laughed. ‘A turkey? Wow. That’s … tempting. In that case, I’ll see what I can do.’ He checked his watch again. ‘Now, I must be going. Thanks again for the tour.’
‘See you around, I expect, now we’re neighbours,’ she said,
‘Aye, I expect you will,’ was the simple answer before he strode out of the door. He seemed to be a mercurial man and despite what he’d said, she had an inkling he wanted to join in community life, but something was holding him back.
He left Marina wondering about him even more, to the point, in fact, that she was finding it hard to focus on the job: keeping people safe.
With dusk starting to fall, and clouds making the evening gloomy, she locked up the station and threaded her way through the gorse to the cottage.
Lachlan was on her mind all the while, which she found a pleasant distraction from the drizzle that had moved in from the Atlantic. OK, so he was simply the ‘new kid in town’ and like every attractive fresh arrival in Porthmellow, he was bound to hold an exotic mystique, if you could call the Scottish Highlands ‘exotic’. And yes, he was single, according to Evie, although that was one nugget of info she obviously hadn’t let on to him.
She was single too, she supposed, as her mother and friends had reminded her lately – but that didn’t mean ‘unattached’.
She was still attached to Nate’s memory, even now seven years after they’d been ripped apart. Despite what she’d heard on the grapevine, even if there was no ‘significant other’, Lachlan McKinnon might be attached to someone too. He hadn’t given any reasons for leaving his Highland life for Cornwall. He didn’t seem much older than her, so he couldn’t have retired … maybe the ‘accident’ had been the reason behind his move.
She might be imagining it, but she thought they had a connection – or was that simply her reading too much into a visitor’s polite interest, after a solo shift in the remote station? After a lonely few years, isolated in her grief and recovery?
Whatever had caused his scars, she had a feeling they weren’t much different from the ones she still carried inside from losing Nate. They had that much in common … and she wondered, could there be more? He had agreed to come to the fundraiser, or more accurately he hadn’t said he wouldn’t come. After his firm ‘thanks, but no thanks’ to joining the Wave Watchers, she’d have expected a refusal if there was no chance of him turning up at all.
Even on their brief acquaintance, she had a feeling he wasn’t one for soft-soap or flannel even if it was to save someone’s feelings … and he certainly wasn’t a charmer or joker, as Nate had been.
Musing on some happier memories of Nate – the good days when they’d laughed and had fun together – she let herself in and hung her damp coat on the peg in the cottage hallway. On finding Tiff pacing around the sitting room with her phone clutched in her hand, her focus switched immediately to her cousin.
Tiff stabbed off her phone and tossed it on the armchair. ‘Sh-shi—!’ She bit off the expletive on seeing Marina.
‘What’s up? Are you OK?’
‘Yes, of course. Why wouldn’t I be?’ Tiff retrieved her phone from the side of the chair cushion.
‘No reason … you just seem a little bit stressed out?’
‘I’m fine.’ Tiff grinned. ‘Apart from haring around the county. I need a weekend off. Now, how was your shift at the lookout? I thought you’d be tired and I made a spag bol. Well, actually, it’s only the bol that’s done. I waited for you before I put the spag on.’
‘Aren’t you hungry?’ Marina asked, pleased she didn’t have to prepare a meal.
‘Not really. I went to a pasty factory at lunchtime and I’m afraid I rather over indulged at the tasting session.’ She rubbed her stomach. ‘I’ll be the size of a trawler by the time I go back to London.’
‘Thanks. I’m ravenous.’
A little while later, she tucked into her dinner, while Tiff toyed with her spaghetti before pushing her plate away.
Marina cleaned her plate and considered finishing Tiff’s leftovers but it seemed rude.
‘Busy day?’
‘Yes. I’m knackered. I’d never realised how exhausting it is, having to be nice to people.’ She sighed. ‘I can’t afford to upset the magazine’s customers but if I have to feign interest about another conservatory manufacturer or handmade soap company, I