Table of Contents

Cover

Title Page

Chapter 1 - Heart of the Matter

Chapter 2 - Home is Where the Heart is

Chapter 3 - Heart Attack

Chapter 4 - Queen of Hearts

Chapter 5 - From the Heart

Chapter 6 - Heartland

Chapter 7 - Heartbreak

Chapter 8 - All Heart

Chapter 9 - Heart-Shaped

Chapter 10 - Heart-Stopping

Chapter 11 - Heartburn

Chapter 12 - Bravehearts

Chapter 13 - Taken to Heart

Chapter 14 - Heart-Throb

Chapter 15 - Heartfelt

Chapter 16 - Wild at Heart

Chapter 17 - Cold-Hearted

Chapter 18 - King of Hearts

Chapter 19 - Sweethearts

Chapter 20 - Heart of Gold

Chapter 21 - Heart-Warming

Chapter 22 - Hearts in the Right Place

Copyright

About the Publisher

heart of the matter

The sky above Coral curved like the inside of a giant beach ball, dipping and fading to blue before gently dissolving into the ocean’s horizon. She squinted at the edge of the world, her red-brown hair curled like a head of bedsprings, bobbing around her. The horizon definitely looked like the edge of the world. It was the edge of her world, anyway.

She scanned the enormous sandpit before her. The beach that morning was full of children with their buckets and spades, making shapes out of the soft, warm sand. A boy dripping wet from head to toe raced out of the sea before flopping, belly-first, on to a patch of dry sand. He rolled left and right until every bit of him was gritty and yellow before tiptoeing up to where a woman stood waiting to catch a Frisbee. Before she could do anything to stop him he had given her a full-body hug. She yelped. He laughed gleefully.

The sky above was suddenly filled with a whirring sound and an aeroplane droned across the sky with a long canvas tail that seemed to flick and ripple in the wind. Coral stared with a wrinkled nose until it was almost overhead. The canvas tail had a message: BEST OF LUCK SARA AND JEFF… LOTS OF LOVE.

The aeroplane continued on its way, as if to the sun, pulling the flying message across the sky. Coral shook her head. She was suddenly annoyed. Just who had wished Sara and Jeff the best of luck? Would Sara and Jeff know?

“Coral? Coral, can you hear me?’

Coral turned towards her best friend. “Mmm?”

“You actually have to move the broom to make a difference.”

Coral stared at the broom she held like a dance partner in her arms. There was a dent in her forehead from where she’d been resting against it. Her friend was right, she hadn’t done much sweeping. The thing was - she hated sweeping the beach hut. Unfortunately, her friend Nicks hated sweeping too. So every week they were taking it in turns. It was just that it always felt like it was her turn.

“What’s the hurry, Nicks?” Coral grumbled. After all, they were on their summer holiday.

Suddenly, and without warning, there was a loud thump-whack sound coming from the glossy red beach hut next door.

Both girls’ heads spun in the direction of the hut. They stared, silent and blinking.

“Did you hear that?” whispered Coral.

“Oh yes.” Nicks’s reply sounded like a hiss.

“We didn’t imagine it then?”

Nicks shook her head slowly. This wasn’t the first time they’d heard strange noises coming from the neighbouring glossy red beach hut either. And yet they had never ever (ever) seen a single soul enter or leave the place. It was always locked up tight with its shutters closed like two sleeping eyes.

Just then a shadow flitted across the window, and then it was gone.

“Did you see that?” gasped Coral, her lips hardly moving at all. She didn’t want the watcher to know she was talking.

Nicks nodded and gulped. She had definitely seen that.

They both stood still and silent, staring - almost wishing for another sight or sound because that might just offer some perfectly obvious explanation as to what they’d just seen and heard.

All of a sudden a dog started yapping. Both girls jumped like they’d been electrocuted. But it was only Romeo, Coral’s Jack Russell pup.

“Romeo!” they both groaned aloud. Romeo took his guard dog duties very seriously.

“We’re probably just being silly,” said Nicks. “I’m sure the noises aren’t anything.” Nicks had always been a sensible sort of girl. She’d never been the type to get tangled up in an overactive imagination, and she didn’t want to start now.

“But I definitely heard and saw something,” insisted Coral.

Nicks shrugged.

“We’ve heard strange noises coming from the red hut before,” insisted Coral.

“It’s the first time we’ve seen anything strange though,” replied Nicks reasonably.

“So what should we do about it? Who should we tell?” said Coral.

“Tell about what?” sighed Nicks. “We’ve no proof that there’s anything strange going on.

OK, we’ve heard a few noises… so what?”

That was true. Coral thought a bit more about this. Nicks had a point: apart from a thump-whack and a vague shadow, what else did they really have?

