Free Follow a Star by Christine Stovell

suggested that her assets weren’t all thanks to Nature’s bounty. May’s charms were all her own; she wasn’t Thunder’s type, surely?
    He narrowed his eyes as Thunder opened his mouth and turned back to May.
    ‘You don’t half look familiar, babe,’ he said, searching May’s face. ‘I swear we’ve met before.’
    ‘Right that’s it,’ Bill said, leaping up. ‘We need to see how
Lucille
’s doing.’
    Waving away Paige, who now that she had got hold of him seemed reluctant to discharge her patient, Bill clung on to May and pointed her in the direction of the companionway.
    ‘Talk about the cruise from Hell!’ groaned May when they were safely out of earshot.
    Unwinding the bandages that made him feel like an extra from
The Mummy
, Bill paused to throw her an amused look. ‘Comfortable surroundings and a sugar daddy to pay the bills … sure you wouldn’t like to swap boats?’
    ‘If that’s supposed to be a joke, it’s not remotely funny,’ May said hotly. ‘I’ve told you before, I needed a break, I was in a hurry to get away and I certainly didn’t mean to raise poor old Cecil’s blood pressure so desperately.’
    He was about to come back at her with a withering retort when he noticed her eyes were brimming with tears. Flip! This wasn’t turning out as he’d intended, it was just that seeing the hideous Thunder come on to her like that with all that guff about being sure they’d met before had made him feel … he struggled for the right word … protective of her.
    ‘May?’
    She fanned her face with her hand and shook her head. ‘I’m going for my shower, then I’ll see if I can find the laundrette. I might as well get on with something useful if we’re here for a day or two.’
    ‘Good idea,’ he nodded, thankful for the reprieve. ‘Is there anything I can do?’
    ‘Yes,’ she said, so vehemently he took a step back, ‘you can cut me some slack.’
    The constant frapping and jangling of rigging lines against the metal masts of stranded yachts knelled an end to their passage plans; even in Ramsgate’s all-weather harbour, little
Lucille
still bounced around like an egg in a cauldron of boiling water. May concentrated on channelling her energy into getting everything shipshape so they’d be ready to set off as soon as conditions were even halfway tolerable. Keeping herself out of trouble by dealing with the pile of washing was easier than defending herself against Bill’s grubby accusation, since she had no wish to explain what lay behind Thunder’s sudden sense of déjà vu. The only dirty linen she had any intention of making public was the load going into the coin-op machine in front of her now.
    She shook her head. However brave she tried to be, thinking about Aiden was still like probing a fresh wound; every time she poked around to see how the new tissue was coming along she made herself bleed again. The washing was beginning to blur and not just because it was spinning. Rather than shed more tears for Aiden, May decided that once she’d bundled the washing into a drier, she’d set off for a spot of retail therapy.
    What she found was that like so many tired seaside places, shunned in favour of more exotic destinations, the town reflected years of steady decline. It wasn’t shopping temples that were keeping the pubs and restaurants open, but towering turbines, the development of offshore wind farms and the construction work that came with them which were creating regeneration. An ill or good wind, depending on your point of view. Perhaps it was passing a shop selling the same sort of new-agey knick-knacks her mother stocked that had set-up some psychic connection, but, whatever it was, it was both a comfort and a surprise to May when her phone rang and she saw it was her mother calling.
    Most of the time Cathy pretended to be far more laid-back than she really was. Although, the fact she’d screeched, ‘For fuck’s sake May, have you thought about the risks?’