Blue Skies Over Wildflower Lock (The Wildflower Lock)

Chapter 33

Daisy didn’t even open the hatch for the coffee shop. There was no way she would be able to focus on work with the dog to deal with. Her chest felt tight with the anxiety of it. If the dog did have a home, perhaps near one of their earlier moorings, she had just taken him even further away. So along with getting to Theo, finding the collie’s owners was now her top priority.

Having looked up vets in the area, Daisy found one only fifteen minutes’ walk away. She had rung them and explained the situation, and they had been more than happy for her to bring him straight in, although that meant she had another issue to contend with.

‘I think he’ll just follow me,’ Daisy said as she stood outside on the jetty. She had already walked from one end to the other and the dog had stayed close to her heel the entire time, his tail wagging. Given how much he’d already followed her, she knew she could probably take him all the way to the vets in the same way, but it didn’t feel right. Even some of the most regular visitors at Wildflower Lock, who brought their dogs almost every day, always checked with Daisy if they minded them being off their lead outside her boat. With her mind made up, she headed back into the September Rose, found a spare length of rope, and made a makeshift leash.

‘Are you sure you don’t want to come with me?’ she asked Yvonne one last time. ‘It’s a nice-looking town. We could always have a walk around the shops?’ Daisy still hadn’t mentioned to Yvonne that she’d heard her having a nightmare, or calling out her late husband’s name in her sleep. It wasn’t a subject she was sure how, or even if, she should broach, but she couldn’t help but feel that Yvonne getting out of the boat and having a walk outside might be a good idea. It would also mean she wasn’t alone in taking the dog to the vets. Sadly, Yvonne shook her head.

‘I’ll stay here if it’s all right with you,’ Yvonne said. ‘I need to book us into a marina for this evening, and to be honest, I’m feeling a little out of sorts. I think it’s been so long since I took the Ariadne on the water that I’ve lost my sea legs.’

‘I understand,’ Daisy said. ‘Well, hopefully, I won’t be long. And I may or may not be on my own when I come back.’

Daisy kept the makeshift leash taut as she walked, but in reality, she didn’t think she needed it at all. The dog stayed close, even stopping when they came to the road. It took a quick tug to make him sit down while they waited for the first set of traffic lights to change, but by the time they were on their third set, he was sitting instinctively, as if he knew what was expected.

‘I don’t know if you’ve done this before, or you’re just very smart,’ Daisy said, looking down at the dog. His tongue hung from his mouth as if he was smiling. A moment later, the little man on the traffic lights turned green, and the pair of them were striding across the road. Daisy was only halfway across when she spotted a man jogging on the other side of the road. His hair was jet black and there was something about him that looked remarkably similar, though it was only as he started striding away from her that she realised why that was.

‘It’s him!’ Daisy said, more to herself than to the dog. ‘It’s the guy from the marsh!’