Sean has stopped shouting his threats. Grace has stopped barking. There’s just the sound of sails slapping in the slack wind.
‘Sean?’ Mine’s a lone voice in the dark. I hold up my hand and strain to see.
There’s a sloshing noise and the hooker appears in a streak of silver moonlight. Sean’s shoulders are droopedwith disappointment. I have a sudden urge to hug him, to tell him it’s all right, but I don’t know if everything will be all right and I certainly can’t hug him. He looks up at me and tosses me a rope, which I catch and help tie up the boat.
‘Good work, English,’ he says casually, slinging his arm around my shoulder as we walk back to the cottage, ‘let’s get to bed.’ My heart does a silly skip.
Inside the cottage we slip off our wet clothes and hang them up.
‘Pass me your clothes, they’re soaked,’ he says in a low voice.
‘What?’
‘Your tights, leggings whatever you call them, take them off,’ he says firmly. ‘I’ll put them by the fire.’ He tuts at my reluctance. ‘OK, I promise not to look, but just take them off,’ he says firmly, and turns his back to me. He’s still in his wet joggers too.
Feeling very self-conscious, I slip my leggings off and hand them to him. Then I shoot into the bathroom, grab a towel and wrap it round my waist. When I come out the fire’s blazing and there are two glasses on the table, a bottle of whiskey beside them.
‘Something to help you sleep.’ He picks up a glass and hands it to me.
Sleep? I might just keel over at this rate!
‘Who do you think it was?’ I ask, watching the orange glow from the fire light up the little room and sipping at the whiskey. It still burns but it’s nice. Sean sits by the fire on the settee. I pull up a chair from the table.
‘Someone who wasn’t expecting me to be here.’ He sips his drink.
Whoever it was certainly didn’t seem to be put off by me being here, but they’re scared of Sean. I have a damn good idea who it is. But if I tell Sean he’ll just charge into town, confirming what everyone already thinks of him. I just need to work out how to stop them.
Thenext morning I’m up early, baking. The radio’s on quietly. I hear a car on the lane and run to look out of the window, just in case the cheeky buggers are coming back for more, by road this time. But it’s Margaret’s little Fiesta. Sean appears from outside, hair messed up from the wind.
‘Oysters, great for a hangover!’ He grins.
‘I haven’t got a hangover,’ I smile back, but my headache says different. ‘And you are never going to persuade me that eating them is a good idea!’
‘Fi!’ Margaret raps on the door and lets herself in. She’s practically bubbling over with excitement. ‘You wanna see the entrants we’ve had for the competition, they’re coming from all over and ticket sales have gone mad! Grab your coat and come down to the café. You have to see the website. Oh. Morning, Sean.’ She stops to flirt as he heads to the kettle.
Sean does a good job of hiding how pleased he is at the news, but the fact he’s not frowning means something.
‘A big success then?’ I say, loud enough for Sean to hear, and give him a smile of satisfaction. He tries not to smile back as he puts coffee into his mug.
‘You were right, I think is the phrase you’re looking for,’ I tease.
‘Well, if we’d left it to you it would’ve been a disaster.’ The atmosphere in the cottage suddenly turns chilly. Nancy has followed Margaret into the cottage. This woman seems to have a habit of turning up without being heard. ‘All that rustic nonsense. Thank God the TV company want to invest in something with some class.’ Nancy looks around at the clothes drying on the chair in front of the fire and looks sideways at me, then out to sea. ‘God, this place is hell.’
‘It’s feckin’ busy,’ Sean says, heading into his bedroom.
‘So can you come and see the website?’ Margaret’s likeTigger, jumping up and down.
‘If that’s OK with Sean,’ I shout in the direction of his room.
‘Fine!’ he shouts back.
‘I have these to deliver too.’ I pick up the box of brownies. ‘Wait,’ I tell Margaret as we head for the car. There’s something I want to take with me, and I grab another cardboard box from the shed and fill it with oyster shells from the pile by the front gate.
‘You see, they’re coming from all over. This one’s coming from Sweden,’ Margaret points at the screen in Gerald’s café.
‘Fi, love, that last lot went in a flash,’ Gerald grins as I hand over the batch of brownies. He gives me a steaming cup of tea and holds up a hand when I offer to pay for it. I thank him, take off my coat and join Margaret at the screen.
‘It’s great.’ I sip the tea.
