She blew a small raspberry as she finished her note. ‘Not likely, my lover. Been shut these last two years. Nasty old place. Got signs up all over.’
‘Who owns it, do you know?’
‘Oh, aye, same bugger who owns all of us, only he ain’t put no signs on us—though I ‘ear that be ‘bout to change.’
Aleksey frowned. ‘Do you mean the Duke of Cornwall?’
‘Him’s the one. Mam went to wave a flag at ‘im t’other day. Only weren’t the red, white an’ blue one, if you get my drift.’
‘So, it just sits there empty? I am surprised squatters haven’t taken it over.’
She laughed. ‘Oh, one or two done tried it. Guess what?’
He narrowed his eyes. ‘They leave?’
She nodded and quirked a lip at his clothes. ‘An’ they all seem to have a little swim after ‘s well. Funny old thing that. Mind you, some don’t come back at all. You putting the old place in your book then?’ She glanced at Tim’s tea. ‘Mention the Slope, if’n you like the scones.’ She swung away to get them their food.
Aleksey leaned back in his chair. The sun had been overtaken now by the cloudbank. It was noticeably colder without its warming rays—the first really cool day they’d experienced in the islands. Nearly October.
Sitting there, the peace and serenity of the place hit him once more. It was so incredibly beautiful with its pretty little houses and cobbled harbour, the diving seabirds, the boats with bunting and, of course, Benjamin Rider-Mikkelsen. Despite their company, he stretched out a hand and let it rest on Ben’s thigh, just gently stroking the dense muscle through the damp fabric of his jeans.
Squeezy suddenly began to snigger. ‘Your fucking faces when I came out.’
Aleksey shot him a look, annoyed. He didn’t like the moron having something on him. He narrowed his eyes, considering. ‘Bet?’
Squeezy sobered, immediately interested. Ben looked between them and said warningly to his friend, ‘Don’t. He cheats.’
Aleksey looked theatrically hurt. ‘Spend the entire night in there on your own, and I’ll buy you a plane.’
‘Whoa. Fuck.’ Squeezy looked genuinely and grievously torn. Then he recovered and rejoined, ‘You spend a night in there onyourown, and I’ll give you what I found in the attic.’
Damn. This was annoying. How many times would this item be brought into a bet? It was probably little more than a dust-bunny, and he’d end up being the butt of that joke.
Ben suddenly intervened. ‘No.’ He pointed at Squeezy. ‘I don’t care what you do. Try it if you want to.’ Then he pointed at him. ‘You don’t spend any nights away from me, remember? So if you go, I go, and I’mnotgoing.’
Tim began to push his glasses up, despite his jam-sticky fingers. ‘What are you all talking about? No! Don’t tell me. God, I hate you all so much sometimes. It’ssounfair.’
All laughing at Tim now, which was becoming something of a bad habit, the bet was pushed to one side. Not forgotten by either of them, Aleksey suspected, but not mentioned again while they waited for their food. When the woman returned, Aleksey asked her, as if they’d had no break in their conversation, ‘My book?’
‘Aye. Askin’ yer questions for yer book we was told. All I’m saying is, little mention of the café would be much appreciated.’
‘Someone told you I was writing a book? Who?’
‘Oh, everyone, my lover. You be hard to miss, begging yer pardon for stating the bleeding obvious. Don’tlooklike no writer they said, and I reckon they’re spot on ‘bout that.’
Squeezy took the opportunity to ask in one of his very serious, very concerned ways, ‘What do writers look like?’
She stared at the idiot for a moment then nodded back in his direction. ‘Not like ‘im.’ Then she flicked her head to Tim, who at that very moment lifted his eyes myopically from studying the photographs he’d taken on his phone, his glasses now on the end of his nose, and said with some authority,
‘Like ‘im. No offence meant.’
* * *
Chapter Twenty-Three
They didn’t get to Light Island until it was dark.
By the time they’d caught the tiny cruise ferry back to St Mary’s and hired a boat and done some shopping and collected their bags from the hotel, they were forced to motor across the shipping lane after sunset.
