Only We Know (2 page)

Sam knew better than anyone that Kangaroo Island was a small place. Maybe he'd run into her as they were disembarking and he could return it then. That hair wouldn't be hard to find in a crowd.

CHAPTER

2

Ten minutes later, Sam pulled up in the main street of Penneshaw. The orphaned denim jacket lay on the passenger seat next to him, bedraggled and damp. Despite his best efforts to find her, the redhead had been lost in the crowd of people disembarking the boat. By the time he'd driven his car out and up onto the roadway, she was gone. He wondered if she'd hopped onto one of the buses that took tourists to all the island's most famous spots: Seal Bay, Remarkable Rocks and Vivonne Bay, which was judged by some to be the most beautiful beach in the world. Not that he'd seen any of those sights in years.

He picked up the denim jacket. It was damp, cool and worn, like the favourite pair of jeans he was wearing. He could have turned it in to the ferry's ticketing office back at the dock, but he was pretty sure if he did it would get lost in the bottom of some lost-property bin. What if the redhead didn't know such a thing existed, or didn't believe that a Good Samaritan would hand it in and so would never think to ask? And if she didn't speak any English it could all get lost in translation anyway. So he held on to it. He had custody of a denim jacket and the burden of tracking down its owner. Sometimes it was a pain in the arse being such a nice guy.

Sam got out of his car and slammed the door closed, checked his wallet and phone were in his pocket, and pointed his keys at the car. Only when the lights flashed to indicate he'd locked it did he realise what he'd done. He'd been in the city way too long.

The sea air was crisp and cool and he took it in, tried to let the island seep through him again. The town hadn't changed much, although ‘town' was probably too grandiose a word to describe it. It was a couple of intersections of bitumen roads, old stone buildings on both sides of a wide country-style main street, meeting the blue of the ocean at one end and the green of sloping hills and sparse gums at the other. There were new shops across a few blocks, interspersed with vacant ones and homes, both regular and holiday; the newish supermarket; a café; and the business centre. Less than a kilometre away was the footy oval, home of his greatest sporting triumph: eight goals one time against the Kingscote Hounds. And there, at the end of the street, sandstone and red-roofed, with a veranda all around, was the old pub, which had kept watch over the ocean for more than a century.

Sam didn't want to count the number of beers he'd downed in that front bar. For him and his mates, it had been either the pub or the footy club on the weekends, whether sweaty after a game or freshly shaved and showered and on the pull. He rubbed a hand over his chin, the growth scratching at his palm while he debated if he should stop by for a beer now or later. Maybe he would, later. For just the one, before he hit the road to make his way to the old man's place. He'd need a drink before he tackled that one: he knew that for sure.

He'd stopped at the supermarket to buy supplies for his father. This was the closest shop to the family property, Roo's Rest, and Sam always stopped by and loaded up with supplies. He bought biscuits, teabags, tins of various kinds. Toilet paper, detergent, shaving cream, washing liquid. The basics, to keep old Charlie Hunter going between visits. His father was always grumpy about the stuff when Sam delivered it, complaining he wasn't old and decrepit and could bloody well look after himself. Sam argued with him about it every time but loaded it all into the cupboards anyway. It gave them something to talk about besides the bleeding obvious: that Charlie was getting too old to live alone. It had been a long four years since Sam's mother had died, and the old man had gone steadily downhill. Sam had tried to get Charlie to see it but he would have none of it. Sam feared he might have inherited the stubborn-bastard gene from his old man.

He found a trolley by the sliding doors of the supermarket and pushed it inside. He glanced over to the cashier, wondering if he'd know her. The girl gave him a shy smile as she flicked her hair over her shoulder. She was a kid, maybe only sixteen or so. He was pretty sure she was no one he knew or was related to. Sam remembered with a jolt that he'd lived off the island more years than the girl had had on the planet. To her, he was probably just another tourist. She wouldn't be wrong to think it. That's how he felt these days. He checked his watch. It was four p.m. There was about an hour's worth of daylight left and he wanted to get this done in a hurry.

Sam pushed the trolley into the first aisle and as he considered the teabag choices something flickered in the corner of his eye.

