The Island Legacy Read online

  Ness supposed this was what came of having a nomad for a father. Addy had never been able to settle anywhere for long. He’d been a restless soul, always on the lookout for the next adventure, the next wonderful place to be, the next crock of gold at the end of the rainbow. Fun and feckless, there’d been something in him that just couldn’t rest. Ness had lost count of all the houses they’d lived in over the years, and she’d stopped hoping that one day he would stay long enough in one place for her to make friends. She’d quickly learned that there was no point trying to fit in or get to know anyone; instead, she became an expert at packing up her room in a matter of minutes. She was even more of an expert in comforting the women whose hearts her father inevitably broke.

  People only let you down, Addy would explain as they drove to a new village or town or sometimes even a new country. It was better to keep moving and keep yourself safe than to have to depend on anyone. Preferable by far to keep yourself independent. Ness, perched shotgun beside him, had nodded – but she hadn’t really understood. Even as a child these moonlight flits had looked to her less like bold strikes for independence and more as though her father was running away. Now that she was older Ness was absolutely certain that running away was exactly what Addy had been doing. Why he’d needed to do this she’d never asked; she’d merely accepted that it was as much a part of him as his flame-red hair and fun-loving nature.

  The irony was, Ness now realised, whatever it was her father had been attempting to escape had always come with him. He could run as fast as he liked, break as many hearts as he wanted, quit jobs, take her out of school, swap continents, race motorbikes at breakneck speed, but none of it ever worked. Even whisky hadn’t succeeded, although towards the end it had certainly helped him slide into oblivion. He’d still shouted out in his sleep every night. Countless times Ness had raced into her father’s bedroom to find him clawing thin air as tears streamed down his cheeks. What the dreams were about she never did discover, but the constant running, drinking and risk-taking didn’t chase it away. Whatever it was that had haunted Addy Penwellyn had pursued him until the second he’d drawn his final breath.

  Ness needed to know what that had been. Maybe now she’d have the chance to find out.

  The big car passed by, hurtling along the lane and with its brake lights flashing angrily as it took the next bend. Ness braced herself for the sound of screeching and wasn’t surprised when seconds later there was a furious blast on the horn. Perhaps crazy driving was a Cornish thing and this was where her father’s love of speed had come from. If so, then Addy had done well to have lasted as long as he did before his motorbike claimed him.

  The traffic here was certainly heavier than she was used to, but then Ness had been living on a small Caribbean island where everyone was as laid-back as a deck chair. The cars there dawdled along at much the same pace as the meandering iguanas, and dodging fallen coconuts was about as dangerous as the daily commute got. Everyone waved and called hello. Nobody ever glowered like Range Rover man, that was for sure. Thinking about St Antonia, her home for the past few months, made Ness feel even more lost. Already she missed the gold-medallion sun, the bright blue sky and the hot pinks and acid greens of the vegetation. Here it felt as though somebody had muted the colours and not fed enough pound coins into the meter to get the heater running.

  This was May, wasn’t it? The sun might be out but she was freezing. Thank goodness the hire car had heated seats. Shorts and vest tops and glittery sandals might work in the Caribbean, but for spring in Cornwall she was distinctly underdressed. As soon as she reached St Pirran she’d raid what was left of her funds and buy some warm clothes, Ness decided. She supposed she should have done this when she was at Heathrow, but all she’d wanted to do was head west. Clothes shopping had been the last thing on her mind, and with her thoughts racing faster than the traffic on the M5, Ness had headed straight to Cornwall. Jet lag, nerves and unsuitable outfits didn’t matter. She’d needed to reach St Pirran and find out exactly what was going on. She hadn’t been able to think about anything else for days.

  Exhaling shakily, Ness uncurled her fingers from the steering wheel. Pins and needles buzzed through her hands. Finally, the adrenalin of her long journey was passing and the reality of what she was doing began to dawn. Travelling to St Pirran was no longer just a fun idea to discuss in the bar or the result of a fairy-tale style bequest; it was something actually happening to her, and happening right now. Something she alone had put in motion. No wonder she was filled with trepidation.

