Huffing, I dropped to all fours on the rug-covered floor and peered under the bed. Alongside more neatly folded blankets and a spare pair of boots, lay my phone. I tugged it over using the power cable. As I blew dust off the screen, it lit up with another call.
Bonnie’s face beamed at me. She’d taken the picture, had chosen her ringtone and programmed her number. Then she’d shoved the phone into my hand and told me not to be a reclusive loser.
I pressed my thumb to the screen and brought the phone to my ear. ‘Hello, Bon?—’
‘Have you been ignoring your phone again?’
I winced, her tone enough to cow me across the distance separating us. ‘I always answer when you call.’
‘Callum, you’re a fucking caveman and you have absolutely brought this on yourself.’
Dread prickled in my stomach. ‘Brought what on myself?’
‘If you’d read any of my numerous texts over the last few weeks, you’d know a student botanist was applying for funding to study the undisturbed flora on the island for three months. If you’d bothered to check in, you’d know I thought the best idea, when he was ready to come over, was if he stayed in the mountains. If you looked at your phone like a vaguely normal member of society, you would know his funding was approved yesterday and he arrived on the island this afternoon.’
My brain struggled with the sudden influx of information. I didn’t talk to other people much and it always took a few moments to readjust. Especially when it was Bonnie, and she was berating me.
‘How does any of that affect me?’ I asked, hoping against hope that for once in my life I’d gotten lucky and an avalanche of crap wasn’t about to land on me.
‘Oh, it affects you very much, my baby brother,’ Bonnie sneered. I could imagine her teeth flashing. If I was in reaching distance, she would have pulled me into a headlock. Her affection was always dealt out violently.
‘Please don’t say he’s staying here,’ I whined. That was the logical conclusion to everything she’d said. If someone wanted to study flora, then they needed to get awayfrom the village, and there was only one habitable place to stay up away from everyone else.
‘No can do, Cally.’ Now I could imagine a look of barely contained glee on my sister’s face. ‘Consider this punishment for blowing me off the last million times I invited you over.’
Shame warmed my face. Bonnie hadn’t ordered me to come down, so there was no compulsion to join her and her husband in their cottage. I’d been able to ignore her summons, again and again and again. I’d assumed she would stop asking, not that she would devise a new and creative way to torture me.
‘When will he get here?’ I ground out. The living situation Bonnie had arranged wouldn’t work, but I wasn’t about to take that out on this poor flower man. He couldn’t have known the mess he was walking into when he asked to study the flora of our island.
‘No clue. Hopefully soon.’
I frowned. ‘How do you not know?’
‘Another of the times when you acting like a functioning member of the pack would be handy is you occasionally coming down to the village at times other than when you have to restock your essential supplies. Then you could have told me there was a rockfall on the road.’
‘Bonnie, did you leave him to make his way up here on his own?’ I asked slowly.
‘Yup.’ She did that annoying popping thing at the end of the word like she always did when she was feeling particularly smug.
‘Is it snowing in the village?’
‘No,’ Bonnie said. I waited for it. ‘Oh, shit.’
‘Yeah.’ I strode out of my bedroom and towards where I’dshucked off my boots moments before. ‘Where did you leave him?’
‘About a mile or so from you.’ Bonnie’s words crashed into one another. ‘I thought he would be fine. Apart from the rocks, the road is good. He only has a couple of bags and I thought he’d get to you while I came back to organise people to clear the road.’
‘He’s human?’ I tugged on my boots.
‘Yes,’ Bonnie said, her voice weak. ‘Hold on.’
I set the phone down while I tied my laces.
‘Okay,’ Bonnie said as I raised the phone back to my ear. ‘His heartbeat is fine. A little fast, but nothing to indicate he’s in real trouble or anything. Just go out there and get him before he turns into an icicle.’
‘Lovely as always to talk to you.’ I lowered the phone and shoved my thumb at the button to disconnect the call.
Throwing it in the vague direction of my sofa, I yanked the cabin door open and nudged the friendly goat waiting on the doorstep out of the way. A thick flurry of snow tickled my face.
