Page 5 of Lawless (Dauntless Island #2)

DOMINIC

O n Friday morning I woke up later than I’d meant to, mostly because the storm hadn’t stopped until around three in the morning.

I’d already been weirded out by spending my first night in a new place, but adding thunder and lightning to that?

Look, obviously I didn’t believe in ghosts or any of that bullshit, but I certainly had spent a lot of last night vividly remembering every ghost story I’d ever read as a kid.

When I’d finally crashed out, all my plans of getting up at six had gone right out the window.

It was almost nine by the time I climbed off my mattress and grabbed my phone to check the time.

My phone had no bars. It was basically an incredibly expensive clock and music player now. It was another one of those things that hadn’t bothered me when I’d signed up for all this, but now I was on this side of the move, felt a lot more isolating than I’d thought it would.

Still, at least the morning was a beautiful one.

I pushed open my bedroom window to let the air in, and it was fresh and cool and carried the tang of salt.

I looked down at my overgrown backyard with its sagging wooden fence, and then went into my living room instead, because the view there—the harbour, the ocean, the endless blue sky—was a hell of a lot more inspiring.

I snapped a photo on my phone and turned it into my screensaver.

Since I couldn’t send it to anyone else yet, at least I could appreciate it in the meantime.

And it wasn’t as though I’d be totally incommunicado.

I had a radio, and, somewhere, a satellite phone.

Besides, it was only a few weeks until the island got mobile phone coverage and I’d go back to ignoring my Aunt Carmella’s Minion memes and messages from guys I’d been at school with who’d turned into crypto bros.

I’d miss Grindr though. It’d be the first app I’d open whenever I could swing some leave to get back to Sydney.

That, and DoorDash, because my culinary skills didn’t go much beyond sandwiches and whatever I could shove in the microwave.

Never mind policing; the real challenge on Dauntless Island would be feeding myself without dying of boredom.

I wasn’t officially on duty until the station opened on Monday, but I showered and dressed in my uniform anyway.

I wanted to check the place out, but also make sure that people knew that the face and the uniform went together.

When I got downstairs for breakfast, the cat from last night was sitting on top of the stove, looking at me like it expected to be fed.

We were both very disappointed in the dry Weet-Bix I tipped into a bowl.

“I’m sure I have milk,” I told the cat. “The longlife shit. I know I bought some. I put it in the same box as the biscuits.”

There were also no biscuits.

Fan-fucking-tastic. Somewhere in the ferry terminal back in Newcastle, one of my boxes was sitting forgotten.

Either that, or it was still on the cargo deck of the ferry and would spend the rest of its life shuttling back and forth between the island and the mainland.

The point was, it wasn’t in my kitchen where it was supposed to be, and I didn’t even have any milk for my cereal.

Or for my coffee .

Shit .

So much for breakfast.

I found a tin of tuna and gave some to the cat.

I waited until it had finished eating and put it outside in the yard.

Then I remembered that Eddie had told me yesterday where the shop was, and figured that was as good an excuse as any to do my first unofficial foot patrol of the village.

I found my radio and satellite phone and checked they were both charged.

The radio was scratchy as hell, and there was a lot of squelchy feedback, but it worked.

I left my firearm in the gun safe, which felt a little like stepping outside half naked, but I reminded myself that this was more community policing than frontline policing.

You didn’t take your Glock to Coffee with a Cop.

The day was bright after last night’s storm, with nothing left over but a few wispy threads of clouds in the sky, and wet earth underfoot.

Everything smelled bright and clean, and the taste of salt in the air was invigorating.

I closed the door of the station behind me, and headed down the dirt road that curved along the harbour wall.

There was a statue on a plinth in front of the church next door to the station, so I wandered over for a look.

A guy in a funny hat stared out at the ocean.

There was a plaque stuck to the front of the plinth:

Erected in commemoration of Josiah Nesmith, the hero who delivered the people of Dauntless Island from the tyrant George Hawthorne.

I’d never been into history much, but it might be fun to learn a little bit more about the island. Eddie from the museum could probably recommend a book.

