‘You too.’ He pointed at the car in front of her, which was already moving. The car behind her also had its engine running, waiting for her to move forward. ‘Have fun on your adventures, Verity Callaway.’
They stared at each other for a moment.
‘I don’t suppose…’ Feeling impulsive, she was just about to ask whether he would be free for dinner tonight, when the car behind began to impatiently beep. The driver wound down his window. ‘Come on, we’re moving.’ He gestured irritably.
‘You’d best get a move on.’ Sam turned and walked around to the driver’s side of his car and climbed inside. He took one last look in Verity’s direction and gave her a sexy smile as he started the engine and began to follow the long line of vehicles in front of him.
‘Damn, double damn,’ she uttered under her breath. Thanks to the impatient motorist behind her she’d missed the opportunity to ask Sam out, but there was nothing she could do about it now. With the handsome stranger still very much on her mind she drove off the ferry and followed the exit signs. Sam’s car was nowhere in sight, but as she knew he would be crossing the causeway as soon as it was safe, she hoped that she might bump into him there. There was something about Sam Wilson that had her wanting to know more.
ChapterThree
Verity glanced at the spectacular view out of the window as she followed the signs to the causeway. The dark clouds seemed to have been left behind for now and the sun was breaking through over the picturesque harbour.
The coastal town of Sea’s End was of outstanding beauty, with its colourful waterfront with stunning white sands bordering the small harbour, watched over by the castle on the hill. In the distance, Puffin Island was surrounded by the glistening sea. Taking a right turn she followed the road signs towards the seafront car park and pulled into a space. Just in front of the car park was a slip road where cars were already lining up, queuing to cross the causeway as soon as the tide turned.
Immediately behind the car park was a row of shops including a bakery. Now her sickness had totally subsided, Verity was ravenous. As she walked into the bakery, the delicious aroma transported her back to the traditional French patisserie she’d visited with Ava on a girly weekend away in Paris. Spoiled for choice, her eyes swooped over the mouth-watering single-portion quiches, freshly made sandwiches, crusty loaves and buttery pastries. She made a selection, knowing she could keep some of it for later this evening and possibly the next morning.
Sitting in the front of her van, she tucked into a crusty ham baguette and admired the view, completely different from this morning now that the storm had abated. Hearing a notification of an incoming text message, she grabbed her phone. It was Kev, letting her know he’d replaced the dustbin in the garden during his postal round. Quickly, Verity snapped a photo of her view and pinged it to him. His reply landed almost immediately.
It’s all right for some!
His return photo was one of the puddled street with black bins standing in a long line, like soldiers on guard. But they weren’t the first thing Verity noticed in the photograph. No, the first thing she noticed was her ex, standing on his drive. She swallowed and studied the photograph.
How was it you thought you knew someone when all along they’d been leading a double life? The number of lies he must have engineered… It floored her. And she’d believed every one. His trips ‘away with work’, the ‘residential training courses’ he’d attended. He’d been away for the same week every year for the past few years and it suddenly dawned on her that it was more than likely he’d been on holiday withher.
All she’d ever wanted was to settle down, have a family and live the fairytale, but that was now the last thing on her mind.
Determined to make the most of the next six months whilst she figured out exactly what she wanted from the future, Verity deleted the photograph then flicked over to her Instagram. Within seconds she’d scrubbed her profile clean until there was no trace of the past or her ex. Good riddance. It was not like there was anything to mourn as she’d apparently never really known him at all.
Feeling surprisingly relaxed, she watched the world go by from the driver’s seat of the van for the next ten minutes. There was something about watching the water lap against the sand that brought a sense of calm. After finishing her baguette, Verity decided to join the queue of vehicles lining up to cross the causeway. As soon as she was in the line, she cut the engine. Feeling a bit tired after the long drive and the ferry crossing, she climbed into the back of the van and snuggled on top of her duvet. Within moments, she was asleep.
* * *
The next thing she knew, she was waking up to the sound of knocking on the van window. Startled, she jumped up and popped her head through the curtain into the front of the van. Standing there was a policeman. Verity quickly wound down the window and began apologising profusely. She’d clearly been asleep for a couple of hours and the line of cars in front of her had disappeared. She was now holding up the long traffic behind her.
Through the open window, the policeman called, ‘Have you driven the causeway before?’
‘I haven’t,’ replied Verity.