Something — or rather someone — with curly red hair.

He slowed to a saunter as he manoeuvred down the aisle towards her. Sam had many skills and remembering the face of an attractive woman was one of them. There was no mistaking it. It was the redhead from the boat. The second thing he noticed, after the hair, obviously, was that she was wearing different clothes. She'd changed into what looked like a pair of old jeans, judging by the rainbow of paint splatters on the thighs, and a long-sleeved black T-shirt, pushed up her arms and bunching at her elbows. He heard bells as she moved, and saw multiple thin leather bracelets jangling around her right wrist. She was tall for a woman, which led him to her long legs and the sturdy work boots she was wearing. He slowed to watch her. She'd stopped just ahead of him and was staring intently at something on the shelf by the tinned vegetables. She reached down to pick up a tin, then held it close to her eyes, as if she'd never seen these particular brands or products before. A stranded tourist. Sometimes it was a pain in the arse being such a nice guy.

His boots echoed on the floor and his trolley wheel squeaked as he approached her. The redhead glanced up in his direction when she heard the noise but casually looked away.

Sam stopped a trolley length away from her, cleared his throat. ‘Hello.' He'd decided to go with simple, given English clearly wasn't her first language. The redhead tossed the tin in her trolley, grabbed the handle, and pushed it forward while still staring at the shelves. He was about to repeat the greeting when her trolley shoved into his with a metallic scrape. The clatter echoed throughout the supermarket.

‘Whoa,' he called out.

She startled and looked up at him with narrowed eyes. ‘Oh, shit, sorry.'

Sam smiled. Definitely not a tourist. Thank god she was as Australian as he was, which would make explaining about the jacket a hell of a lot easier.

‘This trolley is a shocker.' Calla winced. She took a couple of steps backwards and yanked the contraption out of its entanglement. She looked up, tried to focus on the face of the person she'd hit. All she was getting was a blurry haze of tall, dark hair and maybe navy blue where his jacket might be. Her glasses had of course been safely tucked inside the pocket of her denim jacket while she was hurling over the side of the ferry and now both precious items, as well as most of her dignity, were lost.

‘Don't worry about it,' the man said. ‘No injuries to report from this end.' His voice was deep and kind of rough round the edges. Something pinged in her head.

‘Good to know.' Calla was curious now and took a few steps towards him to try and get his face into focus, narrowing her eyes and leaning in close. His features became clearer about two inches from his face — at exactly the same time she felt the heat rise in her cheeks.

Damn it. She couldn't be entirely certain, but she was pretty sure it was the guy from the boat. The tall, rugged, rude one with the short, dark hair and the eyes to match. The one who'd gripped her shoulders and shot her a look of disgust before spinning her around and pushing her towards the cabin door to avoid being puked on. Calla felt the flush deepen and explode on her cheeks. Seasickness had been bad enough without having a stranger as a witness. Thank god she'd changed out of her vomit-splattered clothes in the car before she came into the shop.

‘You were on the boat just now,' he said.

‘Yeah, that was me,' Calla said, rolling her eyes in the sure knowledge of what was going to come next.

She could hear the smile in his voice and then he chuckled. ‘Puking Girl.'

Calla's embarrassment warred with indignation in her throat. ‘Excuse me?'

He held a hand to his heart. ‘Apologies. Puking
Woman
.'

She pulled and shoved the trolley hard to the right so she could move around him. ‘Oh, that's hilarious. If you'll excuse me, I really must get going.'

Before she could get around him, the man had angled his trolley to block her path down the aisle.

‘Wait,' he said.

She pulled in a deep breath and tried to focus on his face in an attempt at righteous indignation. So what if he'd helped her on the boat? That didn't give him the right to be an arsehole. ‘Can I get past? I'm actually in a hurry.'

‘Are you feeling any better now you're on dry land?' The tease in his voice had gone. She wished she could see his face properly to see if it had disappeared from his eyes as well.

Was she feeling better? She had been, until just then when he'd mentioned it. She held her stomach, swallowed. ‘Sort of. Yes. No.'

