The Secret Cove in Croatia

by Julie Caplin

  Come on, Nick. You’ve been sick now. You’ll be fine. Just feeling a bit sorry for yourself. Pull yourself together.

  With slow careful steps he walked back out onto the terrace, looking around for a familiar face. There must have been upwards of a hundred people here. He sank into a chair in the shade with relief and from the secluded vantage point people-watched. Dan and Jonathon would have had a field day here, with their wry down-to-earth observations and his sisters-in-law, Gail and Cath, would have enjoyed themselves looking at all the different fashions on display.

  When the buffet lunch was announced at three o’clock Nick’s stomach was still being rebellious, so he stayed put.

  ‘Hello you, good spot here. Mind if I join you?’ asked Siri, balancing a plate on her knee with one hand and holding a fizz-filled flute in the other.

  ‘No,’ he said, his voice weak, wincing at the smell of smoked salmon wafting his way as she took a bite of a loaded canapé.

  ‘You don’t look so hot. Are you OK? Do you want something to eat?’

  ‘I’m fine. Not hungry at the moment.’ He was feeling a lot better for sitting in the shade. Perhaps he’d just had a touch too much sun.

  ‘Quite some party.’

  ‘Yeah.’

  She gave him a kind smile. ‘Not your type of thing.’

  Nick tried to give a non-committal shrug.

  ‘Not mine either. But I treat it as work. Networking. Which isn’t great when you’re supposed to be on holiday. And Douglas says he enjoys these things but he always ends up in an office somewhere on his phone.’ Her mouth settled in a downward curve. ‘I’m an idiot. I shouldn’t have come.’

  ‘To the party?’ he asked, clutching his stomach as a sudden stab took his breath away.

  ‘You OK?’

  He nodded.

  ‘I meant I shouldn’t have come on the holiday. I thought I could cope.’

  Nick dredged up a kind smile, ignoring the sudden eruptions in his bowel. ‘Cope?’

  ‘With being around Cory and Douglas.’

  ‘If I were you …’ he winced as another swirl of discomfort hit his stomach ‘… I’d hang on in there.’

  ‘Really?’ Siri’s head shot up, her eyes full of hope.

  ‘Sometimes it takes people a while to see what’s right under their –’ He lurched to his feet. ‘’Scuse me.’

  Chapter 20

  Maddie looked down at the makeshift easel she’d fashioned, her collection of watercolour pencils and paint tubes and her paintbrushes. Drawing for Bill had rekindled her desire to paint. While he’d been generous in his praise for her work, there’d been nothing artistic about it. She’d just drawn what he asked.

  Aqua and turquoise, ultramarine and azure. The colours of the sea and sky were jewel-bright in the brilliant sunshine. The wind lapped at the water, cross currents rippling around the boat, the waves tipped with silver as the sun danced and teased the surface, twinkling like starlight. Maddie could hear the rhythmic chirrup of cicadas echoing across the bay and smell the scent of pine teasing the air from the scrub on the shore. She could paint this scene, reproducing it faithfully, but Henry Compton-Barnes from the London art gallery’s words rang in her head. When you look at their work, you know that only they could have painted it. Any number of people could capture the same scene. What did she really want to say with her pictures? Paint from the heart, he’d said. Her mind went back to the day on the beach. The people on the beach, the chubby baby, the laughing girlfriend and the elderly neighbours.

  Her heart leapt as she made the first stroke on the thick cartridge paper, the blue just right, brightening against the deeper wash. She could see it. The people on the beach, their characters unfolding in her head, some standing on the water’s edge, others waist-deep and more bobbing out by the buoys. The beach on a Monday afternoon. There it was. The magic. She could feel it. A composition that wouldn’t win prizes … but it was from the heart and now she understood what Henry had meant.

  A gentle growl from her stomach reminded her it was well past lunchtime and probably closer to teatime. She stood up, stretching her legs, and looked at the two pictures drying beside her, weighted down with various books from the salon. They were a sort of homage to Beryl Cook, although no one was going to bite her hand off to put them in a gallery, but they might sell in a local shop, the sort of thing holiday-makers might pick up as a memento of their trip. She felt she’d put a piece of herself in them, her unique memories of the people, her own characterisation of them.