‘Shallow water or seaweed might cover numerous potholes. There’s been quite a few flat tyres recently, so drive carefully. All that said, some drivers lose themselves in the excitement of driving the causeway for the very first time and drive exceeding slow. Can I ask you to keep the traffic moving.’
Verity nodded and he waved her on. At the start of the causeway there was a short bridge and next to it a refuge shelter for drivers of vehicles that had been caught out by the tide. ‘Well, we aren’t that daft to be getting caught out, are we, Hetty?’ said Verity, taking in her surroundings, which were a little surreal. The causeway was around three miles in length, the first mile through the sea, the next two snaking along the side of the island. The mainland was about a mile from the western end of the island as the puffin flies.
As she drew closer, there was a sign welcoming everyone to Puffin Island. The sign was of course decorated with a couple of puffins. It was incredible to think all of her granny’s stories were genuine and that once she stepped onto the island everything would be familiar. Verity felt a wave of emotion.
With the postcard from Puffin Island still dominating her thoughts, she took in the island itself. The whole place looked like a little piece of heaven and she was confident that she’d made the right decision to divert her plans. She followed the signs to the island’s car park and soon found a vacant space overlooking the sea under the trees. Just ahead there was an information hut, and attached to a board outside was a poster with the tide times. She grabbed her bag, locked up the van, then walked on to study the poster. She needed to make tomorrow’s ferry to Amsterdam, and according to the tide crossing times, it would next be safe to cross at 3.30 a.m. Staring at the poster she realised she needed to make a choice: sleep on Puffin Island and get up extremely early, or head over to Sea’s End and find a safe place to park there. Looking towards Hetty, she smiled. Whatever she decided, she knew her time on Puffin Island was going to be special. She was re-living a part of her granny’s past.
Henrietta Callaway had been a huge part of Verity’s life. In fact, she was more of a mother to Verity than Verity’s own mother had been. Verity’s relationship with her grandparents had been one of love and warmth, and as a child and a teenager she had spent more time with them than with her own mother, whose priority had always been herself. Granted, Alison Callaway had been eighteen when Verity was born, but she had chosen to carry on living her life without any responsibilities and always did what was best for herself.
With the rain stopped and the sun breaking through, Verity suspected it might be a clear night. She made the decision there and then. Even if it was only for a few hours, she would stay on Puffin Island, open up the skylight in the roof and sleep under the stars in her travelling van.
Checking her watch, she saw she had one hour to explore before sampling the scrumptious afternoon cream tea she’d booked at Betty Rose’s Tearoom. On the side of the information hut was a map of the island and Verity took a quick photograph with her phone before setting off along the shallow stream that ran at the side of the cobbled pavement. Within seconds, she found herself on Lighthouse Lane. As she took in the magnificent view, she realised that the Google images of Puffin Island hadn’t done it justice. The majestic lighthouse towered in the distance, standing tall against the cerulean sky over Blue Water Bay. Puffin Island was utterly perfect.
Up ahead, the row of rainbow cottages lined Lighthouse Lane, while here at the very beginning of the lane was Cosy Nook Cottage. Verity gave a tiny gasp. It was real, the cottage she had always claimed she would one day live in, every time her granny mentioned it in her stories. The whimsical storybook cottage was charming, and captured her imagination just as it had when she was a child. The asymmetrical shapes, the mismatched windows, the deeply pitched thatched roof, the oak archway with tumbling blush roses…it was everything she’d ever dreamed of. She wondered if the place even had a secret room, revealed by pulling a book on the bookshelf, just as her granny had told her. She smiled at the notion; some things in her granny’s stories had to be made up. Wondering who was lucky enough to live there, she carried on walking past the line of rainbow cottages, each with a gorgeous name and just as Instagram-worthy as the one before it.
The cobbled lane was busy, with people milling in and out of the independent shops, and children laughing and running towards the cove, waving fishing nets above their heads. Verity stopped outside The Story Shop, Lighthouse Lane’s second-hand bookshop. A couple of trestle tables on the pavement were piled high with boxes of classics. Verity stopped and picked one up.
The book still in her hand, she stepped inside the bookshop. Every shelf was packed with books – travel books, classics, thrillers and romcoms. In the corner an old-fashioned till stood on a wooden counter, and sitting behind the till was a girl who Verity guessed was in her early twenties. ‘What a fabulous bookshop,’ said Verity, placing the book on the counter and looking around with admiration.
