Page 14

The pews were full of casserole dishes and baking trays. Eddie set the potato bake alongside Katrina Finch’s quiche, and I added my flagons to the collection on the altar.

I nodded at a brass plaque screwed into the wall under one of the windows, and Eddie went over to inspect it.

It was dedicated to the memories of three mutineers who’d died in the early days of the settlement on Dauntless: Foley, Pritchard, and Jessup.

Eddie reached out and traced Jessup’s name with his index finger. “Henry Jessup made it to Sumatra, Joe,” he said in an undertone.

“Maybe,” I said. “Maybe not.”

Eddie’s expression was unreadable as he traced the name again.

“Leave it for now,” I said. “Let’s go outside and talk. Then in about twenty minutes Mavis will hand out the plates and cups, and we’ll descend back here like locusts.”

Eddie flashed me a nervous smile. “Right. Talk. I can do that.”

I squeezed his shoulder. “You’ll be fine. Come on.”

Outside we ran into Fisher Harry Finch, Little Harry Finch, and Young Harry Barnes.

“Fisher Harry,” I said, nodding at them. “Little Harry, Young Harry.”

“You made it,” Young Harry Barnes said, a grin breaking through his bushy white beard. “You’d have been missed otherwise, Red Joe.” He looked at Eddie. “Mr. Hawthorne, it’s good to see you again.”

“It’s Eddie,” Eddie said. “Good to see you too.”

Eddie relaxed the longer we talked, but he still stuck to me like a barnacle as we worked our way through the islanders.

“Nasty business,” Verity Corporal said, gesturing to Eddie’s head when they were introduced.

“Nasty,” Mavis Coldwell agreed happily, popping up behind her.

Eddie took a step closer to me.

“Do you need a hand with the cups and plates, Mavis?” I asked pointedly, and she shot me a narrow look before going to get them ready.

Verity Barnes, talking with Verity Corporal, hid a smile behind her hand.

“How do you do it?” Eddie asked, wide-eyed as he followed me back into the church when it was time to eat. “Everyone has the same name!”

“It’s just the way it is,” I said. “It’s the way it’s always been here. It’ll all make sense after you have a few drinks.”

“Really? It might make less sense then.”

“Well, shall we try it and see?”

Eddie huffed out a laugh. “That sounds like a plan, Red Joe.”

Eddie did loosen up with a few drinks inside him and talked with some of the island’s teenagers about Sydney and university.

Distance Education only went up to Year 10, so most of the kids on the island went to boarding school for their final two years of high school, if not before then, and some stayed on for university or for job opportunities they didn’t get on Dauntless.

Some kids, like Little Harry Finch, stayed on the island after they’d finished Year 10 and would probably never leave, but the lure of civilisation was too strong for many of them.

I thought of Amy, and wondered if she’d come back like she’d always said she would. It was an easy promise to make, I knew from experience, before you saw what the mainland had to offer.

I watched as Eddie talked to the kids. He was animated and cheerful, his cheeks ruddy from the cold, but also possibly from his second cup of Sarah Hooper’s rum. It packed more of a punch than whoever it was that had hit Eddie over the head on Thursday night.

I looked around the crowd too, checking to see that nobody was staring daggers at Eddie for the crime of being a Hawthorne.

I saw curious glances mostly—although once, I did see John Coldwell glaring at Eddie with blatant contempt.

It appeared that most of the islanders were keeping their distance from Eddie, apart from the youngsters.

People were wary and speculative, but not downright hostile.

It was the best I could have hoped for really.

“You brought a Hawthorne here?” Nipper Will Harper asked, eyebrows raised.

I snorted. “What the hell else was I supposed to do with him? Lock him in the lighthouse?”

Nipper Will leaned against the wall and folded his muscular arms across his chest. He looked nothing like the skinny kid who’d been my best friend since before I could remember.

Years of hauling full nets would do that.

We’d been best friends forever, but these days it felt like that was through habit more than practice.

We hardly saw each other except for the weekly shindig in the old church.

Will worked long hours on his boat, the Adeline .

He spent more time on the water than on the island.

“Young Harry Barnes is telling the whole island this bloke’s staying with you. ”

I shrugged.

Nipper Will’s expression was unreadable as his gaze bored into me, and then a corner of his mouth twitched. “And Mavis has opinions.”

“I’ve heard them.”

“Probably not all of them,” he said, and took a swig from his bottle.

“Probably not.”

“And Short Clarry’s on about what bashing the bloke over the head will do for tourism.”

“His name’s Eddie,” I said. “And I don’t really give a fuck about Short Clarry and his tourists.”

That brought a smile out of him, and those were few and far between for Nipper Will.

When we were kids, he’d always been laughing and smiling, but a whole lot had changed since then, for both of us.

Then his smile faded, and his expression darkened.

“It’s bullshit, though, what happened. It’s not right. ”

“I know.”

Somewhere close by, a little kid started to wail, and I saw Young Archie Hooper hurrying outside with one of his twins in his arms. Anna, his wife, smiled at him as she held the other twin.

She looked tired, but so would anyone with twin four-year-olds.

Hell if I knew how they did it. It was exhausting enough raising a bloody dog.

My gaze went to Eddie again, and warmth bloomed in my chest as I took in his bright, animated expression as he spoke to the kids.

I was too far away to hear what he was saying, but the kids were rapt.

He had that effect on people. There was something magnetic about his energy, his enthusiasm, the way his words tumbled out of him like he was too excited to contain them.

But he could be quiet too—like last night, when he’d listened as I’d told him about my dad.

I’d never told anyone that before. I’d never had to.

This was Dauntless; everyone here knew already.

Eddie looked around and saw me watching. He grinned at me and waved.

I waved back and didn’t dare look at Nipper Will to see his reaction.

It was stupid as hell to fall for a guy who was only going to be here for a week, but there was a thrill in my gut that felt new and exciting.

Eddie had upended more than the islanders’ sensibilities when he’d arrived from the mainland—he’d upended my heart as well.

But somehow, despite the fact that this wouldn’t last, and despite the fact that a Hawthorne on Dauntless was proving nothing but trouble, I felt more alive than I had in years.