THE DOG SHARE
Fiona Gibson

Copyright

Published by AVON

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First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers 2021

Copyright © Fiona Gibson 2021

Fiona Gibson asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Source ISBN: 9780008385996

Ebook Edition © 2021 ISBN: 9780008386009

Version: 2020-12-24

Dedication

For Caroline, Ratty and Moth with love

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Prologue

Chapter One: Two Years Earlier: Suzy

Chapter Two

Chapter Three: Now

Chapter Four

Chapter Five: Ricky

Chapter Six: Suzy

Chapter Seven: Medley Family WhatsApp

Chapter Eight: Ricky

Chapter Nine: Suzy

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven: Ricky

Chapter Twelve: Suzy

Chapter Thirteen: Medley Family WhatsApp

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen: Ricky

Chapter Sixteen: Suzy

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen: Two Weeks Later: Ricky

Chapter Twenty: Suzy

Chapter Twenty-One: Ricky

Chapter Twenty-Two: Suzy

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four: Ricky

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six: Suzy

Chapter Twenty-Seven: Medley Family WhatsApp

Chapter Twenty-Eight: Ricky

Chapter Twenty-Nine: Suzy

Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty-One: Ricky

Chapter Thirty-Two: Suzy

Chapter Thirty-Three

Chapter Thirty-Four: Ricky

Chapter Thirty-Five: Suzy

Chapter Thirty-Six: Ricky

Chapter Thirty-Seven

Chapter Thirty-Eight: Suzy

Chapter Thirty-Nine: Ricky

Chapter Forty: Suzy

Chapter Forty-One

Chapter Forty-Two: Ricky

Chapter Forty-Three: Suzy

Chapter Forty-Four: Ricky

Chapter Forty-Five: Two Months Later: Suzy

Chapter Forty-Six

Chapter Forty-Seven: Two Weeks Later

Chapter Forty-Eight

Chapter Forty-Nine: Ricky

Chapter Fifty

Chapter Fifty-One: Suzy

Chapter Fifty-Two: Four Months Later: Arthur

Chapter Fifty-Three: Springtime: Suzy

Acknowledgements

Keep Reading …

About the Author

By the same author

About the Publisher

Prologue

‘Dad,’ I yell, ‘look at that dog!’

I’m running across Silver Beach. I know it so well; every rock, the names of all of the shells, the best places to find flat stones for skimming. I know most of the people we see here – and their dogs – at least to say hi to.

But I’ve never seen this dog before.

I stop and wait for Dad to catch up. ‘That’s the kind I want,’ I tell him.

‘Are you sure?’ he says, smiling. ‘Last time we looked, you said you’d have any kind …’

He means the dog rescue centre websites. I’m always checking them out, seeing which dog I’d adopt if Dad would let me. Not that he will – I realise that. It wouldn’t be fair, I’m out all day, we don’t have a garden, blah-blah-blah. I’ve heard it all a million times. But it doesn’t stop me looking … just in case.

I like reading about dogs too. I know loads of canine facts, like they only sweat from furless areas (their noses, the pads on their feet). And when they see a dog on TV, they actually recognise it as a dog. Some even have their favourite programmes (my friend Lucas’s whippet likes Match of the Day). Dogs are amazing.

I grab a piece of driftwood and throw it. The dog tears after it and brings it back to me. We do it again and again as Dad strolls about, looking for more sticks.

The dog’s mostly brown, with a patch of white on his chest, and he’s a bit scruffy and skinny. He probably wouldn’t win any of those competitions where the dogs are paraded about in front of judges. I don’t really like those competitions, but maybe the dogs don’t mind. Obviously they can’t say, ‘God, this is boring, having to sit nicely and look neat. Can we go out and play now?’

I like thinking of all those competition dogs sending each other telepathic messages, planning a mass breakout. I mean, they can communicate through sounds, movements and by producing scents – so why not by telepathy too?

A dog is as intelligent as a two-year-old human, I told Dad recently.

That’s amazing. But we’re still not getting one, he said with a smile.

‘I can’t see anyone about,’ Dad’s saying now. ‘Maybe he’s run away?’

‘Yeah, maybe.’ I nod.

‘We should take him to the police station,’ he adds.

‘Can’t we play a bit more?’

Dad checks his watch. ‘No, we really should go. We don’t want to miss the ferry, do we?’

In fact, I wouldn’t mind missing it this time. I don’t really want to go back to Glasgow. And I definitely don’t want to take the dog to the police station. I want to play here all day, like I used to, when it wasn’t just me and Dad who came to the island, but Mum, too.

