Page 19 of Coming Home to Sturcombe Bay
“Thank you.” She shook her head. “Well, I’d better be getting back.” She picked up the empty cake box. “I promised Mum I’d only be a few minutes. Bye, everyone.”
“That scumbag,” Lisa remarked with uncharacteristic acid when Debbie had gone. “If Tom Cullen gets to hear what’s been going on, he’d sort him out quick enough.”
Liam laughed. “He did once, years ago. And quite by coincidence, it was because of Vicky. She was down here on holiday, staying with old Molly. Gowan and some of his stupid gang were bullying her, here on the beach, and Tom thumped him one. Gowan ran away crying like a baby! He’s been wary of Tom ever since.”
“Ace!” Lisa punched the air.
“Anyway, it looks like the tide’s coming in, and I have a pile of paperwork waiting for me, plus a couple of foals who are due for their vaccinations. Come along, Robyn.” He held out his hand to her. “Say bye-bye.”
“Bye-bye.” The child smiled angelically, waving as she put her small hand in her father’s large one, and they walked away along the beach, Hobo hirpling along beside them on his three legs.
Cassie watched them go, all the way to the ramp up to the Memorial Gardens. That casual, athletic stride — it had been one of the things she had found so attractive about him all those years ago.
That phone call . . . She’d never heard him use that tone — ice-cold menace. She doubted that he or Tom Cullen would ever resort to violence, but when it came to cruelty to animals . . . And she’d hold their beer.
She became aware that Lisa was watching her, a small smile curving her mouth. “What?”
Lisa shook her head. “Nothing,” she said, but there was a knowing glint in her eyes. “Anyway, tide’s coming in. Time to go.” She began to pack up the towels and discarded swimsuits and stowed them in her seemingly bottomless mum-bag. “Noah, you can carry the windbreak for Mummy, and Amy, you can take the empty cola cans and put them in your mummy’s recycling bin.”
The slope of the beach was long and shallow, so that once the tide turned, it came in quite quickly. All the other beachgoers were gathering up their belongings too and hurrying up the steps to the Esplanade. The amusement arcade and the ice-cream parlour would soon be doing a roaring trade, and so would Debbie’s café.
“The kids are going to lose their sandcastle soon,” Cassie remarked as they climbed the cliff steps.
“That’s the way of sandcastles,” her sister responded, laughing. “They know it always happens, but they can come back another time and build a new one. In a funny sort of way, I think it’s quite good for them.”
“How’s that?”
“They learn to cope with disappointment, and that there’s always hope for tomorrow.”
Cassie laughed. “How philosophical!”
“It comes to you as you grow older.”
“Ah! I remember when you dyed your hair purple. Now you’re the local GP’s wife and all grown up and sensible.”
“For now,” Lisa conceded. “But that purple dye’s only on hold. It could break out again at any time.”
* * *
The house was quiet when Liam and Robyn arrived home. He let Hobo off his lead and went in search of his sister-in-law. He found her in the small room which she had taken over as an office to serve all the business management for the practice.
She was sitting at her desk behind a computer and a stack of paperwork, her curly red hair caught up in a loose bunch on top of her head, her expression conveying unmistakable exasperation as he appeared in the doorway.
“There you are! Have you checked those invoices yet?”
“Auntie Julia, we been to the beach,” Robyn announced before he could come up with a better excuse. “Amy was there, and Noah, and we built the biggest, bestest sandcastleever!”
“Did you, Honey-bun? You look as if you’ve been in the sea, too.”
“We did. We raced, and Amy won. And Auntie Cassie came too, and she showed me how to breathe under the water.”
Julia lifted an enquiring eyebrow.
“No, sweetie,” Liam corrected, trying to suppress his laughter. “How tonotbreathe under the water. Remember? You take a great big breath first, then you duck down.”
“Ah.” Julia nodded, smiling at the little girl. “So Auntie Cassie was there too?” The glance she slanted at Liam was full of teasing humour.
“Yes. She’s ever so pretty and ever so nice, and she’s got a tappoo . . . here.” The child touched her shoulder to indicate the placement. “And she’s going to draw one for me too.”
