The Ghosts of Tullybrae House (13 page)

“I think it is. And so did Professor McCall—he put me up for the job.”

“Professor McCall—as in Boomer McCall?” Iain belted a laugh.

“I take it you know him.”

“As I said, archaeology’s a small world.” He shook his head, smiling inwardly. “Boomer McCall. Imagine. Ask him how he got his nickname, next time you see him.”

“I’ve already been given an overview by Lady Rotherham,” she answered dryly. “At least an overview of the livestock and … er …
items
that were involved.”

“And how do you find Lady Rotherham?”

“She’s…” Emmie paused, searching for the right way to express her impression of the lady. “She’s okay. Nice, if a little all over the place. But she’s great to work for. Doesn’t hover, or try to micromanage or anything. She trusts me to get on with my work, and do the job right. So I appreciate that.”

“Yeah, she’s… ah… she’s something else.” He chuckled, ruffling his shaggy hair. “Nah, she’s got a good heart underneath that high-energy exterior. I really think she cares about Tullybrae deep down. If I thought she were exploiting it for her own gain, or to get herself onto the telly, I wouldn’t have agreed to take on the project. Mind, I think there
is
some of that in there, wanting her five minutes of fame. But that’s not what’s at the heart of it.”

“I’d say that’s about right,” she agreed. “When she told me all about the supposed ghosts, she wasn’t trying to hype it up or make a big thing out of it. She simply told me about them like they were part of her family.”

“That’s what Shelagh said—she’s one of the producers over at Stannisfield. She told me Camille mentioned a murder, or murd
ers
, but didn’t much hype up the story other than to pitch it as a point of archaeological interest.”

“It’s a shame they don’t know anything about who it was—or who they were, if it’s more than one. I looked online and in the manor library, but there’s nothing concrete in the written records to substantiate anything.”

“One of the frustrating things about history, huh? If it’s not in the written record, then there’s nothing to carry it forward. It as good as never happened.”

Emmie tilted her head. “Not necessarily. I mean, isn’t that what you do? Dig up the forgotten past, bring it back to life?”

He nodded once, conceding. “I have hope for you yet, young grasshopper. I like the way your mind works. So many of the old fuddy-duddies in our extended field don’t make those kind of leaps. Those that do are the ones that end up making a mark on the historical record. The ones that don’t find their careers stalled at regurgitating research papers and teaching undergrad classes until retirement.” He paused, a thought coming to his mind. “You know, if you’re actually interested in trying to breathe life into the legend, I have a mate down at Glasgow U that has access to a lot of records and documents that no one thought important enough to write about. Lots from your neck of the woods up at Tullybrae. There may be nothing in there, but there could just as easily be something that can give you a bit of a jumpstart. If you want, I can put you in touch with him.”

“Really?” Emmie beamed. “I’d love that!”

“Don’t get your hopes up. It may be a dead end, but at least it’s something.”

“That’s the thing about history,” she replied. “You hit dead end after dead end, but you keep going until one day a dead end turns out to be a hidden door.”

Iain laughed, a charming, heartfelt laugh. “Well said.” He raised his bottle. “A toast, then. To dead ends.”

“To dead ends,” Emmie echoed, and clinked her glass against his.

IAIN’S BUSINESS CARD
lent a satisfying weight to the pocket of Emmie’s corduroy skirt as Ewan drove them back to Tullybrae along the dark Highland roads. It was after midnight by the time they turned through the gates and came up to the house.

Ewan pulled the Kangoo to a stop in front of the main entrance, and turned the engine off.

“I’ve left my notebook in the tent. Be right back.”

Dean unlatched his seatbelt. “Might as well stretch our legs while we’re waiting.” Adam followed suit.

Famke, who had been asleep until then, jolted awake as Sophie crawled sloppily over her lap. After indulging in one too many Smirnoff Ices, the young Londoner was more than a little worse for the wear.

“Yep, stretch’s what I need too, mate,” she slurred.

She yanked open the door, stumbling a little when her feet hit the gravel drive, and sauntered off around the side of the house.

“Man, not again,” Adam groaned.

“Someone make sure she doesn’t go too far,” Ewan called to them, half-way into the field. “I’m leaving as soon as I’ve got my book. She can walk back if she’s not ready to go when I am.”

“I’ll get her,” Emmie relented, exiting the van. The offer was received with a grateful smile from a bleary-eyed Famke.

“You want me to go with?” Dean offered.

“No, that’s okay—Oh, Adam!” No less worse for the wear than Sophie, Adam was relieving himself against one of the tires.

“Sorry, love. Call of nature,” he answered.

“Do you have
any
shame, dude?” Dean admonished.

