“Catch your breath.”
“Who is she? Who is going to fall for me in twelve hours?” Restlessness twirled around his legs and snaked up his spine, aching, urging him to move. He stood then paced the room.
“Your date will be
the one
, because we used the 1Night Stand agency.”
He stilled, unsure if he understood the situation right. “A matchmaker for one-night stands?”
“Trust me when I say the owner, Madame Eve, has an impeccable knack for matchmaking. And for your mother and I, one night was all that we needed to find love. Isn’t that proof enough? No woman could be more perfect for me.”
“But still, I’m not so big on blind dates.”
“Son, you were never big on dates, period. Not since the lass broke your heart after college. But Madame Eve is no ordinary matcher. Some even say her talent for her work is…erm...magical.”
“Magic?” He cleared his throat, nearly choking on the word. “Magic got me into this mess.”
“Maybe it’s what will get you out of it?”
“You really think she can find me a woman who could fall in love with me in one night?”
“More importantly, one
you
will fall in love with.” His mother grabbed his father’s hand, a single teardrop trickling down her rosy cheeks. “Make the most of tonight, son.”
“All the details about your date are here.” He thrust a folded letter at Finn, along with a hotel receipt.
Top quality vanilla paper, watermarked with the 1Night Stand logo, and scented. Lilacs perhaps? He inhaled, sweet notes enveloped in a light musk. Fresh. Pretty. Feminine. Yes, lilacs. He knew the scent well as they were his mother’s favorite flower.
Hotel reservations are enclosed
.
He glanced at the paperwork. “Seriously, Dad? Of all places, you had to pick this one?”
“It’s the only posh hotel in Port St. Mary, you know that. My boy deserves the best.”
He sighed and returned to reading the letter.
Your date will be expecting you no later than nine.
The front desk will have a key for you. Your date will meet you in the room. Her name is Anne; she’s Scottish and new to the Isle. Two years new. So be considerate, patient, and please make her feel...welcome...but don’t overdo it. Show her all the home comforts you must have missed while out at sea. Indulge in the Isle’s little treats and historical treasures. Eat, drink, walk, visit locations with a special place in your heart. And love. Love like there’s no tomorrow.
Wishing you the magical evening of your dreams.
Bien à toi,
Madame Evangeline
A chill raced down Anne Ward’s spine. She wrapped her woolen shawl tight around her chest as the bitter wind sliced through her clothes and prickled her skin. Wintry winds dashed across the terrace of the promenade golf resort. Sat high on a cliff overlooking the wild Irish Sea, the building was a Victorian splendor. Ivy entwined pillars supporting the partially covered decking, and blue shutters framed the original sash windows.
She’d nipped out for a breath of fresh air after having booked in and dumping her overnight bag in her room, killing time before her date arrived. Full of nerves. Her hands balled, and her stomach ached. Mahogany locks whipped her cheeks and nose. She tucked the stray strands behind her ears, sucking in the brisk air. She wanted this. No, she needed this. A woman could go only so long without the love of a man, and she’d exceeded such a time long ago. But not through lack of trying. Port St. Mary, with all of two thousand residents, had so few options. All the good men were wankers or taken. Even eight miles out to larger Castletown, eligible men were a rare find.
1Night Stand, a matchmaking agency recommended to her by a lovely couple whose first baby she had delivered last spring, seemed a good bet. Maybe her last chance. It’d taken her so long to use the service because she believed love should happen on its own, a natural process.
Seemed the mistress of life hadn’t been on her side. So far, the men she had met in Port St. Mary were either new or about-to-be fathers. Or married doctors. She’d fallen prey to becoming the other woman once. Inadvertently. Fell hard, too. Since then, she’d paused in her quest to find love and turned to furry critters for companionship. Taking in hungry strays, she now had three felines. Not how she’d ever imagined herself. Single, thirty, and a cat lady.
The 1Night Stand business card had fallen out of the kitchen cabinet in her quaint, semi-detached cottage one month earlier and restored her faith in fate. Big on synchronicity, she’d taken the act of chance as a sign.
She wholeheartedly believed fate had brought her to Port St. Mary. While on holiday in her mother’s birthplace, she’d aided an impromptu delivery of the vicar’s twins in the town hall which had then led to a job offer. All during the first day of her break.