“So what should we do?” she asked instead.

“We should finish cleaning the beach hut and then concentrate on Cupid Company business,” replied Nicks sensibly.

Coral nodded. Of course Nicks was right. Cupid Company business should always come first. After all, it was what the hut was all about now.

Coral had inherited the hut from her Great-Aunt Coral, but it wasn’t long before it had become more than just a beach hut. It had become home to the little business they had set up - the business of love and matchmaking. And so far, they’d had two success strikes - Coral’s cousin Archie and Gwyn, and Charlie (daughter of the next-door beach hut owners) and Jake.

Coral sighed dreamily. The path of true love could be a lot of fun. Still, for now, she’d better get on with sweeping. It was her mum who had issued strict instructions to keep the hut clean and tidy at all times. Maturity and responsibility - that’s what it took to keep the hut, she had said. And her mum usually meant things too. Coral reached for her dancing partner, the broom, and sighed. Acting cool, calm and collected did not come naturally to her. Still, she would try her best to concentrate on Cupid Company business while she was sweeping the sand from the deck of Coral Hut, which was how she came to realise that there was no Cupid Company business! Quickly she pointed this out to Nicks.

“No business is the Cupid Company business we need to concentrate on,” came Nicks’s reply.

“Of course it is,” mumbled Coral, keeping one eye trained on the sandiest corner of the deck. She would keep her promise to her mum, but she wouldn’t take her other eye off the glossy red beach hut either. Something exciting could happen, and she wasn’t going to miss it!

“We are a professional matchmaking company,” Nicks said, while buffing the hut’s small glass windows. “At the Cupid Company, when we say ‘All for love and love for all’ - we really mean it!”

Now Romeo grabbed the end of Coral’s broom and started a game of tug-of-war. Coral grinned and pulled back hard. Nicks was too busy to notice. She’d already started on her next job of the day: a list written on the paper attached to her foil butterfly clipboard.

“One, we need to advertise. Two, we need to distribute Cupid Company questionnaires. Three, we need to think hard about all the single people we know in Sunday Harbour,” she said as she wrote.

Romeo finally won the tug-of-war and claimed the broom as his own. He was just about to disappear down the hut steps when Coral grabbed the end back to reclaim it.

Further along, a game of beach cricket had started up. The players were laughing loudly and running about and both girls stopped to watch them for a few moments.

“You know, the problem with living in a nice beachy town like Sunday Harbour,” grumbled Coral, “is that the single people out there are just too busy having fun to think about how lonely they actually might be.” She frowned thoughtfully and leaned against her broom. “They make matchmaking very difficult indeed.” Romeo sat at her feet and stared solemnly ahead like he knew exactly what she meant. “I mean, isn’t being in love what life is all about? Could there be anything better? Nobody can play beach cricket forever, can they?”

“Too right,” Nicks agreed. “But look, would you just give me that broom?” she said impatiently. “If you sweep any more slowly you’ll wear a hole in the floor.”

Coral grinned, handing the broom over cheerfully. “Sure, Nicky-Nicks. I’ll tidy up the inside of the hut, shall I?”

But it wasn’t really a question. Before Nicks could answer, Coral had dashed through the door. She simply loved being inside Coral Hut. With its whitewashed walls and the pretty rug of scrambling pink primroses, it hadn’t changed much since her Great-Aunt Coral’s days.

Coral sighed as she looked around at the walls decorated with gold-framed pictures of chubby cherubs and the two shelves with books of romantic poetry. The whole room was like a shrine to love. What could be better than that? CRREEAAK!

The sudden noise from next door snapped Coral out of her reverie. The sound was like furniture scraping. It really was a mystery. Coral shivered, even though it was warm. Perhaps she’d had too much sun. Or maybe it was time to head for the safety of home.

home is where the heart is

It was still morning when the girls got back to the beach hut, having handed out Cupid Company questionnaires to anyone who looked just a little bit lonely. Coral Hut stood fresh and pretty in its new coat of pale pink, lemon-yellow and minty-green stripes. There was no other hut quite like it among those dotted along Sunday Harbour’s promenade. The girls slowed to admire it.

The glossy red hut on the right-hand side of Coral Hut stood locked up tight, silent and gleaming in the bright sunlight.

The hut on the other side - named Headquarters - was painted a khaki colour and had camouflage netting thrown across its roof. Unlike the red hut, this hut buzzed with activity. Its small double doors were thrown wide open and Coral and Nicks’s neighbour Birdie, was lifting and bending and packing things into a rucksack at a frantic pace.

“Are you off somewhere?” Coral called out.

“Oh, hello, dears,” Birdie called over. “The Captain and I are going away for a few weeks.”