  She was rather pleased with the second picture; it looked like the neighbourhood had gathered on the beach to chat and gossip. As she mentally ticked off the characters – the new mums, the middle-aged best friends, the lone swimmer, she stopped at one character. What? With her index finger she traced the figure, a sudden bump in her pulse. It had been a completely unconscious addition. She bit her lip. What was he doing in the picture?

  Before she could give it too much thought the whiny buzz, a mosquito engine of a boat, caught her attention. All afternoon there’d been plenty of coming and going but this was a particularly persistent whine, getting closer all the time. Crossing to starboard, she looked over the side and spotted a small boat puttering in a direct line towards the Avanturista with a solitary passenger hunched over the side.

  The driver hailed her and indicated with his thumb towards the passenger. Maddie hurried down to the stern, now recognising the clothes on the huddled figure. It was almost as if her ruddy subconscious had conjured him up again.

  The little water taxi closed the distance quickly.

  ‘Nick!’ she called and he looked up, his face a pale green.

  Somehow she helped haul him up the ladder and onto the deck, where he collapsed for a frightening moment at her feet.

  ‘You look terrible,’ she blurted out, fear fine-tuning the bluntness of her words. Bloodshot eyes squinted up at her while he dragged a hand through the sheen of sweat dotting his clammy forehead. The once smart clothes were now nothing more than a collection of creases, the white, wrinkled shirt suspiciously stained.

  ‘Feel terrible,’ he groaned and pulled himself to a sitting position, slumping against the wooden side.

  He didn’t smell too good either, but there was no hint of alcohol.

  ‘Something you’ve eaten?’

  He nodded.

  ‘Come on, let’s get you to your cabin. I think you need to get to bed.’

  His eyes drooped in defeat. ‘Feel awful.’

  As she hooked her arms under his, helping him to his feet, he suddenly shook her off and lurched to the side, while a racking retch seized him and he promptly vomited down the side of the boat.

  Limp and spent, he hung there gasping and groaning, his eyes closed.

  Her own stomach clenched in sympathy, remembering the indignity of throwing up over the side of Bill’s launch.

  Steering poor Nick up to his cabin, clutching a bucket in one hand and trying to support him, was hard work and it was a relief when she shouldered her way through the cabin door. Propping him against the wall, she pulled back the sheets and ushered him gently onto the bed. He sat down with a thump, arms and legs limp, before flopping back, letting out a heartfelt groan and closed his eyes.

  The green tinge colouring his skin worried her, as did the shallow breaths and the rapid rise and fall of his ribcage.

  ‘Nick, I’ve put a bucket here for you. And there’s a bottle of fresh water here on the bedside. Can I get you anything else?’

  With another groan, he made a tiny movement of his head which she took as a no. She stared down at him, feeling a little helpless. What should she do? There must be something. She couldn’t just leave him.

  She stepped forward and eased his shoes off. ‘Do you want to take your dirty stuff off and I’ll rinse it through for you?’

  There was no response. Telling herself she’d seen him in swimming shorts before, she leaned forward to pull down the crumpled linen shorts. He moaned
but lifted his hips slightly.

  Grasping the waistband of his damp shorts, she wriggled them down, trying not to notice the feel of the crisp hair on his legs or the muscular thighs revealed. Up close and personal, Nick was all man. What was wrong with her? He was sick, for God’s sake, and here she was eyeing him up. Briskly she pulled the shorts down past his knees, averting her eyes from his legs as she dumped the shorts on the floor with his dirty shoes.

  Feeling braver now, she knelt on the bed to undo his crumpled shirt.

  ‘Nick, you’re going to have to help me here,’ she said, touching him gently on the arm.

  He opened one bleary eye and exhaled and then winced as if mere breathing hurt.

  ‘Come on.’ She took both his arms and hauled him up.

  ‘Sorry,’ he said huskily as she began to unbutton his shirt, his head drooping.

  ‘It’s OK. Once I’ve got this off, I’ll leave you in peace and you can sleep.’