She’d have to lessen her expectations if tonight failed, settle for being the cat lady who lived at the end of Cronk Road. Or fade away, become a part of the scenery the tourists flocked from miles around to see.
“You all right, miss?” A podgy boy she’d met where she worked tugged at her shawl, his cheek bulging on the right. He made a sucking sound, and the swell appeared at his other cheek. “Yum, I love gobstoppers. The Isle Rock and Sweets store sells the best ever. Want one?”
“No thanks.” She shook her head and paused, trying to remember his name. “Henry.” She knew most of the local kids. If she hadn’t delivered them, she saw them at the doctor’s office for their immunizations. As a midwife, she sometimes doubled as a nurse for Port St. Mary. Heck, she’d even done time on the clinic’s reception desk. She loved the variety and small village’s “know everyone” feeling. Very different from her old position in a large hospital in Aberdeen, Scotland. There, she’d delivered babies. No before, during, or after care.
“Hi, Henry. Yes, I’m fine. Your Mummy and Daddy around?”
“Silly, of course. I wouldn’t be here by myself. They’re over there.” The six-year-old waved to the couple who stood with a crowd beyond stacked tables and chairs.
A sudden blast of icy wind raced through Anne’s knit outfit. She shivered and hunched to protect herself against the elements.
Brrr
. “Why is everyone out here? What are they all staring at?”
“The seals, look.” Henry pointed beyond the immaculate lawns of the golf course, toward the sea. “There are thousands of them!”
Seals—not in the thousands, more like sixty or so—scattered the shorelines and surrounding rocks. All barking, clapping, facing toward the....
Lighthouse?
A storm and rough seas had crashed the building into the ocean some four years earlier, so town folk and research at the local library had told her. Her maternal grandfather—at least if her suspicions as to the identity of her biological mother were correct—Colyn Radcliff, used to be a watcher, so she’d studied its history and had quizzed the librarian. Anything to get to know the family she’d never met, to grasp at some semblance of belonging.
“How odd it should appear now,” Anne mumbled.
“What?”
Nobody else can see it?
She shrugged, assuming only she noticed its reappearance because of her family’s connection to it. Or maybe she had latent psychic abilities and had picked up on a residual haunting. After all, four years ago today the tower had tumbled into the ocean.
“Oh…hey, I hear Channel Three News is heading out here for a story.” The boy’s father strolled over and patted his son’s shoulder. “I only hope they’ll come over to the chip shop and bring me some business after.” Likely, his shop on the Victorian promenade was the only “fast food” on the Isle.
“Tae see seals?” Anne quizzed.
“It’s February. There shouldn’t be so many this time of the year. I guess they think there’s a seal story worthy of their viewers.”
“Maybe something to do with the eclipse?” Mrs. Gaverty’s shrill voice echoed through the bustle. The baker who provided most of the B&Bs along the shore with pastries would hope for some of the news crews’ business as well. She’d be the first to hear any news and would hasten to spread it. No one could match her high-pitched air of snobbery and condescension. Although she brought up a good point.
Were seals collecting en masse, and the once-dead lighthouse shining its beacon out to sea, because of last night’s moon? Port St. Mary was a hotbed of supernatural curiosities. She’d never fully understand the Isle’s magical myths. Some put the oddities down to the ley line running the length of the island. Others didn’t seem to notice anything out of the ordinary. But a small majority believed in the myths passed down from their predecessors.
“It’s the one-hundredth anniversary of the first children banished to live out their days as seals. Perhaps they want to do a story on them?” Mrs. Gaverty pulled out her phone and dialed. “The Isle Daily will know more, my son Gavin—”
“Is editor in chief.” The surrounding crowd chorused, mimicking her hoity-toity tone.
“We know. The whole freckin’ Isle knows, you remind us often enough,” one of them barked.
“Aren’t selkies a bedtime story, though? Like fairies?” The boy glanced up, arching his brow, his tone sarcastic. “Only nursery school kids believe in fairytales.”
“No, dear, don’t listen to those stuffy teachers filling your head with facts and figures. There’s more to Port St. Mary than the likes of you will ever understand, and that ‘story’ is as real as the lighthouse used to be.”
