Page 94 of Meet me at the Seaside Cottages

‘Okay, well, bye,’ says Essie, cursing her betraying blush.

‘No, hang on,’ he says. ‘I’m coming with you. I need to see Lowell.’

And he walks her to Lowell’s. They don’t speak much. Essie keeps shooting glances at him, wishing it weren’t so vivid in her memory: the feel of him, bucking against her. Dwight for his own part seems completely happy to be walking down the beautiful lane, the hedgerows growing higher every day, wild meadowsweet everywhere, tumbling over, an orgy of green and fresh planting, shining in the leftover diamonds of the morning dew. He doesn’t check his phone very often, Essie notices, or feel the need to fill empty spaces with conversation. He seems perfectly happy in his own skin, walking his own road with his wide cowboy swagger. It’s unnerving, but undeniably attractive.

Lowell frowns at the sight of him.

‘Hi?’ he says, then glances at Verity, who is signing at him. It is undeniably funny and very obvious that she is asking who the cowboy is – the sign for cowboy is someone taking pistols out of the back pocket of their jeans and shooting with them. She scowls immediately in case they are laughing at her and Essie straightens her face.

Dwight kneels down to her level and speaks directly into her face.

‘I’m Dwight,’ he says.

She points at his hat.

‘You want my hat?’

She nods. He puts it on her head.

‘You can’t give her your hat,’ says Lowell stiffly. ‘She doesn’t need special attention. There’s nothing wrong with her.’

Dwight straightens up, winking at Verity.

‘I’m not giving her my hat,’ he says. ‘I’m swapping it.’

Lowell looks confused.

‘I want Smokey. Ahmed says he’s big enough for his jabs.’

Lowell looks for a moment as if he’s going to disagree, then he remembers suddenly what a bully Smokey is.

‘Um,’ he says, ‘okay.’

‘Let me do it,’ says Essie quickly, as he heads to the laundry. There is a lot of anticipatory barking. When the door finally opens, the puppies charge like maniacs. They are now huge, and seem to move like a cresting wave of hair. The noise is tremendous. Verity is smiling.

Dwight reaches into his jacket pocket and pulls out a black leather collar with studs on it, and a black lead, also with studs.

‘Oh, my God,’ says Essie, ‘That isso. . . ’

‘Like a bit of black leather, do you?’ says Dwight to her, quietly, where Verity can’t see. Lowell is bending down and cuddling Argyll and apologising to the runtiest dog (even though she is still pretty big, and almost pure white) for making her sleep in with the rough boys.

The effect on Essie is instant and devastating. Essie wants to ignore Dwight or tell him he’s utterly ridiculous. Instead, she feels a bolt of pure lust shoot through her. She wants him to take the leather and tie her up and . . .

She quickly turns away.

‘Okay, I’ll take Bute home tonight,’ she had said. ‘Cheer up my mum. God knowsIcan’t.’

Lowell looks up.

‘Say . . . say hi from me,’ he says.

35

The hospital had attempted parking charges, and quickly changed its mind when confronted with the evidence that adding parking wardens to areas with limited public transport and ill and stressed-out people was having profound negative effects on the overall health profile of its base, so had reversed its policy lickety-spit. The new car park, however, was about a kilometre from the actual hospital building, and everyone who worked on site covered their ten thousand steps in corridors alone, so it was still doing them some good.

Unusually, Lish, Janey and Amsan meet up at the same time, closely followed by Owen.

‘Unbelievable,’ he is muttering in the way people do when they pretend they are talking to themselves but they really want you to ask what’s wrong.

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