Sometimes I feel sad being here without her. It didn’t matter so much when I was little – I’d been busy building sandcastles, filling my bucket with seawater to flood moats, all of that. But I’m not little anymore. I’m ten years old and sometimes the sadness seems to creep in, a bit like the seawater that seeps in through my trainers and wets my feet. And I can’t do anything to stop it.

I miss her then. But I’m not missing her now that I have this little dog to play with. We run and run, and I pretend not to hear as Dad calls out: ‘I don’t feel good about leaving this dog on the beach by himself. If we hurry up now, we could drop him off at the police station and we’ll still catch the ferry …’

‘Aw, Dad!’

‘He’s probably run away. And someone’ll be going crazy, looking for him.’ Dad’s looking serious now, properly worried. ‘See if you can catch him. We can use my scarf as a lead …’

‘Can’t we take him home?’ I stare at Dad, wanting him to say yes more than anything. ‘Please, Dad. Please!’

‘I’m sorry. You know we can’t do that.’

‘But he’s lost! Or maybe he’s been abandoned?’ I look back round, expecting to see the dog sitting there, waiting for our stick game to start up again.

But he’s not there. And when I scan the whole beach I spot a blur of brown in the far distance, growing smaller and smaller until he runs around the headland, and is gone.

Chapter One
Two Years Earlier Suzy

The island had come clearly into view, illuminated by a shaft of silvery light. We stared, transfixed, from the deck of the ferry.

‘So, what d’you think?’ Paul asked.

‘It’s incredible,’ I murmured. ‘It’s like one of those old religious paintings – like a Michelangelo or something. All it needs are some floating cherubs and a scattering of naked muscular gods …’

‘Pervert.’ He laughed and squeezed my hand.

I glanced at his handsome profile: long, strong nose; full lips; messy, wavy, light brown hair being buffeted by the wind. ‘I’m so excited, Paul,’ I added. ‘Look at those mountains! And those little white cottages dotted along the shore …’

‘And I think that’s the whisky distillery over there.’ He pointed towards the end of the town.

‘Really? It’s tiny!’ I gazed at the purplish hills that scooped down towards the greener lower pastures. A little way along from the town – the only sizeable settlement on the island – lay a wide crescent of beach. It looked deserted. There would be no resort-style entertainment here, no shops crammed with souvenir keyrings and novelty booze that never seems quite so enticing once you cart it home. My heart soared with the anticipation of a whole week together, separated from the rest of the world.

My mother had been astounded when she’d first heard about our trip. ‘Belinda said you’re off to some island?’ she’d barked down the phone. So she and my sister had been gossiping about Paul and me. Although I didn’t know where my hackles were exactly, I was sure they were raised.

‘Yes, we just thought it’d make a nice change,’ I explained.

‘A Scottish island?’ she gasped.

‘That’s right, Mum. It’s in the Hebrides.’

‘The Hebrides! How on earth will you get there?’

‘We’ll drive up to Oban on the west coast and take the ferry from there. It looks amazing,’ I added, to stir her up even further.

Mum paused, obviously figuring out how to fish for more information in a non-blatant way. ‘Isn’t that a bit … different for you two?’

Ah, the ‘D’ word, a favourite of Mum’s, as in, ‘Oh, is that a new jacket, Suzy? It’s different!’ I.e., ‘If you’re happy to go out in public wearing such a hideous article, then who am I to stop you?’

‘We’ve been up to the Highlands plenty of times,’ I reminded her, ‘since Paul’s dad bought that hotel. You know we love it up there.’

‘Yes, but that was in proper Scotland, wasn’t it?’ You’d have thought we were talking the Arctic Circle. But then my parents had spent their whole lives living within a few miles of York – where Paul and I also lived – and rarely ventured out of Yorkshire.

‘Erm, it was on the mainland, yes,’ I replied. ‘But the islands are proper Scotland too, Mum.’

‘That was in a town, though, with things to do.’ Like we were a couple of kids. ‘And obviously,’ she added, ‘now Paul’s dad has, um …’

Died was what she couldn’t quite bring herself to say. My boyfriend had lost his father the previous summer. Paul had only been ten when his mum had passed away, and apparently he and his dad had been a real team – inseparable really – as he’d been growing up on their Bradford estate. He’d taken his death extremely hard.

‘We are still allowed in Scotland,’ I said lightly, ‘even though Ian’s not there anymore.’