The girls stood still, waiting for Birdie to say something else. Birdie was the most talkative woman they knew - she spoke in chapters, not sentences. You never had to ask Birdie for more information, but this morning she was pretty quiet.

“So where are you going to?” Nicks finally asked, when they could wait no longer.

Birdie now held a torch in her hand. She shook it irritably and pressed the on/off switch several times. Pressing her eye to the end of the torch, she tried again. This time a bright beam of yellow light shot straight out. She dropped the torch and blinked a few times, momentarily blinded.

“Er, what was that, girls?”

“Where are you going?” repeated Nicks.

Birdie retrieved the torch from the deck and placed it in a small cardboard box. “My sister has just moved up north to the city. We promised we’d visit,” she finally replied.

“That is nice,” said Nicks, when it was obvious that Birdie was only telling the story in very small doses.

Birdie sighed. “Not really. I’m not fond of over-populated spaces.” She tried to smile - perhaps at the thought of seeing her sister - but the smile quickly dissolved into a grimace. Coral changed the subject.

“Birdie, we’ve been hearing some very strange noises—” she started.

“It’s terribly noisy in the city!” snorted Birdie.

Coral paused and chewed on her lip for a moment. “Not in the city… from the red beach hut next door. It sounds like—”

“Sounds like cars honking, engines roaring… traffic and trains… that’s all you hear in the city,” Birdie continued, ignoring them and visibly distressed. “It’s not like Sunday Harbour, where everything is quiet and peaceful.”

Coral decided to give it one more try. “But the noises coming from the red beach hut next door… they seem quite sinister.”

“Yes, yes, I know. And you’re quite right,” replied Birdie. “I must brave the city for my sister.” She paused and her eyes glazed over as she stared into the distance. Then she shuddered and snapped out of the moment before quickly resuming her packing. A compass, a pair of binoculars, mosquito nets, a set of two-way radios - they all went in her rucksack.

The girls watched her and sucked on their lips in concern.

“Maybe you’re misjudging the city a little?” suggested Nicks when Birdie added a tray of camouflage face paint to the bag.

Birdie glanced from the bag to the girls and back again. She stood upright and gave a small chuckle. “Perhaps you’re right.”

Both girls sighed with relief. That was more like the old Birdie.

“Attention, please!”

The girls spun round and found their noses touching an olive-green shirt with the word ARMY spelled in black across its front. It was Birdie’s husband.

“Morning, Captain!” They saluted half-heartedly (they still felt a little silly doing the salute thing).

The Captain smiled and tapped their heads affectionately. He moved over to the rucksack, limping slightly as he moved. If it weren’t for his bad knee he’d still be leopard-crawling through the bush with the rest of his beloved army comrades.

“Do we have everything?” he asked.

Birdie nodded. “It should be safe to leave the rest, I think.”

The Captain made a noise like a light aircraft coming in to land, as if he was considering things. “Well, I hope so,” he finally replied. “And I hope we can trust those four girls to be careful with Headquarters.”

“What four girls?” asked Coral, looking around Birdie and the Captain’s beach hut.

Suddenly, Romeo barked. A bold seagull had landed on the deck railing behind Birdie.

“Oh, I’m sorry, girls!” said Birdie, as if Romeo had been barking directly at her. “I should have told you that my niece Saffron is going to be staying in our house while we’re away. It’s the least we can do - after all, she’s given up her bedroom in the city for us.” Just the mention of the word ‘city’ seemed to turn Birdie nervous again. But then she coughed hard and squared her shoulders.

“Anyway, dears, Saffron and her friends will be making use of our home and our lovely beach hut while we’re away, which of course we’re delighted about. We trust her completely.”

The Captain made that light aircraft sort of a noise again. “Out of sight, out of mind, I say,” he replied. “We can’t take any chances with my specialised army gear.” He glanced lovingly at the rucksack they were taking away with them.

Birdie rolled her eyes and bent to zip up the bag. It was clearly time for them to leave. She kissed both girls on the forehead while the Captain closed and locked the doors to Headquarters. They waved goodbye. And then they were gone…

The crashing of the waves on the beach suddenly seemed louder than they ever had before as the girls watched their friendly neighbours head off down the path.

They stared at each other without speaking. There was no need. They’d been best friends for so long their conversations didn’t always need words.

What a time for Birdie and the Captain to leave. Just when we were getting to grips with the strangeness of the hut next door.

Coral glanced down at Romeo. Of course she’d never swap her beloved pup, but if only he was just a little big bigger… with bigger teeth… and maybe a really big scary growl…

heart attack

Nicks didn’t want to think about the mysterious red hut any more. And now that Birdie and the Captain had finally disappeared down the path it was time to get on with Cupid Company business. She tapped her glitter pen against her foil butterfly clipboard. “You’re staring again,” she said to Coral.