  Once she arrived in St Pirran there would be no going back. The solicitor had made it clear that she had responsibilities and big decisions to make and, although he hadn’t said as much, Ness suspected she’d meet opposition and resentment too. Maybe coming here was a mistake? She’d been living abroad for most of her life and these narrow lanes winding through green tunnels of trees felt strange. The rolling fields of buttery-coloured wheat and corduroy plough, the ancient churches snoozing in the shade of yews, and the villages of whitewashed cottages were undeniably English, dreamily familiar from TV shows yet very foreign too.

  Ness felt that old freefalling of her stomach to her sandals, the familiar fear that she was insubstantial and didn’t belong anywhere or to anything. Usually when she felt like this she reached for her snorkel, losing herself in the world beneath the waves and soothed by the vastness of the ocean where everything was inconsequential in comparison to the endless depths and the teeming life. Steadying her breathing as though preparing for a dive, Ness reminded herself that being here was an adventure, maybe the biggest she would ever have. It was certainly one she’d never expected.

  Or dreamed of. How could she? Things like this didn’t happen to girls like her.

  Ten days ago, Ness had been preparing for another normal day – or as normal a day as was possible when you worked as a waitress in a dive hotel. The boats always left early; as soon as the stars faded and soft pink light blushed the sand, the stillness was broken by the clanking of nitrox cylinders and the cries of excited voices. As usual the cicadas’ call, as much the backing track to Ness’s nights as the whirr of air conditioning, had been replaced by the thrum of engines and the thud of dive gear being hurled onto decks. Although her blinds had still been down, Ness had been awake by then: the stripes of light on the whitewashed walls, coupled with the singsong Caribbean tones below, were telling her it was time to head outside.

  She’d lain on her back watching the ceiling fan whir in never-ceasing circles. The thin cotton sheet was sticking to her and she’d kicked it off impatiently, abandoning all hope of drifting back into sleep. It might only have been early but already the temperature had reached the eighties; by noon it would climb even higher. If she hurried she could join the divers for the morning. Once she was in that turquoise world all would be cool and silent – the perfect place to be on a rare day off.

  Ness loved the water and had been drawn to the ocean all her life. Maybe it was why she’d never settled but drifted from one job to another like a restless tide? Her Caribbean life might sound exotic but the waitressing hours were long and the money wasn’t great. The diving and the sunshine did compensate somewhat but the thought of doing this for the next forty years terrified Ness. Life with Addy hadn’t been conducive to a great education, or at least not in the traditional sense, and although she was well read, well travelled and practical she didn’t have a career.

  Was she destined to be as rootless as Addy?

  The trouble was Ness didn’t know quite what it was she did want. She’d always had a sense that there was something she was just missing, an answer tantalisingly out of reach, and if she could only grasp it everything would make sense. Maybe that was her father’s true legacy? She was always going to drift?

  These had been Ness’s thoughts as she’d pinned up her long red curls and made her way to the lockers where the wetsuits were kept. Then the arrival of an unexpected visitor bearing a letter had changed her plans for t
hat morning and maybe for the rest of her life…

  Sitting in her hire car now, with the handbrake jammed on and her heart hammering, Ness wondered what would have happened if she’d been five minutes earlier or had opted to have a lie-in? Would the bemused solicitor, prawn pink and sweating even at that early hour, have given up looking for her and handed the envelope to one of the girls at reception, where it would have lain buried under magazines and totally forgotten while they played on their smartphones and chatted about weekend plans? He’d already tried six resorts that week and looked as though he was ready to drop. If Ness had already gone diving, he probably would have flown back that same afternoon and told his firm how he’d done his very best to trace the sole heir to Pirran Castle but that she was nowhere to be found. Who knew what might have happened then? Either way, it wouldn’t have been her problem.

  Maybe ignorance was bliss.

  Ness’s heart thudded even harder. The sole heir. Her! Nessa Penwellyn! It sounded incredible, ridiculous even, but she’d seen the documents and spoken to the solicitor and it was true: an unknown elderly uncle really had chosen to leave her his castle in Cornwall.