‘I know that, love,’ Mum said, in a softer tone. ‘But d’you think Paul will enjoy it? I mean, don’t you normally go to Majorca or Spain—’

‘I’m sure he’ll love it,’ I said firmly.

‘But what will he do there?’

‘What everyone does on a Scottish island, I’d imagine,’ I said, sensing a throbbing in my temples. ‘Explore and enjoy the incredible scenery …’

‘What if it rains?’

I couldn’t help smiling at that. ‘You’re talking as if he’s a difficult toddler who I wouldn’t consider taking anywhere if there wasn’t going to be a gigantic soft play centre or a petting zoo.’

‘I’m sure there aren’t any petting zoos there!’

Now I was laughing. ‘Mum, he’s a forty-eight-year-old man. He doesn’t need a petting zoo. And if the weather’s terrible I’m sure there’ll be some jigsaws in the cottage.’

‘I wouldn’t have thought he was the jigsaw type,’ she remarked.

‘Oh, yes. Let him anywhere near a 2000-piecer and he can’t keep his hands off it.’

‘Hmm.’ Mum paused, then added: ‘It’s not a bucket list thing, is it?’

‘What, completing a 2000-piece jigsaw?’

‘No! I mean Paul wanting to go to that island—’

‘You think he’d only want to visit a designated area of outstanding beauty if he were about to cark it?’

‘Of course not,’ she blustered. ‘Why are you so defensive? I didn’t mean to upset you, Suzy.’

‘I know that,’ I said, impressed by my ability to remain cordial. ‘Anyway, it sounds like there’s plenty to do there. There’s a distillery that does visitor tours, and you know Paul loves whisky …’

‘You can say that again.’ Mum never missed an opportunity to imply that my boyfriend was a useless drunk.

‘… And then there’s the smokery,’ I added. ‘They do incredible fish, apparently. Buckingham Palace has a regular order for kippers. In fact, the island’s name comes from the Gaelic word for herring – sgadan – so Sgadansay actually means “Isle of herring” …’ A factlet I’m sure you’re fascinated by, I reflected, sensing Mum’s interest dwindling now it had become clear that I would Not Be Riled. ‘And we’re planning to do loads of hiking,’ I breezed on, ‘up and down hills in our anoraks …’

‘Do you even have an anorak?’

‘I’ll get one. And waterproof trousers. There are these amazing silver sand beaches and we don’t want the weather to hamper us …’ And then there’s shagging, I yearned to add, keen to wrap up our chat now. If it pours down all week – which I fully expect – I’m planning to cram the fridge with wine, draw the curtains and we’ll shag each other senseless, in our anoraks. I might even ask Paul to smack me with one of those artisanal kippers. ‘And there’s probably a church we can visit,’ I added.

‘Well, I hope you have fun,’ Mum remarked tartly, and we finished the call.

In fact, although it pained me to the core, I could understand why she was so perplexed about our trip. As far as Paul was concerned, holiday heaven meant glorious sunshine and music blaring from beach bars – and he always wanted to make friends with everyone. We’d been together six years, and although I’d always enjoyed our jaunts, occasionally I yearned for wide-open spaces and for it just to be the two of us. Frieda, my daughter, had already left home and her brother Isaac would soon be flying the nest too. There was no reason, I kept telling Paul, why we couldn’t have a few days in the country as well as our usual fortnight in the sun.

However, he’d never really ‘got’ the countryside, and became visibly twitchy if he found himself in it accidentally. We never even went to parks together, unless we were cutting through one to get to somewhere else. And now he’d booked a holiday that would be entirely focused on country walks, and require polo necks?

I couldn’t ignore the fact that it was completely bizarre. But I was damned if I was going to admit that to Mum.

Those thoughts soon blew away on the cool breeze as the ferry approached the quayside. We’d have a wonderful time here, I just knew it. It was a beautiful blue-skied April afternoon, and my heart soared like the seagulls squawking overhead.

We stayed in a tiny whitewashed cottage close to the shore. Whatever the weather, we’d pack up hearty picnics and set off on hikes along the rugged coastline or up into the hills. Eagles soared above us. We saw red deer who stopped and glanced at us briefly as if to say, ‘So, who are you?’ before scampering away. We rolled up our jeans and paddled in crystal clear streams and fell back, laughing, onto pillows of springy heather.

Our holiday was certainly revealing a side to Paul that I’d never seen before. But I wasn’t complaining. I loved the glorious beaches where we’d barely see another soul, and the wonderful bakery, the old-fashioned sweet shop and the cosy pubs in the town. As I photographed a terrace of impossibly cute cottages – each one painted a different pastel shade – we joked that they’d probably been natural, unadorned stone until Instagram had come along. Then out had come the paint rollers and the jaunty colours.

