Saving Nathaniel (29 page)

Scouting around, he found a few stale biscuits and a crust from a loaf of bread. He crumbled them up and took them out to the table.

When he retreated inside, the birds returned and ate greedily. He smiled to himself as he recalled how much she enjoyed watching them squabbling over the titbits, how they made her smile with their antics. How he missed her smile. How he missed her just being there.

She had been out of his employ for only two weeks before he had called her in a drunken haze. He didn't know how he had managed it, and at the time, he hadn't even been aware he'd done it. He had only known she was there when he had come round from sleeping it off and seen her coat draped over his office chair, and her discarded shoes.

All he knew for certain about yesterday was that she had made sure he was safe, cleaned up after him, comforted him in his distress and stayed with him until the wretched day was over.

She made sure he was alright. As usual she had put him before herself. And then she took him to her bed, and how wonderful, how terrifying and how glorious it had been. He felt a stirring in the pit of his stomach. He had to call her even if it was only to hear her voice. Picking up the telephone he pressed all but the final number.

What am I going to say to her, he thought, his finger hovering over the last digit. He tried a few lines out loud, rejecting each one in turn.

'Thank you for staying with me…' No, ridiculously inadequate.

'I'm sorry…' She'd never believe it.

'Don't leave me, I need you…' That couldn't be more pathetic if it tried.

'That was a great shag. How about another?' The very coarseness of the thought made him cringe.

And finally, the truth, 'I love you, Meg. Come back and take care of me.'

'Oh, God…' He groaned his frustration, and hung up. Nothing he could think of would do. However long it took, he wouldn't call her again until he could be sure of exactly what he wanted to say.

Sitting at his desk he opened his laptop, looking for something to divert his attention and pass the time. He would check his emails and his bank balance. To do that, he needed his flash drive. He patted his shirt pocket. It wasn't there. 'It must be in the desk.'

His hand went to his pocket for his keyring before he remembered. 'Fruit bowl.'

Retrieving his keys from the kitchen, he opened the small drawer at his desk. He took out the flash drive and inserted it into the laptop. He was about to close the drawer when he noticed something missing. It took no more than a second to realise the gun cabinet key box was gone.

He dug his hand into the drawer and felt around. He pulled it right out to the limit of its runners and rummaged through the contents. The box wasn't there.

A momentary panic overtook him and he dashed over to the cabinet to check the lock. It hadn't been tampered with.

'Where the hell is it? What have I done with it?' He turned out every drawer of his desk, his jacket and coat pockets and his briefcase, all to no avail. He had no idea where the box could be, least of all that it was safely nestled in Megan's handbag at Rose Cottage, just over a mile away.

'It'll turn up,' he assured himself. 'You were off your head with drink and you've just mislaid it. It's here somewhere, keep looking.'

Monday morning arrived with a thick, steel-grey mist hugging the ground. It blocked out the sun and every view was obscured. None of the tree-covered hills surrounding the village could be seen. Nat, standing at his bedroom window, could not even see down the driveway to his front gates. It appeared as if the rest of the world, outside immediate sight, had simply been rubbed out. It matched exactly how he felt.

He went downstairs. He had foregone his breakfast; he hadn't taken morning coffee either. Now Megan was no longer there to share it with him, he didn't see the point. Rebecca wouldn't sit and chat and waste time with him even if he asked her.

Needing something to salve the unpleasant gnawing in his belly, he went to the kitchen and helped himself to a glass of milk from the fridge.

As he drank from the beaker, he became mindful of Rebecca watching him through the open doorway to the laundry. She had paused in her ironing of one of his shirts, and on her face she carried an expression of cool contempt.

She doesn't look happy, he thought. She must know Megan was here on Saturday night. What has she been saying to her? Whatever it was, it couldn't have been anything good…if looks could kill, I'd be six feet under already…

Despite feeling as if he had just crawled out from under a rotten log, he attempted to inject a note of pleasantry into his greeting. 'Good morning, Rebecca.'

Her eyes flickered over him and he detected the slightest wrinkling of her freckled nose as she took in his appearance - bare footed and unshaven, with his hair awry, and his shirttails hanging loose over ill fitting torn jeans - an unkempt shambles of a man.

'Everything okay?' he asked.

Her reply was icy. 'Fine.'

'Anything you need?'

'No thank you.'

He took a sip from the milk before approaching the doorway and edging through it. Rebecca's cold grey eyes followed his every move and he felt distinctly uncomfortable under her unwavering, accusatory gaze.

'I've…erm…lost something,' he said with a nervous smile. 'A metal box with some keys in it, about this big.' He made a shape with his hand. 'Would you keep an eye out for it? I'm not sure where I lost it; it could be anywhere…if you wouldn't mind…please.'

'Yes, Mr Mackie,' she said, her face deadpan, her tone, frigid. His eye was attracted by the slight movement of her hand as it tightened around the handle of the iron.

'Thank you,' he said graciously, and smiled again. She didn't return it.

Not keen to give his housekeeper the opportunity to embed the hot, hard metal of the steam iron in the back of his head, he reversed through the doorway before turning his back on her. He was hardly clear of the door before it slammed shut behind him, so hard the draught snatched at his shirt.

'Hell's teeth!' he muttered, and hurriedly left the kitchen to take refuge in his study, out of sight and reach of the furious woman.

Following that brief exchange, they didn't see or speak to each other for the rest of the day…or the next.