  Obligingly like a child, he lifted each arm as she slid the shirt down to his wrists, her fingers gliding over his cool skin and the silky golden hairs on his forearms. She sucked in a breath. Nice chest. Broad, smooth, a smattering of hair dusting that little V between pecs. Yeah, proper pecs. And she could bet these did not come from gym workouts. Poldark, eat your heart out. She had a sudden vision of Nick bare-chested, tossing hay bales, and felt a little flushed.

  Behave, she told herself. You’re acting like some swoony teenager. You got over this sort of thing years ago.

  She tossed the shirt aside and lifted his legs onto the bed, carefully pulling the sheet up to his chest. Despite the late afternoon heat, his skin felt cold and his arms were covered in goose bumps.

  Tucked in, with the sunlight slanting over his face, he looked like a sleeping Norse warrior, golden and strong, weakened by illness. It made her feel unaccountably protective. She looked around to see if there was anything else she could realistically do to help him and pushed the bucket closer to the bedside, made sure the bottle of water was in reaching distance and scooped up the dirty clothes. She couldn’t help looking at him, even though it felt wrong. Seeing him like this, vulnerable and lifeless, made her feel uneasy.

  Of all the guests on the boat, he was the vital, strong, reliable one. Not just in physical strength but in terms of doing what was right and wrong. Him being like this made her feel vulnerable. The accident with Simon had made her mentally categorise who was safe, steady and reliable. Douglas was steady enough but being at the mercy of Cory’s whims made him unreliable and she’d lost all respect for Simon. Siri would be good in a crisis but only if it suited her and, as for Tara and Cory, they were about as much use as an umbrella in a force nine gale.

  With a heavy sigh she crept out of the cabin, heading for the iPad in the saloon to google ‘what to do when someone has food poisoning’.

  Nick threw up once more, waking briefly, and although his colour was somewhere between grey and green, his stomach pains had gone and his temperature was only a little high. Maddie felt a little more in control, having had a phone conversation with Bill’s Dr Cannon, who insisted she call her Zoe, and surmised that it was most likely food poisoning and that he could be laid up for a couple of days. To Maddie’s relief she gave her a list of instructions and the invitation to call any time, which made her feel a lot more confident about the role of nurse.

  So much so that when Douglas called, asking for a pick-up, she asked if there was any way they could use a water taxi. She really didn’t like to leave him. Of course Douglas didn’t mind at all. And as soon as they disembarked he came straight up to see how Nick was doing, with Siri in tow. On the deck she could hear lots of laughter and squealing. Tara didn’t appear to be rushing to check on Nick.

  ‘Sleeping again, but he’s out of it.’ She wasn’t sure he was even aware she’d been in his room or remembered her taking his clothes off.

  ‘Poor guy, he didn’t look good at the party.’

  ‘What’s all the excitement?’ asked Maddie, hearing another gale of laughter.

  ‘The Ellinghams have invited us all to go and stay at their villa for several days. I’ve spoken to Ivan, so there’s a slight change of plan. We’re going to move the boat to a new location tomorrow where it will be easier to refuel and fill up the water tanks. We’re off to Stari Grad. Ivan assures me it’s an excellent location and we can get taxis into Hvar. Then he’ll come back to Hvar later in the week to pick us up. You’re going to have the boat all to yourself.’ Douglas beamed at her.

  Maddie nodded with a pleasant smile, thinking of all the painting she could do.

  Another high-pitched squeal from Tara on deck made Maddie raise an eyebrow. Douglas and Siri exchanged a look which she couldn’t translate. ‘Perhaps you can let Tara know Nick is really quite unwell.’

  By ten o’clock, Maddie seethed. She’d served a light supper which Tara and Cory barely picked at, making her crosser for wasting the time, and she resented serving everyone while trying to keep an eye on Nick. Tara’s complete disinterest in Nick’s condition was astonishing and sheer pig-headedness stopped Maddie saying anything to her. If Tara wasn’t interested, Maddie certainly wasn’t going to volunteer any information.

  Tara’s only comment during dinner was to say that Nick had better be better by the time they headed to the Ellinghams’ villa on the following day.