Not once did Paul grumble about the fierce winds or sudden downpours that soaked us to the bones. The local fish and chips were heavenly and seemed to taste even better when we ate them huddled together for warmth in a covered wooden shelter facing the choppy sea. One evening we treated ourselves to a vast seafood platter – everything caught mere hours before we devoured it – at an elegant art deco hotel.

‘Is it because of your dad that you wanted to come here?’ I asked that night as we strolled back to the cottage.

‘Kind of,’ he said. It made sense that Paul had been drawn to Scotland, which, in turn, had led him to researching the Outer Hebrides for our trip. Ian had been a ducker and diver, owning various ramshackle hotels in Yorkshire before making his final purchase way up north, in Fort William. He’d loved the Heather Glen Hotel so much he’d moved to Scotland permanently and spent his final years living in its annex of leaky attic rooms.

Like his father, Paul had never had a thought-out career plan. When I’d met him he’d been flogging spicy sausages from a fast food van close to York Minster – but that enterprise hadn’t lasted long and there had been a string of ill-fated schemes since then. ‘When’s Paul going to settle down?’ my sister asked a couple of Christmases ago at her place. She and her marathon runner husband Derek live in a vast modern detached house on the outskirts of Leeds. Their kitchen island probably rivals some of the smaller Scottish isles in terms of square footage. Child-free by choice, and with a law degree and a high-flying job with the civil service, Belinda has always relished her wiser older sister role.

‘He’s fine,’ I replied, defensively. ‘There are plenty of things he can do. He’s very resourceful.’

‘Hmm, is that what you call it? And you being freelance as well,’ Belinda added. By a weird kind of fluke, I had become an in-demand writer of obituaries for newspapers. So much work had poured in – because people are always dying – I’d been able to quit my lacklustre job at a recruitment consultancy to focus on writing full-time. ‘I don’t know how you can stand the uncertainty, Suze,’ my sister had added. ‘Will he still be like this when he’s fifty? Sixty? For the rest of his life?’

I don’t know! I wanted to tell her. Anyway, what does it matter to you what he does? The thing is, I’d always reassured myself, you don’t fall for someone on the basis that they’re a settled option. At least I don’t. Yes, Paul was certainly fickle and perhaps not your go-to person if you wanted advice on investments or domestic boiler maintenance policies. But I loved him, and during those long, blissful days as we explored Sgadansay together, I don’t think I’d ever felt happier.

Paul booked us onto the whisky distillery tour where a homely lady in an Aran sweater and tartan trousers talked our small group through the distillation processes. We sampled the whiskies and met the master distiller, a rather gruff elderly man with a rangy build and neatly cropped silvery hair. Apparently, his main method of maintaining quality control involved an awful lot of tasting. ‘It seems terribly unscientific,’ someone murmured.

‘It is scientific,’ our guide said with a smile, ‘but it’s about instinct, too. Isn’t it, Harry?’

He nodded and looked around at us as if wishing he could get back to work, instead of being forced to talk to visitors.

‘But how d’you know when it’s right?’ asked a portly man from Texas.

‘Experience,’ Harry said with a shrug.

‘Harry’s been our master distiller for thirty-five years,’ the tour guide explained. ‘There’s nothing he doesn’t know about whisky.’

‘I’m happy to apply for the job, if ever you want to step aside.’ The Texan chuckled. Meanwhile, Paul kept pinging questions to the ever-patient guide: What creates a whisky’s distinctive flavour? Was it the water, the climate, or the casks in which the spirit matures slowly over several years?

‘When you strip it down to the basics,’ she explained, ‘there are three main components to whisky, and they happen to be the very ingredients that are essential to a healthy, happy life.’ She looked around at us. ‘Can anyone guess what they are?’

Paul cast me a bemused glance in recognition of her teacherly tone. ‘Water,’ someone piped up.

‘That’s right. And here on Sgadansay we have the best water in the world. Anything else?’

Paul shot up his hand. ‘Barley?’

‘Yep,’ she said, nodding. ‘There’s malted barley, plus yeast, which we regard as the food element. And the last one?’ She looked around again at our expectant faces. ‘Love,’ she said finally, ‘by which I mean the patience and care that’s needed to make a distinctive whisky like ours.’ She paused as a skinny young man handed around samples of amber-coloured spirit. ‘And that’s it,’ our guide concluded. ‘Water, food and love. Isn’t that right, Harry?’ I caught the master distiller’s barely detectable eye-roll. I suspected he was too down-to-earth for that kind of flowery talk.