“Occasionally.”

Shaking her head, Emmie trotted off in the direction Sophie had gone.

“Soph?” she called into the empty night. “So-
oph
.”

From somewhere at the back of the house, towards where the gardens were laid out in a maze of beds and high shrubbery, she thought she heard quick, light footsteps on the gravel walkways. Picking up her pace, she followed the sound. When she lost the trail, she stopped.

“Soph?” she called again.

A giggle came from her left.

“Soph, where are you?”

She took off again, following the laughter.

“This isn’t funny.”

Breaking through the rear hedge where the grounds of the manor ended, Emmie slowed. In front of her was a view more breathtaking than the daylight had ever shown. The moon shone brightly, gilding the hills in ribbons of silver. The view was endless. Empty. Yet sublimely beautiful, like Earth when seen from space.

An acute desire to walk out, to become lost in that silver moonlight, pulled her forward, away from the known, safe grounds of Tullybrae. These luminescent hills called to her, promised her that this was where her heart truly lay. It was not in Corner Brook, never there. It has always been here.

She’d gone perhaps a hundred feet before the tingling washed over her right side. A tingling which had been lifted from her when the van left the estate earlier that evening.

He was here. The Highlander.

As if in a dream, Emmie turned to the right. Her eyes tracked across the horizon, taking in the panorama before coming to a halt at a figure in the distance. He was another hundred feet away, but still she knew him. Without ever having seen his face before, Emmie knew it was him.

Immense sadness permeated the space between them and sank deep into her core. He stared at her with an intensity that held her mesmerised. Dark, unruly hair tumbled to his shoulders, and framed a captivating face. Strong, yet graceful in its masculinity. A traditional
feileadh mhor
flapped gently around bare, muscled legs.

He was something she might have seen in a movie, something Hollywood might emulate with the help of makeup artists and costume departments and award-winning directors. Except that he was so much more, so much grander than anything makeup and costumes could ever effect.

He was real. Authentic.

He made no move, did not try to communicate or gesture in any way. He simply stood, looking at her. Waiting, it seemed, for her to come to him.

And she wanted to. Dear God, it terrified her to admit that she wanted to.

Without warning, a pair of arms grabbed her from behind. Emmie yelped, her voice echoing across the landscape.

“Whatcha doin’ out here, hmmm?” Sophie drawled into her ear.

“Soph, you almost gave me a heart attack!”

Sophie giggled—a very different giggle than what Emmie had heard only moments before. Her gaze snapped back to the Highlander. He was gone.

Still reeling, she looked to Sophie, who was sloppy grinning at her like nothing had happened. The girl had no idea what she’d interrupted, no inkling of the connection she’d just severed so carelessly. An irrational streak of anger surged in Emmie’s chest; words bubbled up from some vile place deep within her, begging to be hurled at Sophie and her foolish, pie-eyed face.

Don’t do it. It wasn’t her fault
, urged the rational part of her that was horrified by her own reaction. And she
was
horrified. Mortified. Emmie was not one to take her frustrations out on other people, even when they deserved it.

Sophie did not deserve it now. Emmie breathed. Breathed again. Smiled, and threw an arm around Sophie’s shoulder.

“Come on, sweetie. Let’s get you back to the van.”

She looked back one last time to the empty hills. There was no one there.

Once the van turned onto the road and drove out of sight, Emmie closed and bolted the manor’s front door. The darkened, oil-painted eyes of Tullybrae’s dead followed her up the main staircase.

She felt very strange as she changed into her pajamas and retreated to the washroom to prepare for bed. Rattled, more like. If she had any doubt before now of whom or what she’d been sensing, those doubts had been vanquished. He was a Highlander. He was
the
Highlander. And his interest in her went far beyond curiosity.

It had been no accident that she’d been led away from the group and into the open land. Neither had it been a coincidence that she’d come upon his apparition. He’d meant for her to see him.

He did not look like anyone she’d seen before. Despite this, Emmie had the inexplicable conviction that she knew him. Or maybe not that she
knew
him, exactly, but that he was important to her somehow. That he was, and always had been, an integral part of her existence.

How the hell did that make any sense? It didn’t. The fact that it didn’t, and the fact that she couldn’t shake herself of the conviction, frightened her. It was because she couldn’t control it. It had no place in her ordered, careful life.

The night passed restlessly. The child’s laughter that lured her away from the gardens plagued her dreams. Incessant laughter. And his face, the face of the Highlander, plagued her dreams, too. In sleep, he was closer than when she’d seen him awake. Close enough that she might reach out and touch him. But she couldn’t—her arms would not move.

