Chapter 19
Chapter Nineteen
KIT
The harbour has always been my sanctuary.
Sunday is prep day, when we set up for the week ahead, Jude and me ensuring the smooth running of the family business, while Dad stands there and acts like a harbour master.
It’s my favourite day of the week: a bit of work, time with Maisie, and a huge roast. Family Day.
Today, though, the familiar sounds of creaking boats and calling gulls feel different. Everything feels different. The salt air tastes sweeter. The early sunlight seems brighter. Even the ache in my shoulders from hauling rope feels like something to savour rather than endure.
I know exactly why. And judging by Jude’s shit-eating grin as he hands me a Thermos of coffee, he knows why too.
‘Sleep well, brother?’ he asks, his face punchable and smug, wrapped up in his weatherproof jacket against the autumnal chill. ‘You look remarkably … refreshed. Lighter, like you’ve released a load.’
‘Shut up,’ I mutter, accepting the coffee because I need it, not because I’m willing to acknowledge his meddling.
‘What?’ His eyes widen with mock surprise. ‘Can’t a man enquire about his brother’s well-being after a night spent … now what was it you went rushing off for again, remind me?’
I glance over at Dad, who’s checking lines at the stern of the Mary Jane, thankfully out of earshot. ‘You’re an arsehole, do you know that?’ Automatically, I check on Maisie, who is trying to get a barnacle off the edge of the harbour ladder. ‘Mais, don’t lean so far!’
She looks up and gives me a cheery wave, and then leans straight back over again.
‘I never said I wasn’t an arsehole, but come on. Aren’t you going to say anything?’ Jude grins, all innocent wide eyes.
‘You know, I think you should ask Dot if you can join her knitting morning. You’d fit right in.’
‘Already a gold member, and pay my coffee money on time.’
I shake my head. ‘You all right with Dad this afternoon?’ I try and keep my voice light, but it pitches like the crash of the waves.
Jude’s eyebrows are up near his hairline. His face really is punchable. ‘Plans? Plans that will break the Harding family traditions?’
‘It’s just one time.’
Dad strides over from the Mary Jane, boots thumping on the jetty, nodding to us both. ‘Are you boys done?’
‘Yep.’
I glance at Jude, for once being deadly serious in my appeal to his better nature.
‘Dad, thought we could go to the pub for the afternoon?’ he suggests, keeping his tone light, but Dad’s gaze slices straight over to me.
‘Saw you coming from Salt Cottage this morning,’ he says casually. Too casually.
My heart sinks. Nothing happens in Sea Salt Bay without at least three people noticing.
‘Dad, I—’
‘Be careful, son.’ He cuts me off, voice low. ‘I know you’re a grown man. I know you make your own choices. But that woman…’ He shakes his head.
‘I know what I’m doing,’ I say, though it feels like a lie.
Dad’s expression softens and he scratches under the rim of his woollen hat at his white hair. ‘I hope so. I just want you happy, Kit. You and Maisie. If she makes you happy…’ He trails off, the unfinished thought hanging between us.
If she makes you happy, I’ll try to accept it. Even if I think she’ll break your heart.
‘Thanks, Dad,’ I say, meaning it. For all his stubborn ways, his love has never been in question.
He nods once, then heads up the pier, back straight despite the slight limp he pretends not to have.
‘Well, that was positively glowing with endorsement,’ Jude comments, coming to stand beside me. ‘By Dad’s standards, that was practically a blessing.’
I snort, moving to start the engine. ‘He’s just worried.’
‘Of course he is. He’s Dad and that’s what he does, no matter how big and grown-up we are, but he’s also skewed by his own trauma from Mum walking out.
’ Jude begins casting off the mooring lines.
We don’t talk about Mum, and I glance over at him, but his gaze is studiously on the water. ‘The question is, are you worried?’
I don’t answer immediately, focusing on the horizon of sea and sky.
‘I don’t know what this is,’ I admit finally, once we’re clear of the harbour. ‘Me and Isla. I don’t know if it’s just … clearing the air. Getting closure. Or something else.’
Jude says nothing, just waiting. For all his teasing, he knows when to shut up and listen. It’s one of his better qualities – not that I’d ever tell him.
‘I’m not the same person I was before and neither is she,’ I continue, eyes on the horizon.
‘But?’
‘But last night’—I swallow—‘was the most alive I’ve felt in a long time.’
Jude nods slowly. ‘Then maybe it’s worth finding out what “this” is, instead of assuming it’s doomed before it’s begun.’
‘When did you get so wise?’ I ask, only half joking.
He grins. ‘I’ve always been the smart one. You were just too thick to notice. So what are you going to do with your Sunday of breaking Harding traditions?’