  She’d felt like Cinderella.

  “It sounds far grander than it is,” the solicitor warned. “I should tell you that the building itself is in very bad repair. Put simply, it’s a money pit. Once the death duties have been paid the estate will be in no small degree of debt.”

  Addy had lived his entire life in no small degree of debt, so this came as no surprise to Ness. Why should his brother be any different?

  “But why leave it to me? I’ve never heard of this uncle and my father never mentioned the family home. I didn’t even know he had any brothers. We’ve lived abroad my whole life!”

  “I believe there was some kind of estrangement,” the solicitor said, pulling a hankie from his top pocket and blotting sweat from his shiny face.

  You don’t say, Ness thought. Biting back impatience, she asked, “So what happened?”

  The solicitor’s mopping paused. “I’m afraid I have no idea, but I should imagine it was a very long time ago. And even if I did know, I wouldn’t be at liberty to say. Our client’s family circumstances were his private business. You’d have to ask your cousins, Jamie and Lucy Penwellyn.”

  If these two members of her newly discovered family were as tight-lipped as her father had been, Ness could imagine it would be easier to prise secrets out of clamshells. Head still spinning, she tried a different tack.

  “OK then. You’ve just told me I’ve got cousins, so why wouldn’t he have left it all to them? Especially if one’s a guy? The male always inherits, right? Isn’t that how it goes?”

  It certainly did on Downton Abbey anyway. Addy’s last girlfriend had loved that show. Lord, thought Ness, starting to feel hysterical giggles bubbling up. Gloria would pop if she knew her tattooed biker beau had grown up in a real-life castle. She’d certainly been crazy about his English accent.

  The solicitor shrugged his sunburned shoulders. “Pirran Castle isn’t entailed and there’s no title, so your uncle could leave it to whomever he chose. Having no children himself it was entirely his choice – and his choice was you. What you decide to do with the bequest is entirely your decision.”

  And that, it seemed, was the end of the matter. Regardless of whether she liked or wanted it, Nessa Penwellyn, previously of no fixed abode and with no close family or roots, now possessed the family home – and had also acquired a couple of long-lost cousins. Oddly it was the thought of having a family of her own that excited Ness the most.

  Did she want a castle? What if her cousins hated her? Should she turn it all down and just stay here? Surely she’d be crazy not to at least go and have a look, though? Inheritance aside, she might find out something that would help her understand Addy and herself too. St Pirran was the key to unlocking his secret, Ness just knew it.

  She only wished that the thought of it didn’t make her feel so nervous.

  “If you don’t go to Cornwall to check it out,” her friend Mel had said that evening, when after a Google search and several cocktails Ness was starting to waver, “I’ll never talk to you again.”

  “I don’t know,” Ness said slowly. The night had fallen, the air was soft, and inky waves were lapping against the dive boats. Why leave paradise for a place her father had spent a lifetime trying to escape? She could turn this bequest down if she chose to. The solicitor had admitted this was a possibility.

  “What don’t you know?”

  “Whether I want anything to do with it. It’s weird, Mel. I didn’t even know this uncle.”

  “So what?”

  “So it doesn’t make sense. He and my dad hadn’t spoken in years. Why choose me rather than my cousins?”

  “Maybe he didn’t like your cousins? Or perhaps he wanted to piss them off? Who cares why! The point is that you own a bloody castle with suits of armour and battlements and everything! Stop stressing about it and just enjoy!”

  Ness laughed. Mel’s enthusiasm was wonderful but probably a bit misplaced.

  “From what the solicitor said I think the place is a bit of a wreck,” she commented. The solicitor had certainly implied that there was a huge amount of work required and no money in the pot to pay for any of it. Ness bit her lip. The phrase poisoned chalice sprang to mind.

  Mel’s brown eyes were big circles of disbelief. “So what? It’s yours! God, I have no idea why you look so bloody miserable. I’d have caught the first plane out of here.”

  “I can’t just take off,” Ness protested. She’d poked the melting remains of her cocktail with a straw and frowned. “I’ve got my job to think about.”