  By the time Maddie cleaned up, everyone had retired to bed. She checked on Nick again. In the light of the bedside lamp, he still looked sweaty and clammy, tossing fitfully. Hesitating, she stood over him. Leaving him felt wrong. Deciding quickly, she ran up to the sun deck, removed the cushions from one of the sunbeds and then gathered up a blanket and pillow from her room to create a makeshift bed on the floor in his room. It seemed mean to abandon him when he was so far away from home. It took a while for her to fall asleep, starting each time he turned over and straining her ears with each movement, but eventually she fell into a light doze.

  She awoke to a long low groan. Instantly she was on her feet, putting on the small side light. His hair was plastered to his head in sweat and his eyes squinty at the sudden light.

  ‘Here, bucket,’ she said, lifting the bucket just in time but, although he retched and heaved, there was nothing there. In the dim light he looked pitiful and Maddie’s heart went out to him. She soaked the face cloth again in the bathroom and returned to sit on the side of the bed, where she gently wiped his face. He opened his eyes. ‘Maddie?’ he croaked.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘That’s nice, thanks.’ He lifted his head, his eyes bleary and barely focused. ‘What time is it?’

  ‘It’s about three o’clock.’

  He nodded as if that was important and meant something.

  ‘You’ve got a touch of food poisoning. I’ve spoken to Dr Cannon from Bill’s boat. You just need to stay put.’

  There was a ghost of a smile on his face. ‘Not going anywhere.’

  ‘Here, have a sip of water.’ As he began to drink thirstily she pulled the bottle away, her fingers touching his, trying to soften her voice to mask her fear. She didn’t want him to be sick again. ‘Sip. I know you’re going to be dehydrated. But little sips. It’s better for your stomach.’ Thank God for Dr Zoe Cannon; at least she sounded confident even if inside she was terrified.

  ‘Yes, nurse.’ That faint smile flitted across his face again. ‘Can I clean my teeth? Mouth hideous.’

  ‘Yes.’ She stood up, watching as he swung his legs over the side of the bed, gingerly putting them on the floor. As he rose to stand, he wobbled and she gripped his arm.

  ‘Want a hand?’

  ‘No,’ he muttered; she suspected if he’d had any energy at all it would have been more of a growl. He wobbled for a minute. He held out an arm like a tightrope walker trying to balance. ‘I’m … fine,’ he said, his voice hoarse like sandpaper on wood.

  ‘No, you’re not. For goodness’ sake, stop being all manly and admit you need some help. I won’t tell anyone if
you don’t.’ She put an arm round him and tucked herself under his shoulder to support him. They made slow shuffling progress to the bathroom and from the tension in his body Maddie could tell he wasn’t very happy about needing the support.

  In the bathroom he leaned against the marble vanity unit, his head drooping. She skipped around him and loaded a ball of toothpaste onto his toothbrush.

  He studied himself in the mirror.

  ‘Yes, you look like shit, feel like shit, so why don’t you give up, accept you’re not well and take the help?’ said Maddie with feeling, handing the toothbrush to him.

  ‘Great bedside manner,’ he muttered, jamming it into his mouth.

  ‘You do know I’m not a real nurse.’

  He closed his eyes and carried on cleaning his teeth.

  ‘Better?’

  ‘Much. And I think I can make it back on my own.’

  She let him but hovered at his side and when he reached the side of the bed he collapsed into it.

  ‘Want anything else?’

  ‘Apart from to die.’ He shivered and she pulled up the sheets and the thick blanket, which he’d pushed aside earlier, and tucked it around him.

  ‘Thanks,’ he said, resting his head against the pillows, then he frowned. ‘Are you sleeping on the floor?’

  ‘Yes,’ muttered Maddie, a little embarrassed. ‘It’s only because I was worried about you being sick in your sleep. I don’t have some weird watching-a-person-sleep fetish or anything.’

  ‘Good to know. What I meant was that I feel bad you’re sleeping on the floor.’

  ‘Not as bad as me,’ said Maddie, rubbing her hip.

  ‘You don’t … You don’t have to … you know … stay.’ He nodded towards the floor.

  She raised an eyebrow.

  ‘But I’m … really grateful. It’s nice to know … you’re there.’ The concession cost him; she could see that. ‘I feel bad that you’re on the floor.’