I glance over at the boat shed. There’s a lurch in my stomach that’s impossible to ignore. ‘Will you help me get Jessie’s Dream down into the water?’
Jude’s gaze flicks between the shed and me. ‘What are we waiting for?’
She’s on a ramp in the shed, a glossy azure blue, and untouched for the best part of three years.
Jess had been too sick to go on the water once chemo started, and I haven’t felt the urge to take her out since.
It doesn’t take long for Jude and me to put her on the trailer and pull her down the ramp to the water’s edge.
Jude sighs as she kisses the water, bobbing gently.
‘She looks good. I hope she behaves. She might sulk, you know. Boats are temperamental.’
I’ve got a lump in my throat the size of an oar.
I turn when a hand squeezes my shoulder.
Peter has snuck up next to me, in worn fishing jumper and jeans, the fisherman’s uniform, gripping a coffee in a travel mug, nodding at the sight of Jessie’s Dream dancing under the October sun. ‘That makes me so happy.’
I nod again. The three of us stand there and admire Jessie’s Mirror dinghy for a moment.
It’s not as hard as I thought it would be, although I still think I’m going to turn and see Jess come down to the harbour’s edge, her dark hair streaming gently in the breeze, flask and picnic basket in her hands.
The ache that comes with that expectation, the searing scorch of loss, has ebbed. In its place is a space to breathe.
‘Right.’ I clear my throat. ‘I need to make a picnic. Reckon Dot’s got much in?’
‘Yeah.’ Peter shakes his head, lips turned down in disappointment at my lack of planning. ‘If you want some nearly out of date packaged cookies and a Ginsters sausage roll.’ He slides his phone out of his pocket. ‘Leave it with me.’
He turns and walks off.
‘He’s a handy guy to know,’ Jude says with a laugh.
‘You know he’s just calling Nina.’
‘Best shortbread in the South West. Reckon your picnic could turn out all right. Just make sure we don’t have to come out to rescue you.’
I almost feel the blood drain out of my face. ‘Fuck. I’m on call.’ How the hell have I forgotten? I’ve never forgotten a call-out shift in all the time I’ve been on the lifeboat crew.
Jude claps his hand on my shoulder and gives me a pitying look. ‘You owe me.’
‘Really? You’ll take my shift?’
‘Anything to see my brother smile.’
The giant lump in my throat makes me think I’m closer to crying than smiling.
‘Wow, she’s so pretty!’ Isla is running her hand along the polished edge of the dinghy, while Maisie is bouncing on her toes, almost bursting with pride.
‘She was my mum’s, well, Dad’s really, but Dad bought it for Mum and named it after her.’
I plant my hand on Maisie’s rain hat, steer her to the hull, haul her onto the small deck, and place Nina’s picnic basket in after her. ‘Stand still, Maisie, we don’t want Isla throwing up before we leave the dock.’
I laugh at Isla’s side-eye as I help her up. Her hand scorches in mine, my hand on her waist, lingering until I’m starting to warm up on the inside.
‘This is beautiful,’ Isla says, reverent as she takes in the immaculately restored planks of the deck. ‘This must have taken you ages to restore.’
‘It was a labour of love.’ I glance out at the sea, focusing on the churning water and not on Isla’s face. She reaches for my hand and gives it a squeeze.
‘I’m sure it was. And it’s definitely a step up from the inflatable dinghy you used to try and drown me in.’
I snort, shake my head. ‘Bet you never forgot it, though.’
I glance back at her face and then wish I hadn’t because the expression there is wistful, sad. ‘Never.’
‘Right.’ I clear my throat, ‘Let’s get out before the wind picks up and we end up just making it to the buoys before turning back.’
An hour later we are moored in a smuggling cove, sheltering under blankets, watching Maisie gather seaweed into a gigantic pile. The heather-crowned headland protects us from the westerly wind as Isla crams lavender shortbread into her mouth. ‘How does she make this?’
‘Why do you look like you haven’t eaten since you arrived?’
Her gaze drops, fingers brushing crumbs from the wool of a cardigan I’m pretty sure was Maggie’s.
Although pretty sure Maggie never made violet wool and wooden buttons look quite that good.
Her hair is unravelling from the low ponytail it’s caught in, strands of gold lifting in the air.
Cheeks pinked from the breeze, her gaze is focused on the horizon.
‘You fed me fish.’
I nod, waiting for more.
‘And Piper left me with some supplies.’
‘That was days ago.’
A shrug brushes across the careful space we’ve left between us. I might have eaten her out on her dead grandmother’s sofa, driven myself home with a relentless and overpowering determination that stole my breath, but I’m not sure I’m ready for Maisie to see us tiptoeing back into familiarity yet.