‘That was so interesting,’ Paul enthused as we left.

‘It really was,’ I agreed. ‘And what a swot you were with all your questions! Are you thinking of distilling your own whisky at home in our bath?’

Paul grinned. ‘Why not? I mean, how hard can it be?’ I laughed, trying to shrug off a twinge of regret that we would be leaving the island tomorrow. The sharp, salty air filled my lungs, and Paul kissed the top of my head as we stopped to gaze out to sea. ‘Um, Suze, I’ve been thinking,’ he added. ‘When we get back home … well, I’d like to do something different.’

I gave him a quick look. ‘You want to take up hiking?’ I asked with a smile.

‘Not exactly. I mean, I’ve loved it but …’ He wound an arm around my waist. ‘I mean a kind of work project.’

Oh, Christ. For the past few months he’d been working at a gig equipment hire company in York. I’d been relieved that he seemed to have ‘settled down’, as my sister would have put it. ‘What d’you mean?’ I asked.

‘Well, um … you know my job’s just a tiding-over thing, don’t you?’

‘Is it?’ I studied his face.

‘Well, yeah. I mean, it’s not exactly what I want to do for the rest of my life.’

I cleared my throat. ‘Yeah, okay, I get that. So, what’re you thinking about?’

Dusk was falling and the sky was streaked with pink and gold. Paul pointed towards the cluster of buildings in the distance, their lights glimmering like stars. ‘What would you say if I suggested buying it?’

‘Buying it?’ I stared at him. ‘You mean the island?’ I was laughing now, awash with relief. For a moment I’d assumed he was being serious.

‘I mean it,’ he said quickly, ‘but I’m not talking about the island. Dad’s inheritance won’t quite stretch to that.’

I blinked at him in confusion. ‘So what are you talking about?’

He looked at me, clearly fizzing with anticipation, like a child with a secret they’re dying to share. ‘See the white building over there, down by the shore?’

I nodded. ‘The distillery, you mean?’

‘Uh-huh.’ A smile flickered across his lips. ‘It’s for sale, you know.’

‘Is it?’ My stomach shifted uneasily.

‘Yep,’ he said. ‘And the hotel sale should complete next week, so I could go for it …’ His father’s Fort William hotel, he meant, of which Paul was the sole beneficiary; there had also been a sizeable financial settlement, which had come through recently. Given Ian’s haphazard approach to business, Paul had been surprised that there had been anything at all.

‘Paul,’ I started, ‘you don’t really mean this, do you? I’m sorry, but I can’t take this seriously—’

‘Why not?’ He frowned, looking hurt.

‘Because …’ I paused. ‘Because you know nothing about distilling, do you? And it’s a highly specialised thing. That Harry guy, the master distiller – hasn’t he been doing that job for thirty-five years?’

‘Yeah, but Harry would still be there,’ Paul insisted, ‘and I wouldn’t need to actually do anything in a hands-on kind of way—’

‘Please tell me you’re not serious about this!’

‘I am. I really am,’ he said firmly.

‘It’s completely mad,’ I exclaimed. ‘You might as well buy a fishmonger’s for all you know about—’

‘I don’t want to buy a fishmonger’s,’ he cut in. ‘I want to buy a fantastic distillery that’s been doing brilliantly for decades now. I mean, it can’t possibly go wrong.’

‘My God, Paul.’ I placed a hand over my eyes momentarily as my sister’s question rang in my ears: Will he still be like this when he’s fifty? Sixty? For the rest of his life?

He took my hand and kissed me gently on the lips. ‘It’d be an amazing adventure for us,’ he said firmly. ‘Please, my darling. Please say yes.’

Chapter Two

Back at home in York, I decided that my best plan of action was to throw myself into my work in the hope that Paul’s obsession would soon be forgotten. I wrote obituaries of actors, composers and a celebrated winemaker who had established a vineyard in Sussex. Her niche English wines had garnered accolades until her death at ninety-two.

Since Sgadansay, everything I’d read about the drinks industry suggested at best the need for copious patience and experience, and at worst, that the wrong kind of booze can cause serious harm. For instance, I’d read that the first liquid to run off after distillation may contain methanol. Once ingested, this can turn into formaldehyde, which is useful for chemical loos and the preservation of corpses – but it’s not something you’d want to be swishing around your insides while you’re alive. It can severely damage the central nervous system, I’d read, and cause blindness and death.

