Wildflower Bay (29 page)

‘Ma?’

He knew as soon as he said her name. There was a stillness in the air, somehow. Nothing had changed, and yet . . . He stepped over the letters that lay untouched on the mat.

‘Ma.’ His voice was quieter now. He could hear the pleading in its tone.

Pushing open the door to her little downstairs bedroom, he felt a coldness run through his veins. He closed his eyes, wishing it all away.

Ruth was sitting up in bed, propped up against pillows, her eyes closed, the bedside light on. A cup of tea sat by her side, the gentle mutter of Radio Scotland playing quietly beside her bed on
the digital radio he’d bought her last birthday to replace the ancient transistor she’d had for donkey’s years.

She looked utterly peaceful – she could have been dozing.

But she was gone.

Finn sat down on the bed beside her, feeling her cool hand, closing his eyes again. She was gone, and there was nothing he could do.

Hamish jumped up onto the bed beside him, tail curled in a hopeful question mark. Unthinkingly, Finn stood up, made his way to the kitchen, and tipped biscuits into the cat’s bowl. He
looked at his phone for a long moment before dialling.

‘Isla.’

‘Hi, Finn. I’m just about to do my first client. Can I give you a ring back at lunchtime? We still OK for later?’

‘D’you think you could do me a favour?’

Isla had left her client with Shannon, telling her something had come up. She’d arrived at the bedroom door, her face white with shock, and held on to Finn for a long
moment before following him inside.

‘You don’t have to go in.’ He’d felt protective of her, somehow.

‘I want to –’ she’d looked young, and brave, and frightened – ‘if it’s OK?’

‘Of course it is.’ He’d pushed open the door. He hadn’t moved anything, and Ma had still been sitting up there in bed, paler now, he realized, than when he first walked
in. He’d willed her to wake up, tell him to get on with work, stop hanging around wasting the best of the day, tell him to pop the kettle on, do anything –

‘Oh, Ruth,’ Isla had gasped, her hand to her mouth. Silently, tears had filled her eyes.

Finn had held out an arm and drawn Isla in close. They’d stood together, his face buried in her hair, taking strength from each other.

Doctor Lewis had come out from the surgery. ‘She was a lovely woman,’ he’d said with a sad smile, signing the death certificate, and adding to Finn, ‘I’d like you
to come in to see me at the beginning of the week, so we can have a bit of a chat – it’s been a lot to take in.’

Now Finn, sitting on the sofa, was watching a cup of tea go cold.

‘D’you want me to ring Roddy for you? Or Kate?’ Isla sat down beside him, having seen the doctor out.

‘They’re off the island today – Kate’s having a scan at the hospital in Glasgow.’ Isla nodded. He felt a sudden pang of guilt. ‘But that’s not why I
rang you. I just thought—’

‘I didn’t think it was.’ Isla put a hand on his arm. The truth was, he’d rung her because she had been the first person to come into his head. She’d been the first
person to come into his head a lot of the time, recently. And Ruth was very fond of her, too – he inhaled sharply.

‘You OK?’ Isla looked at him, concerned.

‘Just trying to take it all in. You didn’t –’ He looked at her, suddenly feeling anger. ‘She didn’t tell you she was suffering from heart failure, did she?
You didn’t know she was sick and not tell me?’

Isla shook her head, stung. He was grieving, and lashing out; she knew that instinctively. She remembered when her mum died, how everything was brushed under the carpet. The only emotion
she’d had left, the only one she’d seemed to be allowed, was anger. She’d smashed a cup by accident in the kitchen one night, and, realizing that it somehow made things feel
better, had picked up every single piece of crockery on the draining board, crashing them down on the tiled floor, furious tears streaming down her face. She’d expected to get into trouble
but her dad had just quietly sent her to bed and swept it all up. The next morning when she got out of bed there was a brand new set of dishes in the cupboard, and nothing was ever mentioned about
it again.

So it wasn’t surprising to her that the first thing that Finn would do was lash out.

‘Honestly, I promise – if she’d said something, I’d have told you.’

She’d known something was up – the swollen ankles had been getting worse, and the breathless wheezing – but Ruth had made it clear that she didn’t want to discuss what
she’d have called ‘any of that nonsense’.