‘I just…’
I wait. But I’m not a patient kind of guy. Never have been where Isla Quinn is concerned.
‘Just what?’ I’m so focused on her, I see her swallow, the shiver running across her skin.
‘I just can’t stand the thought of people looking at me, wondering, questioning if I’m a liar. Am I a career-wrecker?’
‘Isla, I don’t think anyone thinks that, and I’m not saying I understand everything about the headlines, but no one around here would ever think that of you.’
She turns slightly, gaze catching mine, as deep and dark as the churn of the sea in front of us.
Her lip curls slightly. ‘You’ve got no idea what men think, what most men think of women who talk out of turn.
And it’s not just men. It’s some women too.
Do you know what the Daily Mail has been saying? ’
‘I try not to read the Daily Mail unless it’s covered in grease from the chippy.’
She chuckles softly but the laughter dies on the wind. ‘Piper thinks I need to tell the whole truth.’
My stomach coils tight at her words, at her fingers plucking at the blanket draped across her shoulder. ‘And what is that?’
The look she turns to give me could turn me to stone. ‘I can’t tell you.’
I nod, looking out at the sea. Words stick sideways in my throat.
‘Because if I do, Kit, I won’t be able to bear the way you look at me either.’
Without hesitating, I reach for her hand and squeeze. Maisie turns, gaze dropping to our joined hands. She grins, and Isla drops her head to my shoulder.
For the first time in two years, the ground feels solid beneath my feet.
‘Should we get back?’ she asks, as the breeze catches a strand of her hair, filling my senses with vanilla and salt.
‘Another ten minutes.’ I press a kiss to the top of her head, strands of her hair tickling my nose. A deep sigh escapes me, like the pull of the tide. ‘And if you’re planning on staying around Sea Salt Bay, it might be time to face going into Dot’s shop.’
‘Dot? I’ve seen her in passing. Is she still the gossip queen of the town?’
‘Hell yeah. And no one will have your back more. Apart from me.’
I catch the hitch on her breath. ‘I don’t know, Kit. I never planned to stay. I was supposed to just hide out and stay out of view for a while.’
‘I know.’
There’s a gentle press on my fingers.
‘But now I can’t help but wonder if I’ve been hiding out in every other place I’ve been.’
I turn to meet her gaze, aware of Maisie chasing a seagull who’s circling her pile of wet seaweed.
‘The actress with many faces. But what if I no longer recognise my own?’
I’m still thinking about her words as Maisie is clambering into bed, exhausted but glowing. ‘Will Uncle Jude be here in the morning?’ she asks, duvet up by her chin.
‘No, why would he?’ I pat her legs and snatch the book we’re reading for bedtime from the bedside table.
Wiggling toes squeeze under my legs. ‘I don’t know. He was here this morning, because you were with Isla.’
‘Maisie, that was a one-off and I did explain.’ I didn’t, not really, but I pretended to.
‘I like her, Dad. You don’t have to hide things from me.’
With a sigh, I lean forward and press a kiss on her forehead. ‘I’m not hiding anything. I don’t know how long Isla will be here for.’
‘And you think she will leave like Mum did?’
My breath snatches in my windpipe, raw and harsh. ‘Maisie, your mum didn’t want to leave us. She wanted to stay so much it broke her heart.’
Maisie’s small fingers reach for mine. ‘Dad, I know that. And maybe Isla will want to stay too, if you tell her.’
I let out a laugh, shaking my head. ‘Who made you so big and wise?’
‘You. You grew me good.’
‘I grew you cheeky. Are we reading this story?’
‘Maybe.’ Her grin is smug. ‘But I saw you smiling today.’
‘I always smile!’ To prove the point, I grimace a flash of my teeth.
‘No, you don’t, Dad. And I’ve missed it.’
Well, fuck.
‘If we don’t read this next chapter soon I might forget how to smile at all.’
She giggles and pats the bed next to her. ‘Come on, then. I’m waiting for you. But maybe you should ask Isla on a date.’
Definitely cheeky.
‘A date, huh?’
‘Yeah, a date.’
‘And what do you know about dates?’ There’s a curl of dark hair stuck up on the pillow, and reaching up, I smooth it down.
‘Lots. Uncle Jude told me.’
Christ.
‘Let’s get to sleep. We can think about dates another day.’
After she’s asleep, I head down into the house that we’ve been growing in together, and maybe for the first time in a fair while I don’t feel as hollow as a tomb as I look at the brick around me, because now I’m thinking about going on dates with Isla Quinn, and wondering how a film star might ever want to stay.