Coral tore her eyes away from the hut next door and bit the end of her pencil, which was actually a red plastic heart on a spring that jiggled when she wrote. At that moment she had nothing to write. There really wasn’t a lot to write about. Coral stared at her blank notebook and tried to look thoughtful. And then her brain circuits lit up like a neon billboard.

“I know - we could matchmake your mum!” she called out excitedly. “She’s been single since like forever…!”

“Well, only since she divorced my dad,” Nicks said doubtfully.

But already Coral’s head was flooded with good ideas. There was Mr McLeod from Arts and Crafts World (there wasn’t enough pocket money in the world to buy all their beautiful beads, but family discounts would certainly help). And there was a very good chance that Frank who owned The Frozen Cow was unattached. Their choc-fudge-brownie frozen yoghurt was the best in Sunday Harbour.

“Look, forget it!” said Nicks before Coral even had time to fully consider the man with the moustache who worked behind the counter at the surf clothing shop. “Mum doesn’t want to be matchmade.”

But there wasn’t time for further discussion as, just then, Romeo streaked up the deck stairs like a white and caramel blur. He screeched to a halt and stood panting through his nostrils, his mouth filled with half a sandwich. A salami slice slipped out of the side in slow motion and landed on the deck with a splat. Romeo kept his chin raised but monitored the fallen salami with one eye. Doggy drool dripped from his lips, but he didn’t budge.

“You’ve got it now, so you may as well eat it!” ordered Coral crossly. She had told him so many times before not to take food from people’s beach picnics. Still, one piece of salami probably wouldn’t do any harm.

Nicks giggled. “Maybe we should find Romeo a doggy girlfriend. It might just keep him out of trouble.”

Coral made a pooh-pooh sort of face. She puckered up her lips and rubbed Romeo tenderly on his chin, which was now mucky with mayonnaise.

The girls were so busy concentrating on Romeo that they’d failed to notice that the red hut next door was slowly coming to life behind their backs.

“Ew, look at your fingers,” said Nicks.

“What’s wrong with them?” Coral loved her pup, drool, mayonnaise and all.

“They could do with a good wash,” laughed Nicks.

“Oh, I’ll just wipe them on—”

The sound of rattling keys ended Coral’s sentence. Both girls spun in the direction of the sound.

There stood a very tall man - so tall his head loomed over the door frame of the red hut. And he was as thin as he was tall - so thin that the Adam’s apple in his neck stood out like a second (and only slightly smaller) head. He looked like a long thin snake that had just eaten something quite large. The lump pulsed up and down like it was still alive.

Both girls sucked on the air so hard it sounded like they’d been winded.

“What a scary kind of guy…” wheezed Coral breathlessly.

Scary-kind-of-guy heard their gasps and twisted his heads left. His eyes were small and round and so dark that they seemed to reach out and hook on to the girls. They couldn’t have looked away if they’d tried. The black pinpoints of his eyes drilled into theirs like a locked-on laser beam. And still the lump in his neck pulsed. Up-down. Up-down. Up-down.

Forever came and went and still they all stared at each other. And then, suddenly, Scary Guy moved the long thin sticks of his fingers. The keys on the round brass ring in his left hand banged together, the sound echoing like the clang of a giant brass bell. It even seemed to surprise Scary Guy, who all of sudden dropped the brown leather bag he’d been carrying. It landed with a monumental thud. The impact of the fall sprang the lock and the two halves of the bag suddenly split apart and fell wide open. They all stared at the bag as its contents spilled out across the decking. There was a hammer, a long coil of rope and a roll of thick silver duct tape.

Suddenly, Scary Guy stooped low, and in no more than two swift movements he had scooped the lot back up into the bag and snapped it shut. He was just as quick to unlock the hut’s door and disappear inside, slamming the door shut behind him.

And then the world seemed especially quiet. A wind came up and blew the girls’ hair, but still they didn’t move. They were all big eyes and thumping chests. It was Romeo’s howl that finally broke the spell. It was almost as though he sensed that something was up.

Coral was the first to breathe again. “Wow wee…” she gasped. “What do you make of that?”

Nicks was the first to actually move again. She slithered on to a deckchair and tapped her knees thoughtfully. “He was a strange one,” she said. “Did you see the stuff in his bag?”

Coral nodded solemnly. “You do know what the most common use for duct tape is, don’t you?”

Nicks shrugged lightly. If Coral was going into crazy mode there was no point in encouraging her.

“Kidnapping… murder… that sort of thing!” Coral cried out, grabbing the air with her hands and giving it a good shake.

