“Sure I can’t tempt you?” Victoria said. The smoothie was the exact color and consistency of wallpaper paste.
“I’m sure,” she said hastily. “Shall we go outside?”
The only shaded area was toward the back of the long garden, between the outbuilding and the mottled wall beyond.
“Any idea what you’re going to use this barn for?” Skye asked, careful to keep her tone neutral.
Victoria tapped a finger against her lips, brow furrowing.
“Adam has some kind of idea about a darkroom, but I don’t know. Feels a bit silly to me, when everything is digitalized these days. I guess it could be an exercise studio, but that would be expensive, and we may not even stay here past the two years.”
Skye crossed to the outbuilding and peered through one of the dust-coated windows. Inside, the wide space was clear of junk, and she could see no holes in the walls or cracks in the ceiling. All it would require would be a sweep, a spruce, a few bits of furniture.
“I was wondering…” She turned back to Victoria, who had taken a large sip of her drink and seemed to be having some trouble convincing herself to swallow it. “If you’d let me use it from time to time?”
“Sure,” Victoria said through a grimace. “I mean, I’d have to check in with Adam, but I can’t see it being a problem. What do you want it for?”
“That’s the thing,” she said. “It’s not strictly for me. I don’t know if you’ve heard that I’ve been teaching George?”
Victoria shifted in her flip-flops.
“I heard.”
“Well, it would be great to have a classroom. Somewhere where I can set things up.”
“You want this whole area just for George?”
“And Iris and Ajax—you know, from the shop? I’ve started teaching them English, and I suspect there might be quite a few children on the island who could benefit from some extra schooling. If I had the space, then—”
“I don’t think so,” Victoria said.
“It wouldn’t be every day,” Skye hastened. “Only a few times a week, and I’d make sure we kept the noise down.”
“One kid is fine,” she said. “A whole bunch of them? No way.”
“How about three?” Skye said tentatively, but Victoria shook her head.
“Sorry,” she said. “It’s not that I—I just— You’ll have to find some other place.”
“Oh. OK.” Skye fell silent, at a loss for how to respond. Victoria’s entire demeanor had changed, her easy slouch replaced by a stillness that felt almost brittle. Was it Adam she was worried about? Was he so averse to noise that he wouldn’t be able to focus if a few children occasionally passed through? But that made no sense, not from a couple who until recently had been living in one of the busiest—and loudest—cities in the world. Maybe they simply didn’t like children, although that seemed ridiculous.
“I should get back to my yoga,” Victoria said briskly. “Unless there was anything else?”
Skye shook her head, words scattering before she could gather them. Moments later, she found herself out on the hillside again, the sky too bright, too empty.
She had the creeping sense that whatever had passed between them, whatever had sharpened the edges of Victoria’s mood, was only the surface of something much deeper.
Thirty-five
It was four days before Andreas returned.
From her spot high on the ridge, Skye caught sight of his truck winding along the road, a flicker of relief sparking before uncertainty took over. It was still early, not yet nine, but she’d been awake for hours, roused from sleep by the insistent clang of church bells.
Sunday again. No ferries. No Martyn.
Dust rose as the truck crunched over the hillside, pulling up not at her house but at the sisters’. Andreas climbed out, his dark hair catching the light. Skye watched him throw a quick glance over his shoulder before heading for the door. She didn’t think he’d spotted her up on the mountainside. There had been no wave, no nod of greeting, no signal whatsoever.
The warmth of the morning seemed to slip away as he disappeared inside. Skye lowered her gaze and traced a crack in the earth with the toe of her shoe. Not far from where she sat, rockroses had opened their delicate pink faces to the sun, small bursts of color against the wide, arid gold landscape.