‘It goes away, the seasickness. You might want to pick up some water crackers while you're in here. They'll help settle your stomach.'

Damn it. Now he was being nice.

‘Thanks for the medical advice. Now, if you wouldn't mind moving your trolley, I've really got to go.' She found a smile to flash in his general direction and moved off. She wasn't lying about being in a hurry. She'd been warned about driving around the island at night; apparently, at dusk, the kangaroos emerged and enjoyed waiting by the side of the road to bound across just in time to be hit by any passing car. She'd read all sorts of stories about the damage a 90-kilogram kangaroo could cause to a regular car, not to mention to itself, much less to the old bomb she got around in.

‘Listen,' he called after her, ‘I was actually hoping to run into you.'

Calla sighed. ‘Got some more vomit jokes up your sleeve, have you?'

When he laughed, deep and heartily, she turned back.

‘Sorry about that. I didn't mean to have a go. I actually went looking for you on the deck after you went outside to —'

‘Yes, I get it. Why?'

‘To see if you were all right.'

‘Still alive and kicking, as you can see.'

‘And while I didn't find you, I did find something that I think belongs to you. A denim jacket. With some kind of jewellery pinned to it?'

Calla gasped. All her annoyance disappeared. He had it. Her beaten-up denim jacket. More importantly, he might have her glasses too, as well as her mother's precious brooch. She started to shake. ‘That's … that's great news.'

‘The jacket's in my car and I'm parked out front.'

Her sheer relief bubbled out in a nervous scatter of words. ‘I didn't realise I'd left it behind until I drove my car off the boat and then I figured it was too late to go back and look for it. My glasses are in the pocket. I can barely see without them. So thank you. You've saved my life.'

The man smiled at her and, even though he was fuzzy, it seemed like a nice smile.

‘I've got a few more things to pick up. Why don't I meet you outside when we're done?'

Calla nodded frantically. ‘Sure. I won't be long.'

‘No rush.' He shrugged.

She breathed a huge sigh of relief. She was back on track. She tried not to skip like a loon as she headed for the confectionary aisle.

CHAPTER

3

Step away from the Nice Guy.

And also, step away from the chocolate.

Calla urged her trolley round the end of the aisle with a frustrated shove and then stopped and glanced down at the display before her.

The first was easy. The second? Not so much. Even without her glasses, she recognised the distinctive red wrapper of her favourite bar and snuck one into the trolley. Okay, maybe she'd put two in there. She'd been advised to pick up food supplies when she hit the island, instead of lugging everything from Adelaide, and it didn't take her long to pick up the things she needed for dinner for a few nights and the extras: milk, a loaf of bread, some apples. She'd booked a Penneshaw cabin with sea views, but four nights was all she could afford. She hoped that would be enough time.

She was there to find her brother, Jem, the sibling she and Rose hadn't seen in two years.

The brother who had fallen off the map.

The brother they'd thought was dead until two weeks earlier.

Calla felt a shiver across her shoulders and knew it wasn't from the icy gust of winter wind sneaking in through the supermarket sliding doors. It was fear, plain and simple. What if this sudden trip to Kangaroo Island turned out to be a huge mistake? What if Rosie was right, and this
was
a fool's errand that would only break their hearts all over again?

Calla reached the checkout and the young cashier began tallying up her items with a broad smile.

‘Hi there. You here for a holiday?'

Telling the truth to a total stranger was way too complicated. ‘Yes, here for a few days. It's my first time here on the island, actually. Anything you recommend I should do?'

Cashier girl rolled her eyes and lowered her voice. ‘To be honest? Get back on the boat. I've been stuck here my whole life and I can't wait to get out.'

Calla realised there was no point in telling a teenage girl who'd grown up on an island with a population of just under four and a half thousand people that life wouldn't be more exciting somewhere else. Anywhere else. Calla looked at the wide-eyed hope in the girl's eyes and recognised herself. She'd been that girl, once upon a time, harbouring big dreams and fantasies about what the world might have in store for her. She'd gone out into the world and been as disappointed and crushed by it as anyone else. She was now a woman who'd learnt the hard way that big dreams and fantasies rarely came true.