eyes, not even knowing why she was surprised. ‘They’re going to be here in a few hours; I’ll go to the shops. Do we need anything else?’
‘Babe?’ Mats called, swinging himself down the short staircase by the ladder and landing softly like a cat. ‘Need anything?’
Justine walked through, wrapping her hair up in a towel. ‘We’re pretty low on peanut butter.’
‘Okay, peanut butter,’ Bell repeated, checking her purse was in her bag. She wasn’t strictly sure peanut butter was a vital ingredient for tonight’s coq au vin, but she supposed come breakfast . . . ‘The one with the seeds?’
Mats pulled another face as Justine sidled up to him. ‘Why can’t we just have peanut butter with peanut butter in it? I don’t want seeds in my butter. I’m not a frickin’ canary.’
‘It’s added goodness, babe,’ Justine grinned, hooking an arm around his neck and kissing him on the mouth. She was three inches taller than him, and often took advantage of the fact. The kiss became more involved –
‘Right, well, I’m off then,’ Bell groaned. It had been twenty-two days exactly since they’d met and she was looking forward to the month mark, when Mats said he usually began to calm down. ‘Be done by the time I’m back, please!’
‘Oh, he will be,’ Justine joked.
‘Oi!’ Mats protested, picking her up.
Bell skipped up the stairs and jumped off the boat, onto the concrete gangway. It was very wide and stable, something of a relief after three months at sea, although she preferred the rickety swaying of the wooden sort. Of the Swedish archipelago . . .
She immediately pushed the memories aside, refusing to let them settle. She had been disciplined and done a great job of outpacing her past, and she didn’t intend to let it catch up with her now.
She glanced up at the sky as she walked quickly through the marina, past the hundreds of glossy white boats, sails bound, masts swaying in the wind; it wasn’t called the City of Sails for nothing. Black clouds were billowing overhead like witches’ skirts, the forecast storm arriving pretty much on time.
The sight of it made her smile. She did her best to smile every day, refusing to sink back into the clutches of despair. She might have been here before, but Tove had sent her off with the actually wise wisdom that ‘life isn’t what happens to you, but how you choose to react to it’. So in the aftermath of those awful final weeks in the summer, she had first chosen freedom – and now she was choosing happiness. They weren’t inextricably linked yet, but she hoped one day they might be.
‘Hi! Hi!’ she called out to the increasingly familiar faces as she passed by their boats, hand raised in a friendly wave.
‘Hey, Bell!’
‘How’s it going, Bell?’
Their answering calls had different accents to the one she’d known during the summer, but the same carefree smiles and wind-whipped hair.
She turned onto the main strip, glancing in through the open door of the harbourmaster’s office as she passed, walking with a long stride. ‘Hi, Dan,’ she called.
‘. . . Hell?’
She stopped walking like it was a command. ‘Kris?’ she shrieked as a scraped-up man-bun on top of a very handsome head appeared around the door frame, swiftly followed by Tove’s electrified perm. ‘Tove?’
‘We were literally just getting your berth details!’ he laughed, running over and picking her up in a bear hug, swinging her around so that her legs swung out. ‘Jesus, there’s a lot of boats here! It’s Sandhamn on steroids!’
She laughed with delight, feeling like a little girl as he swung her round, the Swedish language like music to her ears after her Kiwi hiatus. ‘But I wasn’t expecting you for hours yet! I’m out of milk!’ she cried, effortlessly speaking Swedish back and feeling very over-excited as he put her down and Tove swooped in for her hug.
‘Travelling winds,’ Tove said into her hair.
‘Huh, I could have done with some of those myself,’ she said, pulling back and taking in the happy sight of them both. They hadn’t changed a bit. Admittedly, it had only been four months, but in that time, her entire world had changed.
‘Yeah? You’re okay? You made it across safely?’ Kris asked, forever concerned.
‘Well, I’m here, aren’t I?’ she laughed.
‘It couldn’t come a moment too soon as far as I was concerned. He was fussing constantly,’ Tove said, rolling her eyes. ‘Kept checking the charts, looking at wind speeds . . .’