‘Do your family have a property here too, then?’
‘They have a property nearby but, no, I came here with a school friend and I stayed with his family.’
‘Good?’ Nina asked.
‘It was great,’ Jack said. ‘Best summer of my life. We didn’t do much really—just the beach most days. I bought this place last year when it came on the market and I thought it was too good to pass up. I’m getting plans drawn up. I want to build up and get the view …’
‘And get heating.’
‘Oh, yes.’ They lay in silence for a moment and then Jack turned and looked at her very serious face, could almost hear her worrying about what to say to Janey, how to approach things with her sister. ‘You need to relax.’
‘I know.’
‘You get too tense.’
‘Thanks, Jack,’ she snapped, but she knew he was right. ‘I don’t know what to do today—I mean, she’s hardly going to want to build a snowman.’
‘There’s loads to do here.’
‘Like what?’
‘Outdoor ice skating,’ Jack said, ‘and there’s a whale tour, it’s supposed to be fantastic.’
‘How do you know?’
Jack would rather face the freezing morning than deal with that topic. He’d already said far too much, way more than he usually would, and so he pulled back the blankets and climbed out. ‘I’m going to get the fire in the lounge going and then sort out breakfast.’ He shook his head as she went to climb out. ‘Stay there,’ he offered. ‘I’ll bring you in a coffee.’
Jack set to work building the fire and then he headed off to make coffee, and as he returned with two mugs, he nodded to Janey, who was huddled on the couch. ‘Still here? I thought you’d be out the window.’
Janey gave a reluctant half-smile. ‘Yeah, well, I didn’t fancy freezing to death.’
‘Did you want a coffee?’ Jack asked. ‘I just made some.’
Another shrug and then a nod and when she told him she took it the same as Nina he handed her Nina’s mug and then went and made a fresh one, then headed back into the bedroom.
‘Janey’s up, but not Blake.’
‘She’s up …’ Nina went to pull back the blankets, but Jack very deliberately sat down on her side of the bed.
‘Leave her.’
‘But it might be a good chance to talk to her, before Blake gets up.’
‘Which is why she’s probably sitting on that couch waiting for the door to open,’ Jack said. ‘She was waiting for a lecture from me or an, oh, so casual talk from you. Just let her relax …’
‘It’s so hard, though.’
‘Which is why it’s good you’ve got the whole weekend. Look, I’ll head back soon and you guys can just have some time—she’ll talk when she wants to, Nina.’
‘And if she doesn’t?’
‘Then she was never going to.’
He’d been working with children a long time and was actually very good with adolescents, his slightly aloof, completely unshockable stance giving them confidence. More than most, Jack understood that things weren’t always as they seemed—was never blindsided by the persuasive words of the parents.
They drank their coffee and then headed out, only to be met by the delicious smell of breakfast coming from the kitchen. Nina realised that had she got out of bed the minute Jack had told her that Janey was up, had she dashed to the living room for the essential talk, then this might never have happened. Blake and Janey, standing in the kitchen and serving up a delicious breakfast of pancakes and sausages and eggs from the ingedients that Nina had bought from the store last night.
‘This looks lovely.’
‘I’m starving,’ Jack said, and watching Janey serve up he reminded her that Nina was a vegetarian. ‘No sausages for your sister.’
‘It’s …’ She felt Jack’s hand squeeze hers, realised she must not make too much of a fuss. ‘I’ll set the table.’
Jack helped, and not just with the cutlery.
‘Janey is nearly sixteen,’ he pointed out. ‘She should be making breakfast, Nina.’
‘And she is.’
‘And you should be allowed to say you’re a vegetarian and that you don’t eat sausages.’ He looked at her. ‘You would have eaten them, wouldn’t you?’
‘Of course not.’
‘Liar.’ Jack grinned. ‘You’d go against every one of your principles just to please her. You don’t have to be her mum.’
‘I know that. But she needs more than just a big sister.’
‘No,’ Jack said. ‘She just needs you to be you and she needs to take on some of the responsibility too. What were you doing at that age?’
He left her for a moment to ponder and when he returned with orange juice and glasses she answered his question, because at fifteen years old her part-time job in the hardware store had made a vital contribution to the family.
‘Working,’ Nina said. ‘And going to school. We weren’t exactly well off.’ And though he appeared unmoved, Jack was far from it, especially when, as they sat eating breakfast, talking and laughing, Janey had mentioned their mum and the Mother’s Day breakfast they’d shared just before she’d died.
‘Nina did all the cooking then,’ Janey said. ‘I just got to pour on the maple syrup.’ And he felt his stomach tighten as he realised, perhaps properly, all she had been through. That Nina hadn’t been much older than Janey was now when she had lost her parents, and the thought of her so young and alone and dealing with such grief brought out a rare surge of compassion in him.
Not that he showed it.
Instead, because they’d cooked, he found out that meant he and Nina were doing the dishes and he grumbled all the way through it. Then Janey grumbled when Nina suggested they go on the whale boat trip.
‘You’re going,’ Jack said in the end to Janey. ‘You can miserable with me.’
And though Nina wanted him gone, there was a sigh of relief she held onto because handling the two of them was just so much easier when he was around. Maybe because he was actually old enough to be their parent—the nine years Jack had on her made a big difference.
‘Thanks,’ Nina said again.
‘No need to thank me.’
They were impossible to get out of the house, Jack realised.
Janey took for ever in the bathroom and came out fully made up, while Blake had zero attention span and had to be told five times to wash and get dressed. Nina thought that Jack, with his streamlined life, would get irritated, because it was close to eleven by the time they all headed off, but he didn’t seem fazed at all.
Jack talked to Blake in the car about the hockey game the previous night and Janey moaned that the last thing she wanted to see was a group of whales.
‘A pod of whales.’ Jack turned briefly from the driving seat. ‘It’s a pod of whales, not a group of whales.’
Nina rolled her eyes, surprised when Janey giggled.
On deck, it was absolutely freezing, but the cabin was warm and there was endless hot chocolate. They took it in turns to go in and out, but it was more than worth it when finally a pod of whales was spotted. Far from being bored by them, Janey and Blake stayed on deck for ages—it