Finn hung his head, shaking it slightly. ‘I’m sorry, Isla. I don’t know why I said it. I just –’

‘It’s OK. You don’t need to explain. You loved her, and she loved you so much, and . . .’ Her voice was choked, and she felt the tears spilling over again. Oh, Ruth.

Finn rubbed his forehead, pressing his brows together, screwing up his face in thought. He looked up at her, his whole face registering shock and sadness.

‘I’m going to have to ring Shona now, let her know. And the rest of the family.’ He put his head in his hands for a moment. ‘Oh God, Isla. What a bloody mess.’

‘Isla?’

Shannon, who’d stayed on after work to tidy the salon in preparation for Jessie’s visit back to the island, shook Isla’s arm. She’d been staring out of the window and
into space again, something that she’d done a lot of in the few days since Ruth’s death.

‘Hmm?’

‘I was wondering if we should lock the back room before Jessie gets back?’

‘Jinny’s room?’

The little back room – which had previously been filled with ancient stock and out-of-date equipment – had been cleared out one weekend by Jinny and Shannon, who had borrowed
Jinny’s dad’s pickup truck and taken most of it to the little scrap yard on the hill towards Scalpsie Bay. Jinny had taken it upon herself to paint the room a pale violet and hang
bright sari material – which she’d bought from the market in Glasgow – on the walls. With the addition of some of her Buddha statues and some fairy lights, she’d made the
little space beautiful. Isla had signed off the expense of a massage table, saying she’d deal with Jessie later, and Jinny, delighted, had started doing the occasional holistic treatments on
their regular clients.

‘No,’ Isla decided on the spur of the moment. ‘Leave it with me. I’ll handle Jessie.’

Shannon looked dubious. ‘She’s not going to like it.’ She shook her head. ‘She says all that stuff has no place in a hairdresser’s and if people want that kind of
hippy nonsense they can go up the hill to the weirdo retreat place.’

Isla stood firm. They’d worked hard, and she wasn’t going to back down now – and anyway, putting it off until Jessie was back on the island full time, rather than popping over
for a few days’ visit, wasn’t going to make it any easier. She couldn’t help thinking that Ruth would approve of that, too.

‘Well,’ Jessie looked around the salon, taking in the changes, ‘you’ve got this place looking like a new pin.’ She gave a nod of approval.
‘I knew I’d be leaving it in good hands with you, Isla. Have these lassies been behaving for you?’

Isla looked at the girls, who were both dressed neatly in black today – they’d decided that with Jessie coming over for a visit, they were going to pull out all the stops. So whilst
Shannon’s hair was still peacock blue and her tattoos spun in a riot of colour down her arm, her black jeans were spotless, her silk vest ironed perfectly. Jinny’s tiny frame was
engulfed in a voluminous, flowing black dress, her hair ironed straight, no jangling bracelets on her wrist, but huge, ornate Indian silver earrings that hung down to her shoulders.

‘We thought as the shop was closed we could give you a special treatment,’ said Jinny, twisting one leg behind the other, pulling out a chair. Shannon poured a cup of tea and handed
it over.

‘What’s this?’ Jessie sniffed the cup, surprised.

‘It’s an ayurvedic blend,’ Jinny beamed, looking pleased with herself. ‘Designed to rebalance your chakras and bring body and soul into alignment.’

Oh God
, thought Isla,
you’re going too far
. She looked over Jessie’s head at Jinny, pulling a face.

Jessie took a sip, sitting back in the chair. ‘Very nice,’ she said, her tone surprised.

‘We’ve made a few – changes,’ Isla began. ‘I mean, you’ve probably heard from Calum . . .’

‘Och yes, he tells me the place is heaving and I tell you what, it was a surprise when I took a look at the accounts on the computer. What have you been doing, Isla? Have you been printing
money out the back room or something?’

Isla saw a fleeting glance of panic exchange between Shannon and Jinny.

‘Not quite, Jessie, but –’
No time like the present
, thought Isla. ‘Actually, before Shannon does your hair, Jinny’s got something up her sleeve to show
you.’

Jinny gave a tiny squeal of excitement. Released from her silence, she whirled across the room, opening the door with a flourish to reveal the brand new treatment room. There was some spa-type
music playing quietly, and the scent of essential oils wafted out from a burner.

‘If you’d like to come this way, madam, and slip off your shoes, you can settle yourself down on the bed for a treatment . . .’

