Chapter 16
SIXTEEN
The grass is greener on the dangerous side
Georgie
Patrick beeps the horn a few minutes later. My stomach flips nervously as I grab my bag and hurry outside.
He’s parked in a Land Rover that looks like it’s endured multiple Highland winters. One muscled arm rests lazily over the steering wheel.
The second he spots me, he kills the engine and strides around to my side.
God help me. He looks exactly like the rugged fisherman I’d pictured when I wrote The List. His navy T-shirt stretches across broad shoulders, his hair is wind-mussed, and his rough stubble suggests he forgot to bother with a razor.
“You really don’t have to,” I say, cheeks already burning as he reaches for the door handle.
He huffs, as if my protest is irrelevant. “My mum would box my ears if I didn’t.”
I smile. Somehow, I don’t think anyone in the world could box Patrick McLaren’s ears. But I like that he believes it.
I clamber into the passenger seat, and the cab fills my senses: salt air, warm leather, and that mix of masculine soap and him.
My thighs squeak against the seat, and I tug self-consciously at my shorts. My legs look like uncooked chicken.
“We’re heading to the other side of the island,” he says, settling back behind the wheel. “Departing from the village of Stein. Ever been?”
“It’s supposed to be really pretty,” I say, clutching my guidebooks. “It’s got a Michelin-star restaurant there, right?”
“It does.” He shifts gears, and the Land Rover lurches forward.
“Why does Skye have so many Michelin-star places? I counted three, including the hotel.”
He shrugs, steering with one arm draped casually.
“We’ve got the sea in our backyard. Best fish you can get, pulled from the water that morning.
People who know what they’ve got and treat it like gold.
” His mouth tips into a smirk. “Better than a fast-food chicken shop on every corner, like in London, right?”
I giggle, mostly from nerves. “I guess so.”
I glance around the cab’s no-frills interior. “I pictured you in a Porsche, not this.”
He lifts a brow. “Bit of a waste on single-track roads. You’re lucky if you hit forty most days. Plus, try hauling diving gear or climbing equipment in a sports car.”
I nod, watching him handle a tight bend like he’s done it a thousand times.
I like that he’s not a knobhead with a flashy sports car compensating for whatever men usually compensate for. Tiny willy energy, I guess.
Not that Patrick needs to worry about tiny willy anything.
“Which area are we heading to from Stein?” I ask.
“North. Deeper water past the Lochbay Islands. We’ll pass a few nesting colonies—gulls, ducks, geese. Then out to the Ardmore Arches where the puffins nest. If we’re lucky, we might see minke whales.”
North and deeper sound like words people use right before a tragic headline about tourists lost at sea.
But I gave myself a stern pep talk about being brave.
Despite knowing this is obligation-to-Jake tourism, there’s something thoughtful about the fact he’s planned this. He’s not just taking me out on his boat but plotting a route to tick off the wildlife I wanted to see.
“Let me guess. You’re the captain and the tour guide?”
“I am.” His eyes meet mine for a second, and something warm flickers there. “Do you feel safe with me this time?”
I laugh, except it comes out breathless. “Safe from what? Drowning? Getting eaten by a whale?”
“Among other maritime dangers.”
“I don’t know what your experience is with boats. But surely there’s less chance of death than in the helicopter? You crash a helicopter, it’s splat. With a boat, I can… float. Maybe.”
“Such faith,” he says dryly. “I’ll do my best to keep you alive.”
“Is this a control thing? You don’t like anyone else navigating you places, so you have to master every mode of transport?”
“Maybe,” he says, eyes on the road. “Mostly it’s about not sitting on the sidelines. You watch someone flying, or cutting across open water…” He shrugs. “I’d rather be in it than clapping from the shore. I don’t like sitting still.”
“So you have a fear of missing out more than a fear of dying?”
“Fear of dying’s a waste of time. Fear’s the quickest way to miss the best bits of living.”
That hits me in the chest. Riri’s voice surfaces in my head like she’s sitting right there in the back seat: Say yes to adventure.
“But you’ve had near disasters,” I say. “I know you once fell twenty feet while ice climbing.”
His brow lifts. “Been keeping tabs on me, have you?”
My cheeks warm. “On Jake. My brother. And I know he waters down the scary bits so I don’t panic every time he leaves the country.”
“Smart man.”
“How did you lose the toe?”
“Frostbite.” He takes the corner so sharply I grab the door handle. “Antarctica expedition with Jake. We got caught in a whiteout for two days. By the time we made it back to base camp, my toe was a frozen fish finger.”
My jaw drops. “Oh my God, that’s horrifying!”
Exactly the sort of detail that makes me question whether I should be on a boat with this man.