Anne tried to hold the spite desperate to fall from her tongue, to stop a rolling of her eyes and a tsk. How dare Mrs. Gaverty slam Henry’s belief’s down so easily while taking a clear snap at Miss Johnson, a darn good and well liked teacher. Also, the only other non-born ’n bred Port St. Mary gal she had met since moving here.
What are they saying behind
my
back?
She jumped to teacher’s defense. “Dinnae think there’s anything wrong with Henry’s teacher sharing facts. We dinnae all believe in fairies prancing around gardens and mermaids diving for pearls.”
“And what would you know, outsider? Pft, Scotland may be a land for sensibility, but if you stick around here for more than a year, you’ll soon learn the mystical ways aren’t to be scoffed at.”
Erm, hello!
She’d been in Port St. Mary for two years already. If the town gossip didn’t think she’d been there long, what little impact she’d made.
Mrs. Gaverty held the phone against her ear. “Gavin, what’s the scoop? Why are they filming on the Isle? Is it the seals?” She paused for a few moments and nodded her head a couple of times. “Huh-huh, I see. Okay, then, see you for dinner.” She hung up. “Some movie star is doing a family tree documentary; that’s all he knows.”
Anne shrugged then made her way into the hotel lobby. She admired the neutral tones accenting gold-framed oil paintings and a shiny herringbone wood floor. Everyone spoke of the excellent service. And food. The place had quite the reputation as the best restaurant around, a five star eatery even the most famous celebrity chef would have trouble finding fault with. Their Christmas carvery drew even the guests from the B&Bs; all the trimmings, plus the perfect Christmas pud, mince pies, or sherry trifle to finish. Maybe one day she’d have someone special to share such a meal with. Coming here for a holiday meal could become their annual tradition.
And it was perfectly positioned to seal-watch.
The cute creatures kept tourism alive on the little island. Local folks spoke of them constantly, and stocked their stores with seal knick-knacks. The one-screen cinema showed Andre and Slappy every Sunday afternoon. Anne had never thought twice about the creatures before moving here, but now joined in the local passion, as captivated by the tales as a native.
From her office in Sudgen House, the doctor’s surgery, she had a fantastic view of the Irish Sea. Each day, during her morning coffee break, she saw an older couple chatting to the same gray-spotted seal. Kissing the darn thing as if it were their child, taking in turns talking to the mammal and using flamboyant hand gestures as if telling stories.
She often strolled past them, eavesdropping and blaming her fascination with the seals for her watchful gaze. Would she ever find someone to hold her hand, share knowing looks, offer assistance over the rocks? Loneliness haunted her. More so now she lived in Port St. Mary and away from her few school friends. But she dreamed of becoming a part of the place. Accepted.
A sigh escaped her.
“Get you a warm drink in a flask to take out so you can watch the seals a while longer?” The landlady, Bethany, smoothed her gray hair back into its fancy do and straightened her silver-tweed skirt. Her pregnant daughter and hotel co-owner had visited Anne at the surgery just the other day. A real family business. She’d bumped into them at the fish and chip shop a few evenings back and teased the new baby would be making beds before speaking his or her first word. Three generations of women running a hotel, the makings for a winning TV drama.
“Hi, Bethany, how’s your daughter doing? She still moaning ’bout morning sickness?”
“Rowena’s well, thank you, except for wishing her first trimester was over. Now, how about the flask?”
“Weather is cac, blasting a Baltic gale out there.” Anne rubbed her shoulders then shivered “I’d rather stay in the warmth than be blown tae frosty smithereens.”
“A hot toddy at the bar, then?”
“Maybe later.”
“Of course.” The dear old lady inhaled deeply. “You smell divine. What scent are you wearing?”
“Lilac Breeze, the perfume I’ve worn since my thirteenth birthday.” A beautiful woman with hair as bright as fire and skin as pale as milk had gifted her a bottle, asked her not to tell anyone about it. She now believed that woman to have been Sereanna Radcliff, her real mother.
Port St. Mary legend claimed she’d lured married men into having affairs with her so she could steal their money. Of course, these tales were those told by bitter women and their men. Sereanna couldn’t defend her name, as the tale placed the “whore” in the lighthouse as it crumbled into the ocean.