I knew Paul would laugh in my face if I mentioned this stuff, so instead I was trying to gently persuade him to reconsider what to do with his inheritance. ‘It could really make a difference to your future,’ I ventured as we lay in bed one night.

‘To our future,’ he said.

‘Well, yes. But maybe there’s something else you could invest in, that’s slightly less risky—’

‘It’s not risky,’ he insisted. ‘Okay, I might not be experienced but I’m committed and passionate. You know the owner’s keen to sell up and retire …’ I nodded mutely. We’d been over this already. ‘And he’s eager to pass it on to someone like me, who’ll bring a fresh approach, rather than a big conglomerate that’ll just gobble it up.’

Since when was Paul committed and passionate about the spirits industry apart from – and I hated to concede that my mother was right – when it came to drinking the stuff?

‘I’m not jumping into this,’ he added. ‘I’ve been looking into it for months.’ We had already established that he’d lured me to the island under false pretences. ‘All I want to do is make more of the heritage and the island setting,’ he insisted. ‘And you’d be brilliant at handling the media side …’

‘But I have a job already!’

‘Yeah, but you could take this on as another strand.’

‘What if I don’t want “another strand”?’

‘And you’ve got tons of newspaper contacts …’

‘Yes,’ I countered, ‘but only on the obituaries side—’

‘C’mon, Suze. Let’s be daring and bold. Live a little!’

Don’t you ‘live-a-little’ me, I seethed, resenting the implication that I was the one spoiling his fun. Suzy Medley: Trampler of Dreams. This was coming from a man who hadn’t been able to sell his spicy sausages without accruing a rack of debt – which I’d helped him pay off. ‘Paul,’ I said firmly, ‘just leave it, will you? I can’t talk about this anymore. I just can’t.’

A couple of days later he found me in Frieda’s room, which wasn’t really Frieda’s room anymore but my office. I’d had to admit, it was silly to keep it as some kind of shrine after she’d left for university. So I’d carefully packed away the curly-edged posters and heaps of battered old trainers and conducted a thorough archaeological excavation under her bed. There I’d found yet more trainers, a musty old sleeping bag, tatty school jotters and, startlingly, a half-eaten pizza in a greasy box.

I’d also rescued the withered cheese plant she’d refused to let me ‘interfere with’, as she put it, insisting it was ‘fine’ crammed into the rusting olive oil can she’d found lying in the street. I seem to have a lucky touch with houseplants. The first thing I’d done, when I’d come home from dropping her off at student halls in Cumbria, was ease it out of the can and re-home it in a roomier earthenware pot so it could breathe. I’d imagined it groaning with relief – like a woman ripping off a constricting bra at the end of the day.

‘Can I show you something?’ Paul asked now, laptop clasped to his chest.

‘Sure,’ I replied. If it was going to be a YouTube clip of a man being chased by a hippopotamus, I hoped it’d be quick as I had urgent work to finish off. He pulled up a spare chair and opened his laptop on the desk.

I read the document on the screen. It certainly went into far greater depth than any of his previous business plans, which had amounted to scribbled notes in tatty notebooks or, on one occasion, on a Pret a Manger lemon cake wrapper. This time he had acquired a full list of the distillery’s employees, and their salaries, plus detailed costs of raw materials, bottling, transport, property maintenance, insurance, utilities and legal shenanigans; every overhead seemed to have been accounted for. He had also written an impressive marketing strategy with the aim of bringing the small distillery to the attention of the world.

‘This is really thorough,’ I remarked.

Paul nodded. ‘My dad would be so proud,’ he said, with a catch to his voice. Startlingly, his eyes were wet.

‘Oh, darling.’ I pulled him close and kissed him. ‘This is all about your dad, isn’t it? You’re not over it, I can tell.’

He shrugged mutely and raked back his hair. It was still abundant, peppered with just a little silvery grey at the sides. ‘You don’t believe in me, do you?’ he muttered.

‘It’s not that,’ I insisted.

‘Wasn’t I supportive to you, when you gave up your job to write full-time?’

‘Of course you were! I don’t think I’d have had the courage without you—’

‘Well, I thought it was daring,’ he went on, ‘and it made me love you even more—’

‘I hated that job though,’ I cut in, which was true. The atmosphere at the recruitment consultancy had been toxic and I’d been relieved to get out. ‘And it felt like the right time,’ I added.

‘Well, this feels like the right time too,’ he said firmly. ‘What are you worried about exactly?’

‘That you don’t know anything about it.’