In her dreams, he wore a tortured expression. “Save me,” he would say. Nothing more, just “Save me.”

“I can’t save you, you’re dead,” she called.

“Save me” was his only whispered response.

“Save you from what?” she cried. “Save you from
what
?”

Somewhere in the back of her consciousness, the part that lingered between awake and asleep, she was aware that she was tossing and turning. Aware of the strong scent of roses, and of a hand upon her hair.

When the dim light of a rainy morning pulled her from slumber, she found that the covers had been tucked in around her during the night, and roses still hung in the air.

It was after ten when she was ready to head down to the kitchen for breakfast. Instead of her usual stylish ensemble, she wore jeans and a college hoodie. Her hair, still wet from a hasty shower, hung lank around her shoulders. There wasn’t a spot of makeup on her face, and she hadn’t even bothered with shoes. Instead, it was her slippers.

When she caught sight of herself in the full-length, enameled Rococo-style mirror at the top of the main staircase, she cringed.

This is not me, she thought, and waited for the familiar panic to surface—the panic which always accompanied the knowledge that she was not at her best. That the leash on her life which she held tightly at all times was slipping.

It never came. Apathy was all she felt as she looked at herself. Apathy, and the Highlander’s presence.

“Late night?” Lamb remarked when she joined him at the wooden work table and listlessly plunked herself onto the sea-green stool.

“I thought you’d be upstairs already,” she answered. “Aren’t you usually hard at work this time of the morning?”

“It is my turn to cook the breakfast,” he said simply.

Emmie dropped her head into her hands and rubbed her squeaky-clean face. “I’m sorry, Lamb. I didn’t realize you’d be waiting for me. I should have been up earlier.”

“Nonsense. You young people are entitled to a night of fun followed by a lie-in once in a while.”

“I wouldn’t call it ‘fun’ exactly.”

Lamb quirked a white brow. “Did you no’ have a nice time?”

“I shouldn’t say that, it’s not fair,” she amended. “I did have a good time. It was nice spending an evening with the dig crew. They’re all great, and they each tried so hard to make sure I felt included. Even Adam, if you can believe that.”

“Oh, aye. Adam. That one.” Lamb chuckled.

“He’s not so bad once you get to know him. There’s a good heart beneath that male-chauvinist exterior. He actually served us all drinks. I mean, took the time to ask us what we wanted and pour it for us.”

“You don’t say.”

“I know. I wasn’t expecting it. But I think it proves that he’s thoughtful. Deep down, at least.”

“I’ll remember that in my dealings with the lad. Was there something about the party itself you didn’t fancy?”

Emmie reached for the silver thermal coffee pot in the centre of the table, and poured its contents into her cup.

“Cream?” Lamb offered, passing her the white jar.

“Thanks.” Emmie accepted it and poured. “I’m not really big on parties. I’m a wallflower, to be honest. I find keeping up conversation in a big group exhausting. Does that make sense?”

“It does.” Lamb helped himself to a piece of toast. “I’m much the same. I prefer good conversation with one or two friends rather than stilted or superficial conversation with many people. Especially when most of those people are all trying to talk over one another.”

Emmie smiled sadly. “And you feel like you’ve got to keep up or risk fading away?”

He tipped his head knowingly, and they lapsed into silence. Emmie spent the lapse staring blankly at her coffee cup.

“Why don’t you go back to bed for a while, hmmm?” Lamb suggested. “You look knackered.”

“No.” Emmie plucked some bacon and a slice of toast from their platters, and munched without enthusiasm. “Too much to do. It’s just a bad night of sleep, that’s all. Everybody has those.”

With a last sip of her coffee, which she’d only half drunk, Emmie took her dishes to the sink and gave them a scrub. Then, approaching Lamb from behind, she gave his shoulders an affectionate squeeze. “Thanks for brekkie, it was delicious.”

He watched her go.

“I assume her bad night of sleep had something to do with
him
?” he said when she was out of earshot.

Mrs. Lamb sighed, troubled. Her starched dress rustled as she materialized in the seat Emmie had just vacated. “I daresay it does.”

“Should I be worried? He seems to be around her a lot. He doesn’t mean to do her any harm, does he?”

“Oh, nothing like that. He’s fascinated by her, though, I’ll say that. Drawn to her. I don’t know why yet, I haven’t been able to puzzle it out. And no’ for lack of trying, mind. But there’s something between them. Something that goes beyond a chance encounter.” She paused, at a loss to explain the inkling she had. “I’ll keep an eye on her, and on him. In the meantime,
you
can work on getting her to eat more. She’s all skin and bone as it is. Half a piece of toast and two rashers of bacon does no’ a breakfast make.”