Now it was Nicks’s turns to snort, only she made more of a delicate pssht sort of sound. “Oh, please, where do you get that from?”

“I watch television! Where there’s dodgy business - there’s duct tape. No criminal can be without it.”

“Keep your voice down.” Nicks glanced left, then right, before whispering, “So you’re suggesting that our neighbour is a criminal?”

Coral paused and took a deep breath. “Not just a criminal. A—” She stopped herself. Actually, she wasn’t exactly sure what she was suggesting. But she was convinced that Scary Guy was up to no good. Why else did you carry duct tape, a hammer and rope around with you?

Coral did an about-turn and tiptoed inside Coral Hut. She really needed to lie down on the lovely bright white daybed for a bit. She wanted to rest and think the whole dramatic incident through.

Coral sighed as she absorbed it all. She felt better already. Almost. Sort of. With just a bit more rest…

queen of hearts

Nicks and her mum were still jumping the early-morning waves the next day as Coral made her way over to the beach hut, feeling queasy from all the saltwater she’d swallowed. She climbed up the front steps and settled down on her beach towel, pressing her tummy to the deck, and resting her chin on her hands at the edge. The view was good and the warm morning sun had turned the deck toasty. She could even see the top of Romeo’s snoozing head poking out of the cool hole he’d dug in the warming sand. And then, very slowly, she started dozing off. When suddenly—

“SAY IT ISN’T SO!”

The voice was so loud. Coral hoisted one eye up.

“I don’t even know what that colour is!”

“It’s called khaki.”

“They should call it KAK-i instead.”

“Oh dear.”

“And what’s that hanging over the roof?”

“It’s camouflage netting - my uncle’s ex-army,” This particular voice sounded weary.

Coral raised the other eyelid ever so slowly. The image of four older girls came into focus. They were standing in front of Headquarters with lipglossed lips and manicured fingers pinching their trim hips. They all wore variations of the same sort of thing: bikinis, knotted sarongs, oversized sunglasses, wide-brimmed sunhats, and enormous beach bags dangling from the crooks of their bent arms. They looked like a fashion shoot. Coral guessed they must be about eighteen years old. She kept her eyes half-mast and watched them carefully.

“We could spruce the place up a bit?” suggested the weary voice with forced cheeriness. “I’m sure my aunt and uncle won’t mind if we add our own pretty touches.”

So that was Saffron - Birdie and the Captain’s niece. Coral zoned in on her - with her sequined clothes, shimmering glass-bead accessories and glittery lipgloss, she was obviously a sparkly sort of girl.

“We’d have to do a lot to pretty this place up!” muttered a girl with long, dark red hair.

“Oh, Tallulah, don’t be such a bore,” ordered a girl with wavy blonde hair. “Do you remember our last makeover? Now did we transform that girl from drab to fab?”

Tallulah gave this some thought. And then she smiled. “You’re so right, Sienna, sweetie. We can make anything look beautiful!”

Coral was still watching carefully; she was keeping a tally too. So there was sparkly Saffron. And Tallulah the redhead and Sienna with wavy blonde hair. That just left a girl with short feathery hair who seemed preoccupied with her shoes. She pulled one leg and then tried to pull the other. But her feet were stuck fast. She seemed to think about this for a moment, then she slid her feet out of the shoes. Bending low and using both hands, she yanked the shoes from the sand. She’d worn high heels to the beach!

Saffron already had the double doors of Headquarters pulled wide open. She was surveying the interior of the hut with her enormous beach bag still dangling from her arm while she tapped a fingernail against her front teeth. She seemed to be thinking out loud.

“Some glittery dangly decorations… a crystal bead curtain, perhaps… flowers… a few scented tea candles…”

The other two girls - Tallulah and Sienna - had also taken an interest in the hut. Tallulah was testing the spring of the army cot bed with her bouncing bottom (except there was not much bouncing to be done). She looked less than impressed with the hard mattress. She muttered something about “So much for comfy afternoon naps,” while Sienna turned the Captain’s brass bugle this way and that in her hands. She then put the bugle to her eye and looked through it like a telescope. She seemed less than impressed too.

Saffron meanwhile was humming a tune while she busily dressed one of the beach hut’s windows in her (unsurprisingly) sparkly sarong. After a few minor adjustments to the sarong tassels she stepped back to admire her decorating. At last somebody looked pleased.

“Time to suntan!” squealed the girl who was now sensibly carrying the high heels in her hand. She had found a spot on the sand directly in front of Headquarters, and was dropping everything - a large pink towel, a glossy magazine, various bottles (suntan oil, sunblock, cooling mist face spray, mineral water) and her mobile phone. She then finally settled down on her towel with the magazine and began to read out loud.