‘It’s only whisky, Suze. You saw how they did it. It’s not difficult—’

‘What about the chemicals?’

‘What chemicals?’ he asked, looking confused.

‘The chemicals produced when you distil something! I’m scared you’ll embalm yourself—’

‘What?’ he spluttered.

‘It’s true, Paul. I read about it.’

‘I don’t think that’s likely, babe.’ He was smirking now, infuriatingly. ‘What about when you made that sloe gin? I wasn’t aware of you performing a risk assessment then—’

‘Sloe gin’s just gin, with sloes in!’ I sensed hysteria rising in me as we started to laugh.

‘Fuck, Suzy, you’re bonkers, you know that?’ I was bonkers? Bloody cheek! ‘Remember there’s the master distiller,’ Paul added. ‘That Harry guy …’

‘Okay, so why d’you want me to be involved?’

‘Because you’d be brilliant,’ he insisted, ‘and because I love you.’

‘I love you too, but—’

‘Listen,’ he cut in, brushing a strand of hair from my face, ‘I want to do something amazing with Dad’s money. But …’ He paused. ‘I’ll only do it with your blessing.’

I smiled, despite everything. ‘I know what you’re like. You’ll do whatever you want.’

‘Oh, Suze. You know I’d never do anything to hurt or upset you.’ He slid his arms around my waist and kissed me again. Even after six years I was still hit with a whoosh of desire whenever he touched me. Damn him for being so sexy and for always getting his way.

‘Okay,’ I said finally. ‘I guess you should do what feels right for you—’

‘For both of us,’ he said, beaming now. ‘I want this to it be our adventure.’

Six weeks later, Paul and I became joint directors of the Sgadansay Distillery. And two years after that, the once-thriving business had been royally fucked up.

Chapter Three
Now

I expected a grilling. I deserve it too. Yet it’s still shocking to look around at all the stony faces and realise every single person in this room hates me.

It’s like when you’ve run, panting, onto an aeroplane. As the last passenger on board, you’ve caused its delay and now it’s missed its departure slot. Instead of jetting off to Lanzarote you now have to sit on the tarmac for two and a half hours. Everyone knows it’s your fault and they are radiating hatred.

Only this is worse – far worse. It’s not the start of their holidays that’s been ruined, but their livelihoods. I feel sick with shame.

‘Erm, if I could please just say something,’ I call out, shakily, then wait for the hubbub to die down. We are all crammed into the wood-panelled reception area of the distillery. It was sunny half an hour ago but now rain is battering at the windows.

The dozen employees are all sitting on plastic chairs and staring at me with disdain. I inhale fully, trying to give the impression that I am calm and in control. ‘I’ve tried to explain things as honestly as I can,’ I start. ‘That’s why I’m here, so you’d all know the full picture and that I’m doing my best to try and sort things out.’ My voice wobbles as I scan the room again. ‘Please believe me when I say I’m deeply sorry about everything that’s happened,’ I continue. ‘If there’s anything at all that I can—’

‘Sorry?’ calls out a sturdy man in a lumberjack shirt. ‘You think saying sorry makes things any better for us?’

‘No, of course not,’ I bluster. ‘I just want you to know that—’

‘Sorry’s not going to put food on my table,’ cries out a woman with a beanie hat pulled low down on her head.

‘I realise that,’ I start, ‘and I wish things were different—’

‘We deserve a full explanation,’ thunders a ruddy-faced man in overalls, ‘as to why it’s been allowed to get into this state.’

‘That’s what I’m trying to give you,’ I say, sensing my own cheeks flaming. I look down at the smart charcoal linen dress and glossy black heels that I borrowed from my friend Dee to wear today, in the hope that they would make me seem professional and calm; reassuring, even. But now I suspect the businesslike outfit is just alienating me even more – if that were possible – from everyone else in their jeans, thick sweaters and flat boots.

It’s-Margaret-fucking-Thatcher, a man muttered under his breath as I walked in. He looked about twenty-five. I was amazed that she was even in his frame of reference at all.

‘No idea what you were doing,’ the lumberjack shirt man barks from the front row. ‘It’s a bloody disgrace!’

‘You bought it on a whim,’ snaps the beanie hat woman.

‘A vanity project!’ cries someone else.

‘Thought it’d be fun to have it—’

‘With no thought of what it’d involve …’

‘Bloody idiots, the pair of them!’

I’ve lost track of who’s saying what, and even if I could come up with something helpful to say – something to calm the simmering fury – I wouldn’t be able to get a word in. The only person remaining silent is Harry, one of the few employees I know by name, and whom I hadn’t expected to be here today. He’s just sitting there, staring ahead, in faded jeans and a big grey fisherman’s sweater. I can hardly bear to look at him.