The village was picturesque: sandstone cottages, the narrow band of beach that ran along the outer side of the harbour wall at low tide, and the lush green hill that rose up above the village and was topped by the white lighthouse.

I was definitely going to get up there as part of my beat and introduce myself, and maybe score myself a tour.

The view from the top had to be spectacular.

I walked along the street, breathing in the sea air and listening to the cries of the gulls. Okay, so my phone was a brick and I didn’t even have any milk, but shit, this place was gorgeous . Nothing like sun, sea, and salt air to strip my earlier pessimism away.

I checked the museum, but the door was closed.

The sign in the window didn’t give any indication of opening hours, but maybe Eddie would be around sometime later.

It was pretty obvious that if I was going to make a friend on the island, it was going to be him.

Mostly because he was the only person who’d actually spoken to me.

A few houses on the other side of the museum, I turned left and headed away from the harbour wall down a road that was as crooked as a dog’s back leg. A woman wearing jeans and a flannelette shirt watched me from her front doorstep.

“Good morning,” I said. “I’m?—”

She stepped inside and closed the door.

Okay then.

I found the shop a few houses up, right where the village gave way to grass and trees, and the slope of a hill that steepened sharply as it led up to the lighthouse.

There wasn’t much to indicate it was a shop, except for the sign in the window.

The sign was written very aggressively in black marker:

OPEN 7 AM. CLOSED 7 PM. THIS MEANS YOU YOUNG HARRY BARNES.

The bells on the door jingled brightly as I pushed it open.

An older woman—the same one I’d last seen yelling at the blokes from the ferry—glared at me from behind the counter.

Tufts of grey hair poked out from underneath a knitted beanie.

There were deep furrows running down either side of her pinched mouth, and her eyes were narrowed to slits.

“Hi, I said, pretending she didn’t have a face like murder. “My name’s Dominic Miller. I’m the new senior constable here on the island.” I held my hand out to her over the counter.

She looked at my hand and made no move to take it. Then she huffed. “Mavis Coldwell.”

I pulled my hand back. “It’s nice to meet you. How long have you been running this place?”

The furrows by her mouth deepened. “This is a shop, not a discotheque. Either buy something or leave.”

“I actually need to buy some milk,” I said, my fixed smile trying its hardest not to crumble in the face of her hostility.

“I’m out,” she said, and turned her attention back to the magazine on the counter.

“Okay,” I said. “What about those tins of milk powder right there?”

She looked at me, and then looked down at her magazine again. Licked her thumb and turned the page. “Those are spoken for.”

Okay then.

We stared at each other for a moment longer, and then the bells on the door rang again.

Another familiar face, though I doubt he remembered me.

It was the guy from the ferry yesterday.

The hungover one. He looked a little brighter this morning.

He had a narrow face and a long nose that made him look very serious.

His dark hair was cut shorter on the sides, but longer on top where it almost curled.

He was wearing a hoodie and jeans and boots that were stained with mud.

“Mavis,” he said, and then snapped his mouth shut as he caught sight of me. He nodded.

“Morning, Robbie,” Mavis said. She stepped out from behind the counter and brushed past me. Then she held the door of the shop open as Robbie darted back outside, only to return moments later lugging a massive steel churn. He headed out the back with it, presumably to a cold room.

“Is that milk ?” I asked.

Mavis glowered at me. “Yes, it’s milk. And I sell it to my regular customers. Those that have ordered it.”

Robbie ducked past me again.

“I just want some for my cereal and my coffee,” I said.

Mavis leaned back as Robbie hauled in a second churn. “Well, that’s none of my business, is it?”

Robbie gave a small snort at that.

“Okay,” I said. “Can I put in an order for next time, please?”

“There’s a waiting list,” she said, folding her arms over her chest.

Of course there was. I tried not to sigh. “How long is the waiting list?”

She looked me up and down. “Six months.”

Fucking fine .

“Great,” I said, my forced smile starting to waver under the strain of holding it for so long. “If you’d put me on it, that’d be fantastic, since I’m going to be here for a long, long time and I’m not going anywhere. Have an awesome day.”

I strode past her and back into the street, and almost ran smack bang into a horse.

I looked at the horse, and the horse looked at me.