“How do you know if you’re loved up?” she demanded.

Coral’s ears pricked up.

“You have to answer A, B or C,” the girl finished.

The other girls stopped what they were doing and nodded thoughtfully.

“Question one,” the girl went on. “It’s your first-year anniversary and your boyfriend: a) buys you flowers and choccies or b) makes you a card or c) gives you an extra special cuddle because it’s not about gifts anyway?”

The rest of the girls were silent. Tallulah was the first to speak. “Is there a D, Chanel?”

Ah, so that was the girl’s name, thought Coral.

“I told you there’s only A, B or C,” Chanel went on.

“Are they fancy florist flowers or flowers bought from the local petrol station?” asked Saffron.

Coral could barely stifle a snigger.

“I think a handmade card is very sweet. I’d say B,” decided Sienna.

“Cuddle - I’d choose an extra special cuddle,” replied Tallulah, who had obviously given up on the non-existent D option.

Chanel sat upright and grinned happily at her friends. “Isn’t it just brilliant that we all have boyfriends!”

Coral groaned inwardly. So no matchmaking to be had here then.

“Having a boyfriend just makes the world seem brighter,” Saffron agreed. “Even if I’m having a bad day I just have to think about Max and suddenly I feel better.” She hugged herself and smiled in a warm and cosy sort of way.

Chanel nodded. “That’s the power of love. Having a love life is just the best! But it’s good that we still have time for our girlfriends too.”

The other girls all nodded and started talking at once.

“Right on, sister!”

“Of course we miss the boys.”

“But they’ll still be there when we get back from our holiday!”

“Here’s to girl power!”

“And the power of love!”

Coral stared awestruck at her shiny and sophisticated new neighbours. You really didn’t get girls like these in Sunday Harbour. These big-city girls looked and behaved like film stars. And they seemed to love ‘love’ just as much as Coral and Nicks did!

Suddenly, a cool wind sprang up and goosebumps popped up on Coral’s skin. She needed to get dressed. But she didn’t want to draw attention to herself - not in her plain old boring school swimming costume anyway. It had been at the top of the laundry pile and had made for easy grabbing. She scowled at her laziness. Of course she couldn’t wait to meet her fabulous new neighbours, but she wanted to make the best first impression too. So there was nothing else for her to do but slowly leopard crawl backwards along the deck in the direction of the door to Coral Hut. Along the way she stubbed her toe on a deckchair and scraped a knee on the bare deckboards, but it was worth it. She made it inside the hut without being noticed.

Her purple and pink heart-shaped backpack was still on the daybed and she zipped it open. All she’d brought with her was a hooded top, a pair of board shorts printed with yellow smiling starfish and her Crocs. It was hardly an outfit torn from the pages of a magazine, but it was all she had. She sighed and put on everything except for the Crocs. She was now as ready as she could be for her grand entrance.

She tiptoed back to the doorway for one more inspection. Her timing had to be perfect. She carefully put her nose round the corner. She glanced right. The girls were reading magazines, filing their nails and nattering. She glanced left. SCARY GUY WAS ON THE DECK OF THE RED HUT AND STARING DIRECTLY AT HER!

Coral screamed.

The big-city girls over at Headquarters screamed too (Coral’s scream had just given them the biggest fright).

Scary Guy quickly disappeared through the door of the glossy red hut and snapped it shut behind him again.

Nobody else moved. Coral stood still, framed in the doorway, her breathing slowing again. The girls were all staring at her. She hoisted up her eyebrows in an innocent sort of way, then gave a small whistle before tucking her hands inside her pockets. Or she tried to, anyway. As it turned out this particular pair of board shorts didn’t have any pockets, so she had to cross her arms instead.

Sienna was fanning her face with a nail file while Tallulah pressed her magazine against her chest. Finally Saffron spoke.

“Is everything all right, little girl?”

Little girl? Coral glanced around before she realised that they must be referring to her.

She coughed. “Oh yes. Oh, sure,” she replied as she stumbled out on to the deck. OK, so it wasn’t quite the grand entrance she’d planned.

“Have you hurt yourself?” asked Chanel, who was now nervously clutching her sunhat.

Coral shook her head.

“Did something scare you then?” asked Sienna with a sad face, like Coral was five years old and the bogey man had suddenly appeared from under the bed.

“Scare me?” she spluttered. “Definitely not.” She hadn’t got a plan, or time to come up with one either. But the girls were all staring and waiting expectantly. So she suddenly let out another scream. And then she grinned and shrugged. “When I’m really happy I just sometimes give a good scream.” She smiled sweetly.

The girls seemed to be thinking about this for a moment before slowly starting to move about again. Sienna resumed nail filing and Chanel put her sunhat back on.