Forty minutes later, Jessie emerged looking completely blissed out and not quite on the same planet. She sat amenably whilst Shannon blow-dried her hair (‘There now, you look gorgeous
– off you go for a date night with Calum, and maybe his luck will be in tonight . . .’ Shannon said at the end, causing Isla to fix her with a glare that said ‘don’t push
it’).

‘You’re looking braw, hen,’ said Calum, winding down the window as he pulled up outside the salon.

Jessie turned around and gave them a wave, pausing just as she was about to climb into the passenger seat. ‘I’m away to be a lady who lunches, girls. Have a lovely day.’

Isla closed the door of the salon and turned around.

‘Yes!’ shouted Shannon and Jinny, fists in the air in celebration.

‘Well, I think we could call that one a success.’ Isla gave them a massive smile, and the three of them hugged in delight. She was fairly certain that Jessie – who’d
confided to Isla that she was enjoying playing granny far too much to come back to working in the salon full time – wouldn’t be getting under Shannon’s feet for too long, but she
wasn’t going to say anything just yet. Right now, just knowing that they’d passed the first major hurdle was enough.

‘So what are you two up to with the rest of your day off?’ Isla locked the salon door.

‘I’m away to the park for a picnic with Rab,’ said Shannon, hitching her bag over her shoulder and waving as she saw his little car pulling up at the end of the street.
She’d finally given up on
The Rules
and the two of them seemed to be getting on enormously well, spending all their spare time together. He was another reason Shannon would have for
wanting to stay here on the island, Isla realized. With Jessie seemingly quite happy, things seemed to be working out for both the girls.

‘Jinny?’

Jinny gave an impish grin before pulling on a motorbike helmet that looked ridiculously huge on her tiny frame. She’d recently been given an old moped by her dad, and took great delight in
trundling around the island at thirty miles an hour, beeping excitedly to everyone she knew, waving an arm that caused the scooter to waver alarmingly on the road.

She flipped open the visor. ‘I’m taking myself off on a secret mission,’ she explained, wrinkling her nose with delight. ‘I’m going up to Lily’s place because
she’s looking for someone to do some extra treatments on the retreat clients, and I met her in the street the other day, and we got talking.’

‘Oh Jinny,’ Isla couldn’t help laughing. Jinny and the crazy Lily were probably the perfect combination, and her retreat clients would absolutely love Jinny’s quirky
nature. ‘That’s brilliant. So what’s the secret mission, or can’t you tell?’

‘Och no,’ said Jinny, shaking her head. ‘The secret mission was going up to Lily’s place to talk about working there part-time. I was a bit worried that you’d be
concerned I couldn’t fit in working at the salon and up at the retreat, and –’ she put a hand to her helmet, where her mouth would have been had it not been masked –
‘I’ve just told you the secret!’

Isla shook her head, still laughing. ‘I’m sure we can work around you. It sounds like a brilliant idea.’

Everything was getting sorted, and Ruth was gone. With a sudden wave of tiredness, Isla decided to go up to the little flat and have a rest. There wasn’t anything else to do.

She’d just settled down on the orange and brown sofa with a book and a drink when the doorbell chimed. Pulling herself up with a groan, she looked out of the window – she
didn’t get visitors, as a rule.

The only person besides the girls it could be was Finn, but he’d popped into the salon that morning, surprised to see it open, checking she was OK. He’d looked tired and drawn, and
she’d hugged him goodbye as he headed off to the funeral directors’ to discuss Ruth’s funeral service. When Isla turned back both the girls had been studiously looking away,
pretending to busy themselves with last-minute preparation for Jessie’s arrival, but she’d felt their stares. Isla knew they were dying to know what – if anything – was
going on. The idea that she and Finn could just be friends seemed impossible for them to comprehend.

She headed downstairs, not having been able to see a thing from the window.

‘Hello, darling.’

Her father was standing there looking pleased with himself, a couple of M&S bags in hand.

‘Thought I’d take a day off, see how my girl is doing, seeing as Jessie’s over for a couple of days.’

‘She knew you were coming?’ Jessie hadn’t said a word.

‘Aye, I said we’d maybe pop in later on and say hello, but she tells me she’s off out for a fancy meal after having her hair done in some posh salon?’

‘Come upstairs.’ Isla paused to give him a huge cuddle. He was exactly what she needed.

‘I nipped to the shops before I came, picked up a few bits – I know you said you were fed up because the food here is terrible.’