Page 27 of Lawless (Dauntless Island #2)

NATTY

M e and Button John were building new shelves for Big Johnny’s shed.

It was the sort of job that Button John couldn’t be trusted to do on his own, which was most jobs, but definitely anything that involved power tools.

Big Johnny said it was a bloody miracle Button John still had all his fingers and toes, which would always make Aunt Jane click her tongue and tell him to be nice, and Button John splutter as indignantly as a wet cat.

Big Johnny was right though—it was a miracle.

I’d thought it at least three times already today, even with keeping a close eye on him.

It was late in the afternoon by the time we were finishing up. We were both covered in sawdust and grime, and our washing up session with buckets of soapy water had turned into a water fight when Emily came rushing out to find us.

She yelled as she rounded the corner at the back of the house and narrowly missed the handful of water Button John had just flung in my direction. Then, instead of giving Button John a bollocking, she ignored him. “Natty! Aunt Susan just walked off the jetty into the harbour!”

My blood ran cold. “What?”

“The copper fished her out,” Emily said, eyes wide. “Verity Barnes just came and told us. She’s fine, Verity says. Mum and Dad are going to check on her now.”

“What? Why...” It was pointless even finishing the question. Emily wouldn’t be able to answer it. Hell, I’ll bet Mum didn’t even know why she’d done it, if there had even been a reason to begin with.

I set the bucket down and ran towards home. Button John came with me. We made it to my house just in time to see Big Johnny shaking Old Peter Corporal’s hand at the front door, and then ducking inside.

Old Peter Corporal nodded at me and Button John as we passed him.

“Mum?” I called out as I got inside. “Mum?”

“She’s upstairs,” Big Johnny called back from the kitchen. “Jane’s got her in a hot bath.”

Big Johnny pulled me into a hug as I stepped into the kitchen. He was as big as his nickname implied—tall and broad and everything that had somehow skipped a generation with me and Button John.

He ended the hug and then held me at arm’s length while he looked me up and down.

I opened my mouth.

“Not your fault, Natty,” he said.

“Tell that to Will,” I said, bitterness creeping into my tone.

“I will,” Big Johnny said. He nodded over my shoulder at Button John. “How’s that shed looking?”

“Still standing,” Button John said. The brightness in his tone didn’t ring true, but Big Johnny grunted and smiled anyway.

It was hard being Mum’s son. Sometimes I thought it must have been even harder to be her brother, because, out of all of us, Big Johnny had known the person she was before for the longest. Sometimes I thought he’d lost the most of her, but that wasn’t really how it worked.

It wasn’t the sort of thing that could be measured, but I couldn’t stop my brain from trying to puzzle it out any more than I could stop myself from poking at a bruise to see if it still hurt.

And sometimes I wondered what it would feel like to be so completely in love with someone that losing them broke you forever.

Mum had loved Dad so much that she’d drowned with him, and me and Nipper Will hadn’t been enough to keep her from sinking under the waves.

That didn’t seem fair. And I knew it wasn’t Mum’s fault—it wasn’t a choice she’d made.

Just that it didn’t seem fair, not to any of us.

“What happened?” I asked.

“Old Peter Corporal says she walked off the end of the bloody jetty,” Big Johnny said, his voice rough. He shook his head. “The copper went in after her. Lucky he saw it.”

“The copper?” I exchanged a look with Button John.

Big Johnny let out a long breath. “I tell you, I didn’t want a copper on Dauntless, but I’m bloody glad he was here today.”

“Me too,” I murmured, my thoughts flying to Dominic.

Was he okay? A rush of guilt followed fast on the heels of my concern, because I was being an arsehole for ignoring him when he hadn’t done anything wrong.

And now he’d done something so, so right , and I wanted to tell him that, but I didn’t know if I could.

Me and Dominic couldn’t be friends, not on Dauntless, and we couldn’t be anything more than that either.

I liked Dominic, and I didn’t want to lie to him.

But if I couldn’t lie to him—and I was a terrible liar—then I’d have to keep my distance, however much I wanted to kiss him again, to feel his body sliding against mine, to watch his face and drink in his expression as he came.

I squeezed my eyes shut for a moment. Now that I was here, home, and I knew that Mum was safe, it didn’t make me feel any better. Instead, all the panic I’d kept in front of when I’d been running here from Button John’s place had caught up with me. It rushed over me like the tide.

