“Slacking off there, Twin Two,” Dan said, using his childhood name for her. “At this rate, I’ll lap you.”

She resisted an eye roll. “Totally what I intended, Danny Boy. I wouldn’t want to upset your need to be faster or fitter.”

“You look pretty fit to me. You should come on our next walk.”

Her body gave an involuntary shudder. “Does it involve me carrying my bed on my back?”

“Only if you want to.”

“I will never want to,” she said emphatically then laughed despite the memory of driving rain, mud and a pack that had almost toppled her off the side of a mountain when she was sixteen. “I’m surprised you’d want to invite me.”

“Who can forget the Alice Hunter Hoadley Hide hike meltdown?” He laughed at the memory, but then his face became almost serious—for Dan. “Back then your pack was too big for you. The right gear makes all the difference.”

“Exactly and my camera, lunch, water bottle and a light rain jacket constitutes the right gear.”

“It’s a day walk at Cape Conran so it’s a perfect match. I’m hoping to see sea eagles.”

Dan treated life as a competition and she could just imagine the pace he’d set, practically jogging through the bush. “Are there some slow walkers in the group?”

“Youngest is twenty and oldest is eighty so we cover all speeds.”

The idea of walking in the bush appealed and for all Dan’s faults, he was good company. “I’ll think about it.”

Fergus McLean called out from the side lines, “Change over, Dan.”

“Gotta go, Twin Two. Call me if you’re coming and I’ll get you a seat in the car pool.” With a grin and a wave, Dan was off and Alice had no doubt that by 7:00 a.m., he’d have invited another ten women.

When Alice passed the medical practice’s team tent, Penny called out, “All good, Alice?”

She gave a double thumbs-up and kept walking. Alice was filling in for Libby and she was happy to do so but that didn’t stop the anxiety for her twin grinding in her gut. Her usually confident and indomitable sister had placed herself in voluntary isolation from the town. Alice tried reassuring herself that it was only a week since all hell had broken loose and perhaps Libby was wise to avoid the gossip burning around the bay like a firestorm. Not that Alice expected it to die down anytime soon.