‘You didn’t consider the responsibility of what you’d taken on,’ announces a woman with spectacles perched low on her nose – and it strikes me now that it could be an animal she’s talking about: a dog bought for Christmas with no thought as to who would be walking it and bagging up its poos. And now, as I stand here being shouted at, I’m transported back to a time when my daughter had begged for a dog.

She was almost ten, so it was over a decade ago. I’d explained that, as I was working out of the house all day, it wouldn’t be fair to leave one all alone.

‘We could get a dog walker,’ Frieda suggested.

‘Honey, I’m not getting a dog and then employing someone else to walk it.’

‘What about you, then? You could come home for lunch—’

‘Could I?’ I laughed. I was working in the centre of York at the recruitment consultancy. ‘It’s too far from the office,’ I added.

‘You could run. It’d do you good, Mum. You were saying you need to exercise!’

‘I’m not running back and forth to our house every lunchtime …’

‘You could take him to work then!’ So this dog was already a ‘he’ and not some imaginary, gender-less pet.

‘I very much doubt it,’ I replied, truthfully.

‘Why not?’

I should add that this was long before the entire western world had become obsessed with dogs and started taking them to their offices and lying around on beanbags cuddling them. ‘He might pee on the carpet,’ I replied.

‘Please, Mum,’ Frieda begged. ‘He wouldn’t. We’d train him!’

I knew I was a soft touch. From what I’d gathered, I allowed far more impromptu sleepovers than any of the other mums. However, I refused to give in, and I think I made the right decision in opting for guinea pigs instead. I was still married to Tony then – our children’s father – and he’d grudgingly agreed, adding, ‘I hope they don’t get tired of them, Suzy. You know how fickle kids are.’

We got two, partly so Frieda and Isaac could have one each; plus, I’d read that solo guinea pigs can get lonely. They named them Millie and Maisie (I suspect Frieda over-rode Isaac on that score) and loved them unconditionally. Frieda never asked for a dog again.

I read once that, when you’re in the midst of a terrible situation, it’s not uncommon for your brain to spin off to a happier time to protect you from the awfulness that’s going on. It’s a kind of coping mechanism, I think. Perhaps that’s why, as the lumberjack shirt man jumps up to shout, and is swiftly joined by almost everyone else until there’s a cacophony of yelling and tears are flooding my eyes, I’m picturing that beautiful day – the morning of Frieda’s tenth birthday. When I was just a normal mum, responsible for my own little family and not the inhabitants of an entire island whose lives were about to be wrecked.

‘I love this icing!’ Isaac, who was eight, had said as he lurched towards the cake I’d made the night before. I loved to bake and tend to our little suburban garden. How simple life was back then.

‘Hands off, Isaac,’ I said. Too late, he was already licking a swirl of chocolate frosting off a finger.

I turned towards Frieda, who’d wandered into the kitchen to see what was going on. ‘There’s a surprise for you two in the garden,’ I said.

‘What is it?’ she asked.

‘Go out and see.’ Frieda grinned, then ran out through the back door. Isaac and I hurried after her.

‘Mum!’ she cried. ‘Oh, Mum. Are they ours?’ I nodded, too choked to speak for a moment. She and Isaac bobbed down to gaze at the two bundles of beige and white fluff inside the new hutch.

‘Can we hold them?’ he asked.

‘Of course you can,’ I said, feeling as if my heart might burst, ‘as long as you’re careful …’ Frieda opened the hutch door and they scooped up the animals into their arms.

That’s what I’m picturing now, as the shouting goes on and my gaze lands upon the only person in this room who has remained seated: Harry in the grey sweater. In his late seventies, he is by far the oldest team member – but he’s not even employed by us anymore. He resigned a few months ago, apparently disgusted with how things were developing here.

I look at him and he gazes back at me, and I’m on the verge of rushing over to hug him. I don’t, of course, because I can imagine how that would go down around here.

Who the hell does she think she is, coming out here, trying to hug people?

He’s up on his feet now and wiping at his eyes with his hands. Oh God, I think he is crying.

The shouts seem to fade as I watch him striding towards the door. I’m seized by an urge to follow him, even though I know that’s the last thing he’d want. So I just stand there, feeling helpless as he leaves; this dignified elderly man, whom I have broken.

It seems incredible that, once upon a time, everything could be made right with a couple of guinea pigs.

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