‘Petrel Island?’

‘Off the coast of-’

‘I know Petrel Island.’ He was focused on her face, and his fingers were still doing the smoothing thing to the back of her hand. It was making her cringe inside. This man-he was who she wanted for ever. She knew that. But he-

‘We evacuated a kid from Petrel Island twelve months back,’ Grady said. ‘It’s a weird little community-Kooris and fishermen and a crazy doctor-cum-lighthouse-keeper keeping the whole community together.’

‘That’s Beth.’

‘That’s your sister?’ His tone was incredulous and she knew why. There seemed no possible connection between the placid islander Beth and the sophisticated career doctor he was looking at.

But there was. Of course there was. You couldn’t remove sisterhood by distance or by lifestyle.

Beth was her sister for ever.

‘Beth’s the island doctor,’ she told him, finding the courage to meet his eyes. ‘She’s also the lighthouse caretaker. It’s what our father did so she’s taken right over.’

‘Beth’s the lighthouse-keeper? And the doctor as well?’

‘Yes.’

‘But…why?’

‘It’s a family thing,’ she told him. Seeing his confusion deepen, she tried to explain. ‘Dad was born on the island, and inherited the lighthouse-keeping from my grandad. He married an island girl and they had Beth. Then the lighthouse was upgraded to automatic-just as Dad’s first wife died. She was seven months pregnant with their second baby, but she collapsed and died of eclampsia before Dad could get her to the mainland.’

Grady was frowning, taking it on board with deep concern. ‘She had no warning?’

‘There was no doctor on the island,’ Morag said bleakly. ‘And, no, he had no warning. Everything seemed normal. She was planning on leaving for the mainland at thirty-four weeks but she didn’t make it. Anyway, her death meant that within a few weeks Dad lost his wife, his baby son and his job.