He flashes a wolfish grin, like the whole thing’s some fond holiday anecdote. “Medic took one look and said, ‘That little piggy’s not going to market.’ Snapped it off right there.”
“Snapped it off?” My hand flies over my mouth. “Like a… like a Kit-Kat?”
“Pretty much.” He winks at me. “Didn’t even bleed. Frozen solid. Jake fainted the second it cracked. Big tough adventurer, one crack sound and he was out cold.”
“That’s—ugh—that must’ve been excruciating.”
“The body’s clever. Goes into shock to protect you from pain. I’ve been fortunate over the years. Mostly superficial injuries. Handful of broken bones here and there.”
“Patrick, your toe literally snapped off. That’s not superficial, that’s horror-movie material.” I shake my head. “We could not be more opposite.”
His eyes flick sideways, amused. “Because I’d rather be clinging to an ice wall in a blizzard than lying on a beach?”
“Because you hear ‘frostbite’ and think ‘acceptable risk.’”
A deep chuckle rumbles out of him. “Alright then, Fitzgerald—what’s your idea of the perfect holiday?”
I fidget with my seatbelt, feeling very boring. “Just being somewhere relaxing and pretty with people I love. Reading books. Eating too much. Not worrying about whether my extremities might snap off.” I pause. “I guess I just want to feel happy. And safe.”
Safe. The word drops between us like I’ve admitted something deeply unsexy.
His mouth twitches. This man craves avalanches the way I crave biscuits. He runs toward danger; I run toward the kettle.
“We’re all looking for safety in different ways,” he says finally.
“What? Your holidays are the opposite of safe.”
“They look that way. But when I push myself, I learn exactly where my limits are. I know how far I can push and still survive. There’s no greater safety than knowing your own capabilities.”
“Huh.” I chew my lip, sneaking a glance at him.
“Maybe you’re right. Maybe safety isn’t about avoiding risk.
It’s about knowing who you are when it all goes wrong.
” I pause. “Although, to be fair, nothing really goes wrong when you’re reading on a beach.
Worst case scenario, a seagull shits on your chips. Or, you know, tsunami.”
“See? You do live dangerously. Seagulls are vicious bastards.”
I bite my lip to stop my grin. “Did Jake really faint when your toe snapped off?”
He chuckles. “Dropped like a stone. I wish I’d filmed it. Big surprise, huh?”
“Not to me. Jake hasn’t always been Mr. Tough.”
That earns me a raised brow. “Sounds like a story I need to hear.”
I roll my eyes, already blushing. “Our last holiday with Dad, Jake swam straight into a jellyfish. He was thrashing about, shouting he was dying. I was the one who dragged him to shore. I was fourteen. He was twenty, six feet tall, bawling like he’d been shot.
To be fair, the jellyfish did sting him very close to the family jewels. ”
Patrick laughs. For a second, I glow under it. Then the warmth fizzles, replaced by a strange hollow. Was I braver at fourteen than I am now?
“I’m saving that story for later,” he says. “He’ll never live it down.”
This feels shockingly like banter.
His gaze drops to the bird-watching guidebook in my lap. “You’ve annotated the whole thing.”
I glance down at the highlighted, color-coded pages. Sticky tabs stick out.
Heat floods my face, like he’s caught me with porn instead of puffin facts.
“I wanted to know what to look for,” I mumble. “Besides puffins. I like to be prepared. And... birds are nice.”
“Birds are nice,” he repeats, so dry I brace for mockery.
“You think that’s sad, don’t you? That I’ve color-coded a bird book for a boat trip?”
But he doesn’t smirk. Doesn’t tease. He glances over at me, and his voice drops lower. “No, Georgie. I think it’s sweet.”
My heart forgets how to beat. It just stops, stutters, then races to catch up.
“We’re here,” he says, breaking the spell.
I follow his gaze to the harbor below. A small fishing boat rocks in the water.
Oh God. Just the two of us. On a boat. For hours.
Patrick
After showing her the puffin colony, I take us further along the coast.
I’ve never seen anyone so thrilled about watching birds puke half-digested fish into each other’s throats. Georgie called it “absolutely brilliant” and thanked me for letting her witness “authentic feeding behaviors.”
“Oh my God, look!” She points toward the cliffs. “Are those fulmars?”
Binoculars are up before I can answer. Her hair whips across her cheek as her brow furrows in fierce concentration and her lips part.
Hard not to admit it’s endearing as hell.
“Aye,” I say, easing the throttle back. I nose us in closer to the cliffs. “Nesting season. They’ll stick around all summer.”
“They’re incredible,” she breathes, never lowering the binoculars. “The book said they can live up to forty years. Forty years of flying all over the world and coming back to the same cliff face.”
“Loyal bastards.”
“Like they know exactly where they belong.”