“So happy I could scream…” said Tallulah with her head tilted left then right. “Yes, I think I’ve heard that saying before.”

Sienna nodded while she filed. “It does sound very familiar.”

“Aaaah!” screamed Chanel.

Saffron echoed her scream and then so did the other two girls. They all grinned at each other. Coral grinned at the girls. They grinned back. There was a lot of crazy grinning. Coral could see she was going to like these girls a lot.

From the heart

The four girls had already disappeared off to explore the sights and sounds of Sunday Harbour when Nicks got back - pale and puckered - from her wave-jumping session. Coral didn’t mention the arrival of the fabulous, big-city girls next door. She simply locked Coral Hut and, with her best friend and her puppy on either side of her, smiled quietly before leaving for home. Not that there was any big hurry. The sun was still high in the sky and lunchtime was a safe distance away, so the two girls ambled along slowly and spoke even less.

Nicks’s cheeks had been painted pink by the sunshine; Coral’s glowed with happiness from her small sweet secret. Nicks was quiet because she was tired; whereas Coral was keeping silent as she wanted to savour the girls’ glitzy glamour (without interruption) for just a little while longer. She had a suspicion that Nicks might not be quite as impressed by the lipglossed, lovestruck ways of the four big-city girls as she was. Nicks was a much more sensible sort.

The trio were just strolling past the Seafood Shack when Romeo stopped. His black nose sniffed the air hungrily, but the girls kept on walking. They passed the bakery, but still the girls kept on walking. It was only when they came to the local charity shop that Coral slowed and came to a standstill.

“Come on, I’m bushed,” groaned Nicks, who was now a short distance ahead.

Coral’s nose was flattened against the shop’s window. “Oh, you have to see this!” She jabbed a finger at the glass and tapped it excitedly.

Nicks knew there was no point in resisting, so she trudged over to see what the fuss was about. Beyond the glass window pane were a pair of used ski boots and a set of four teacups with an uneven number of saucers. Neither of those could be what had got Coral so excited. And then Nicks noticed the mannequin with the missing arm that was half hidden by a bright pink feather boa. Now that was just Coral’s sort of thing.

“It’s pretty, but where would you even wear a pink feather boa?” she said.

“No, not the feather boa. Look!” Coral jabbed her finger at the glass a few more times.

And then Nicks noticed the square brown cardboard box with the words VALENTINE PARTY DECORATIONS (Going Cheap!) scrawled and underlined in thick blue marker pen across one side.

“Could we do this another time?” Nicks suggested half-heartedly.

But Coral had a determined grin on her face. “No way - it’ll be snapped up before we know it!”

“But we’re months away from Valentine’s Day,” Nicks groaned.

But Coral wasn’t listening. “A box full of romance!” she sighed blissfully. “C’mon, I have pocket money.” And then she disappeared through the charity shop’s door.

Nicks hesitated for a moment before scooping Romeo up in her arms and following her friend inside. She found Coral pointing at the box in the window, already discussing her potential purchase with the grey-haired lady behind the till.

“Oh, I remember the poor young dear who donated that box of Valentine decorations to the shop. I remember her well,” she was saying. “That girl sobbed her heart out right on the spot where you’re standing now. You see, she’d just lost her one great love.”

Nicks watched Coral. She was rooted to the spot and staring, silent and unmoving. Her lower lip looked ready to tremble.

“But how did she lose her one great love?” Coral cried out, her mind was reviewing all the possibilities. Was it an illness? An accident? Some natural disaster?

“He ran off with the blonde from Belarus,” replied the charity shop lady matter-of-factly.

Coral’s concentrated face of emotion dissolved instantly. “Oh right,” she said. It was hardly the epic love story she’d been hoping for.

“And the young girl said she never wanted to celebrate Valentine’s Day ever again,” concluded the lady, like she had come to the unhappily-ever-after end of the story.

Coral thought about the dumped girl. If only they knew who she was. There was no doubt in Coral’s mind that the Cupid Company could help her to find love once again.

“So will you be buying the box of decorations in the window?” the lady asked.

Nicks already knew Coral’s answer. “I’ll fetch it,” she quickly answered. She really just wanted to get home.

She returned carrying the box, but Coral couldn’t wait for home. Already she was dipping both hands excitedly into the tangle of decorations dedicated to love. The air was instantly a flurry of red and pink and silver. There were padded fabric hearts that said FOREVER, BE MINE and LOVE BUG. There were dangling cupids, foil garlands of red and silver hearts, heart-shaped window stickers, balloons that spelled L FOR LOVE and a banner that said I LOVE YOU. There was even a tub of fake rose petals for scattering. Coral sighed noisily and stared, starry-eyed. She was in Coral Heaven. And then she thought about the girl whose boyfriend had run off with the blonde from Belarus. It was like holding a piece of history. She sighed again, but was soon drawn to the other items in the charity shop, which was like an Aladdin’s Cave of treasures. Her hands reached for the overflowing shelves, railings and baskets.

