she and Glenn can pay for Vivian’s care. She offers him a home with her, but Nathan, who loves the old house, tells Emma that he knows where he can get the money to take care of Vivian. He says it was stolen from him, and if Emma will help him find it, they won’t have to sell the house.
There’s only one problem – the money was stolen by a pirate sometime in the early 1800s, shortly after Nathan died...