On Friday morning, Megan approached Rebecca to ask how Nat was faring. She reported that he seemed a little subdued but overall fine, and expressed her own surprise that he didn't seem to be drinking anywhere near as much alcohol, although his tea intake had increased considerably. Satisfied it was safe to do so, Megan showed her the key box.

'He's been looking for this,' she said when she saw it. 'He's had me turning the house over. What are you doing with it?' She took the box and rattled it. 'He said there were keys in it. What're they for?'

'It's nothing you need be concerned about,' said Megan. 'Just take it back and leave it on his desk and don't say where it came from.'

'He's going to ask.'

'So say you found it. Use your imagination.'

As soon as the box appeared on his desk, Nat realised Megan must have taken it. He had no clue why she had done it, but his relief at getting it back overrode any annoyance he felt toward her for putting him through days of needless anxiety.

The next few days stretched out long and empty for him. He spent a lot of time travelling to and from his Aberdeen office, or working or reading in his study. Sometimes he would simply sit and brood. He tried to work out some of his unrest over his feelings for Megan at the gym, receiving only severely aching muscles and a strained hamstring for his pains.

He still hadn't called her, convinced it was now far too late to be meaningful. He had also managed to convince himself that, although he was in love with her, she couldn't possibly feel the same about him.

What had come forward for consideration was something far more drastic, something that could be the solution to all his problems - selling up and moving out of the area. He would walk away and leave it all behind. The best solution all round.

Instead of calling Megan, he made an appointment with the estate agent at their small office in the village square.

He had no trouble parking. The tourist season hadn't started and there was plenty of space. A few other people milled about the square and he watched them from the car as they passed him by. He had lived in Kirkton for more than seven years and he didn't recognise any of them. Another good reason to leave, he thought.

Forty-five minutes later, he left the agent's office with the information he wanted safely tucked in his coat pocket. He had nothing planned for the rest of the morning and with time to kill, he strolled around the square, window shopping.

It was ten minutes past eleven when he reached the door of the coffee shop on the edge of the Green. He had driven past it often, but had never been in. This might be his last opportunity to try it out.

The little bell over the door tinkled as he entered. He ordered a hot, strong coffee and glanced around for a convenient table. That was when he saw her, sitting alone in the corner, reading a magazine.

His first instinct was to abandon his coffee and leave before she saw him, but a force much stronger than he moved his feet forward and in a few short steps, he stood in front of her.

He cleared his throat with a polite, 'Ahem'.

Chapter 25

It had been more than a fortnight since Megan's night at the Lodge with Nat – fifteen days and five hours by her calculation, and she hadn't heard a word from him.

At first, she loitered around the cottage in case he called, but when it became obvious that no contact would be forthcoming, she reluctantly had to accept that he had no interest in her, and blamed herself. She had seduced him and scared him off. Moreover, she believed he was not interested in her because he still loved Joanna.

'Forget him,' she told herself. 'It was a mistake; another painful, bloody mistake. One day you'll learn.'

After abandoning her fruitless vigil, she decided the best thing she could do for herself was to keep occupied and concentrate on things over which she actually had some degree of control.

Without a job to fill her day, although she was now half-heartedly looking for one, she had time to go swimming and attend exercise classes or go walking – anything would do to fill the hours. She joined the local library and withdrew an armful of books she had always intended to read. The garden of Rose Cottage also took up a fair amount of her time, now spring had arrived.

Keeping her mind busy and off Nathaniel Mackie became her sole preoccupation, and it proved to be very hard work.

The evenings were the worst. With Rebecca and Paul often busying themselves with each other in the sitting room, she would retreat to her own room at the back of the cottage. She found reading or sewing didn't distract her mind enough and thoughts about Nat would often creep around the unguarded edges. She pushed them aside, but their banishment was only temporary.

This morning was bright and pleasant and her walk bracing. She took a route around the village on a popularly used path that ran along the old railway line and through the Community Woods. She wished, for a brief moment only, she had a dog.

A red squirrel, its bright copper coat gleaming in the sunshine and its white chest as crisp as a newly laundered shirt, paused on the path a few yards in front of her. They both stood and eyed each other. Satisfied she was not a threat, the squirrel flicked its bushy red tail and scampered off into the undergrowth.

Further along the path, she heard a woodpecker somewhere in the depths of the wood, drumming out its virility on the trunk of a hollow tree. The sound echoed around her. The air was filled with the shrill tweeting of myriad songbirds as they became caught up in the timeless springtime competition for mates.

She followed the route of the well-defined path until it eventually brought her back to the village Green. A tree-ringed grassy oval, it was large enough to host the Highland games every summer and the community bonfire and fireworks in November. Children played football and rugby on it on Saturday mornings and a car boot sale was held there on the last Sunday of every month during the summer.

Across the Green, she spotted the village coffee shop, The Black Sheep. She had always fancied going in there; it had a cosy, rustic look, and as the walk had stimulated her appetite, now was as good a time as any.

She crossed the Green to the shop and stepped inside. To accompany the quiet jingle of the little bell above the door, she heard the church clock chime out eleven o'clock. If she had still been at Struan with Nat, it would have been morning coffee time - perfect.

The aromas of fresh brewed coffee and toasted cinnamon bagels were heavenly, and after ordering both, she took a seat at a table in a corner. The shop wasn't too busy. With the tourist season not yet upon them, her fellow customers were locals. A few of them she recognised.

She sipped at her drink and nibbled her bagel and perused a free magazine supplied for the convenience of the customers extolling the virtues of the Cairngorms National Park.