“Give the lady your money, Coral,” ordered Nicks.

But Coral had already found another treasure.

“Coral!” A tired Nicks was getting impatient.

Coral spun round with a giant pair of oversized tortoiseshell sunglasses on her nose.

“Ha ha, very funny,” said Nicks. “But I’m really in no mood for fooling about.” She gripped the wriggling Romeo even closer.

“Who’s fooling about?” grinned Coral as she flounced in the direction of a basket of discounted scarves. Dipping her hands inside, she let her fingers ripple through the soft and silky material. Of course she knew there wasn’t much time left ticking on her best friend’s meter, but she hardly needed any time at all. Quickly she found what she was looking for and held it up, smiling. The grey animal-print silk scarf with the sparkle stripe was very fashionable.

Nicks was huffing and puffing now and tapping her foot impatiently, but she clearly wasn’t quite ready to expire just yet. So Coral took one last dip into the basket and came up with a purple paisley bandanna. It would be perfect for Romeo. She gave a small joyful whoop and carried her final purchases over to the till where her box of Valentine decorations was still waiting. This had been her best shopping day ever!

The lady accepted Coral’s money with a gentle smile and was about to place the sunglasses, the scarf and the bandanna inside the box of decorations for easy carrying when Coral slipped the sunglasses from her grip and returned her smile.

“Thanks very much,” she said, “but I’ll be needing those.” She put the sunglasses on her nose and pushed them up as far as they would go. “C’mon, Nicks. C’mon, Romeo.” And then she swished out of the shop with the box of decorations hoisted under one arm like a very big trophy.

Nicks hurried after her, relieved to be leaving, but also a little confused by the sunglasses (although her best friend did have a strange sense of humour). Coral was outside and waiting on the pavement, still wearing the oversized glasses.

“Don’t you think you should take those things off now?” asked Nicks.

“Take them off? Whatever for?”

“Oh, please, stop being silly.”

“I am not being silly. All the celebs wear these. We’ll need to find you a pair too.”

Nicks groaned and made a choking sort of sound. “I don’t think so. They don’t even fit you properly.”

Coral tilted her head at a backwards angle and started walking, narrowly missing a large lamppost.

Nicks returned Romeo to the pavement and quickly caught up with her zigzagging friend. She was no longer feeling quite so tired.

“So how are the sunglasses working out for you then?” she asked with a smirk that was almost as big as her friend’s sunglasses.

“Great!” Coral looked awkward but determined. “They’re lovely,” she said, almost smacking straight into a postbox. She held on to the box of Valentine decorations even tighter. Nicks decided it was wiser not to even ask what she planned to do with those. It looked like her best friend just needed to focus all of her concentration on getting home safely!

heartland

Coral had got Nicks to promise she would be at her house at nine the next morning, and now Coral was counting on it — literally. There was a small clock on her bedside table that she was watching, its two heart-shaped hands edging forward.

“Coral, Nicks is here!” her mum called up from the kitchen.

“Send her to my bedroom, please!” Coral hollered back.

“Must you all shout to one another?” her father called from the study.

“Sorry!” both Coral and her mum cried in unison.

And then Nicks’s head appeared round the bedroom door. “Wowzers,” she breathed out loud.

“Isn’t it brilliant!” Coral grinned.

Nicks stepped inside the bedroom. There were pink padded hearts tied with ribbon to cupboard handles, lamps and the bed frame. The ceiling was alive with swirling hearts and dangling cupids. The banner across the wall above her bed spelled out: I LOVE YOU and strings of red and silver foiled hearts dipped from corner to corner. There were even bunches of balloons tied to the bedposts and red hearts stuck to the windows. The finishing touch was the fake rose petals scattered across the carpet. Nicks swished through them like autumn leaves, noticing Romeo’s face poking out from under the bed.

“It’s certainly very Valentiney,” Nicks commented. Even if it wasn’t that time of year. But she didn’t say the last bit out loud.

“It’s a room dedicated to love and romance,” said Coral excitedly. “Can you think of anything nicer!” It wasn’t a question, and Nicks knew better than to answer.

Nicks gazed around the room with her hands on her hips and grinned. “It is lovely!”

Coral reached for her heart-shaped backpack and pulled out the giant tortoiseshell sunglasses. “Shall we get going then? Romeo could do with a paddle in the sea. It’s going to be a hot one.”

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