“Why’d she—” My voice caught and snagged, and I had to start again. “Why’d she do it? Is she getting worse? What if it happens again and nobody sees it? I can’t be here every second of the day. Even if I could, I have to sleep! I?—”

Big Johnny pulled me into another hug, slapping me on the back soundly. “Not your fault, Natty,” he said again, his voice as rough as mine but about a million octaves deeper. “It’s not your fault.”

But that was no consolation, and we both knew it. It wasn’t an answer either.

“She’s in bed,” Aunt Jane said, and I twisted out of Big Johnny’s hug. Aunt Jane showed me a sad smile. “She doesn’t know what all the fuss is about. She doesn’t even remember going off the jetty.”

“She hasn’t had dinner,” I said. “I’ll make her something.”

“She’s sleeping, love,” Aunt Jane said. “She’s fine. Go and sit down, and I’ll make you a hot Milo.”

I opened my mouth to protest, but Button John grabbed me by the wrist and pulled me into the living room.

I sat on the couch and Button John sat on the floor in front of my feet.

He began to gather up the blue and green knitted squares that Mum had left lying around.

He didn’t say anything. He didn’t have to. Just being here was enough.

I stared at the photographs on the bookshelf. Mum and Dad, and me and Nipper Will too. Everyone smiling for the camera. I wished Dad was still here. I wished Mum was too.

“What if she’s getting worse?” I said.

Button John leaned against my leg. “Dad didn’t say she was.”

“He didn’t say she wasn’t, either.”

We both listened to the murmur of voices as Big Johnny and Aunt Jane spoke in the kitchen. I couldn’t make out the words. Then, a few minutes later, Aunt Jane appeared with two mugs of hot Milo and set them down on the coffee table. I picked mine up.

“The boats are coming in,” she said.

I blew on my Milo to cool it and nodded.

Great. Just what I need. Nipper Will telling me how I’ve fucked up again.

I couldn’t drink my Milo. I set it back down and stood up and shook my head at Button John when he made a move to follow me.

I left the living room and headed up the stairs.

It wasn’t even dusk yet, but the curtains in Mum’s room had been pulled closed.

When I opened the door to look inside, it was dim and still.

Mum was lying on her side under her blankets, her face resting on her pillow, her eyes closed.

She looked peaceful as she slept. She looked small too, curled up like a little kid.

I leaned in her doorway and swallowed against the ache in my throat, suddenly overwhelmed with thoughts of both helplessness and gratitude.

Helplessness because there was nothing I could do to keep Mum here, to reach her, to hold onto her, and profound gratitude because she was safe.

That Dominic had been there today. And then helplessness came again, a new wave following fast on the first, because he couldn’t be there every minute of every day any more than anyone else could be—any more than I could be.

I heard Nipper Will downstairs, his voice raised loud in a questioning tone, although I couldn’t make out the words, and Big Johnny murmuring something in reply.

I straightened up and pulled Mum’s door closed.

Then I took a breath and held it until I felt strong enough to head down to the kitchen and face my brother.

I’d thought he’d look angry, but when I slunk downstairs and into the kitchen and I saw his face, he just looked tired . He caught my gaze, and then tightened his mouth and looked away, still nodding as Big Johnny clapped him on the shoulder.

And then, because there was nothing me and Will could ever get right, I said, “It wasn’t my fault.”

Because I didn’t just need him to know this, I needed to hear it back from him. I needed to know that he knew. I wanted to know he didn’t hate me, except that’s not what he heard, because I’d said it wrong. All he heard was a selfish kid trying to weasel out of everything.

“I never said it was,” he said with a glare.

“Well, it wasn’t.”

“It’s nobody’s fault,” Big Johnny said in a tone that left no room for argument, even if either of us would be willing to argue with a bloke who could snap our necks without breaking a sweat. Well, my neck, anyhow; he’d probably have to exert at least a small amount of force to snap Nipper Will’s.

Nipper Will shrugged off Big Johnny’s hand and began to unbutton his orange PVC jacket, revealing the sweat-stained T-shirt underneath.

He usually had his gear off before he got inside, but either Big Johnny called him in first, or he’d already heard on his way home what had happened.

Whatever the case, now he was filling the kitchen with stink—both fish stink and his own.

“I’ll fill the tub,” I said, shouldering past him and Big Johnny to head outside.