  “Jeez, girlfriend! You’ve just been told you’ve inherited a stately home. Go and check it out! There are millions of girls who’ll wait tables in the sunshine.” Then Mel’s eyes narrowed suspiciously. “Please tell me you’re not still hoping Stephen will sort his shit out. You’re not hanging on for him, are you?”

  Stephen Ambrose was Ness’s ex. Fun, good-looking and (courtesy of his venture-capitalist father) wealthy too, he’d swept her off her feet when she’d first arrived on St Antonia, showering her with gifts and romantic trips to idyllic beaches. Unfortunately, a love of gambling and a weakness for pretty faces were also high on his list of personal qualities. Ness knew she’d wasted far too much time and energy, not to mention too many tears, on him. She hadn’t needed the psychoanalytical skills of Freud to figure out why she’d been attracted to Stephen and which way their relationship was headed. Ending things with him had been one of the best decisions she’d ever made, although her ex was finding it hard to see it that way. He definitely wasn’t used to hearing the word no and from a lowly waitress too! Leaving him behind would be a definite bonus.

  “That’s well and truly over. No more spoiled playboys for me,” she said firmly.

  “Or only very rich ones with big willies and even bigger yachts,” Mel grinned.

  But Ness shook her head. “No way. I’m through with shallow idiots. Never again.”

  “So there’s nothing keeping you here then, is there? Go and check that castle out. If you don’t like it then sell the place, buy a hotel out here and I’ll work for you instead,” Mel said happily. “Sorted!”

  Ness smiled at this. Her friend’s enthusiasm was infectious and for the first time since she’d learned about her legacy she’d felt excitement fizzing deep in the pit of her stomach. Maybe this was the missing piece of her puzzle.

  “Sorted,” she agreed, and they clinked glasses. It had sounded like a plan, especially after a few drinks.

  So, one plane ticket and a long drive later here Ness was, at the foot of a hill and on the brink of the unknown – and definitely on the brink of turning around and driving away. This all felt too big and too weird.

  Ness had missed Addy every day since his accident. Yes, he’d been infuriating, irresponsible and totally feckless, but he would have known exactly what to do now. Parked i
n a lane he would surely have known, only a mile from the place where he and his brothers had grown up, Ness missed her father more than ever. She had so many questions she needed to ask, but Addy would never be able to answer them now. She’d never been brave enough to enquire about his past or demand to know more about her mother. Discussions about Beth had always been off limits and Ness had never known why. She’d been beautiful. She’d played the violin. She’d drowned when Ness was a baby. That was it. End of story. Addy had lived in the moment and been determined to stay there, right until the second the motorcycle tyres had veered off the tarmac; he’d always skirted questions, like a skater zigzagging across the surface of a frozen pond. And now it was too late. Ness would never have the chance to glean answers or know more about her family unless she screwed up her courage and faced this odd legacy head on.

  She wound the window down and inhaled the salty air. The lane was empty now and rose steeply ahead. Before she could change her mind, Ness released the handbrake with a determined clunk, put her foot down and let the car surge forward into the unknown. Within moments she had crested the hill, and suddenly the world fell away with dizzying speed. The sea below was a glittering kaleidoscope of blues and greens and turquoises, spread out at the foot of a town filled with higgledy-piggledy houses almost paddling in the shallows. Floating in the blue, like something from a fairy tale, was an island tethered to the shore by a winding sandy ribbon. On top of the island a ruined castle slumbered in the sunshine, keeping watch over the bay with the quiet dignity of ages.

  The journey, her worries and even her jet lag were instantly forgotten as Nessa Penwellyn fell head over heels in love with her inheritance.

  Chapter 3

  Thank goodness the tide was starting to go out and she could soon walk across the causeway, thought Lucy Penwellyn as she scurried down Fore Street with her wicker basket in one hand and Biscuit’s lead clutched in the other. It had been sweet of Merryn to give her a ride to shore earlier on, but she’d been drinking tea and chatting with Annie Luckett for far too long and now she was dreadfully behind.