CHAPTER 2

That night dreams interfered with my sleep. When I awoke, they had disappeared into the recesses of my memory. The details might have faded away, but I was left with a sense of impending doom that was hard to shake off.

The day before, I’d been preoccupied with preparing for the whisky tasting and fearful of the unknown I’d encounter when I left the Highlands. Something there must have triggered the disturbances I’d encountered during the night.

It was still dark outside, making whatever visions I’d awoken from seem even more sinister. Checking the time, I realized I’d begun sleeping longer and later than I had during the summer months. Days were short and nights were long now as the shortest day of the year approached. Fourteen hours of sunlight were distant memories as we suffered through a mere seven hours at best.

Today’s sun wouldn’t rise until approximately eight thirty, and it would disappear completely by four, already beginning to fade from sight as early as three. That is, if we even saw the sun. Mostly we were grateful for the light it emitted through the cloud cover.

I wasn’t about to dredge up the specifics of what I was sure had been a terrible dream. Let sleeping dogs lie, as the saying goes.

Speaking of dogs. John Derry, Vicki’s brother-in-law and Kirstine’s husband, had already shoveled a path from the main house to my cottage. He wasn’t in sight now, but there was no doubt that he had done the hard labor. He always did.

Cup of coffee in hand, I assessed the white world outside my window.

Coco and Pepper ran along the path and began yipping at my door. They must have been snow pile diving, because they were coated in the white, fluffy stuff. Or rather, they had been, before they shook it all over my floor and pajama pant legs.

“I don’t know why I let you in here,” I scolded them lightly. The truth was I loved the little Westies like my own. I couldn’t think of a better way to brighten up the day than with a visit from them. They were the perfect antidote to this morning’s gloomy beginning, which had been inspired by elusive imagery produced by my renegade mind.

The two lounged by the fire while I showered in the hottest water my body could tolerate. Then I dressed in warm trousers with leggings underneath and a cotton sweater. The snow had stopped falling sometime during the night, but the weather report had forecast wind and a lingering chill.

I poured another cup of instant coffee, something I’d gotten used to over time and now found pretty good. Sitting at the table, I nibbled on one of the cheese scones I’d purchased from A Taste of Scotland, my favorite bakery. The Scots pronounce the name of this delicacy much differently than we do in the States. Here it phonetically sounds like “skon,” rhyming with “gone.” This one was baked with Scottish cheddar cheese from the Isle of Mull. It was delicious.

Vicki had finally installed Internet access at the farm, so I started up my laptop. I still did all my writing at the pub, finding it more conducive to the creative process. At home, I was easily distracted by pretty much everything and everyone, especially by my friend and her canines. But really anything could interrupt my thought process. A quick glance out the window now with a view of the hillside was enough to stop my brain from functioning as it should.

Because across the lane, framed by the hills, I spotted an enormous red deer stag, with a thick winter coat and a huge rack of antlers. He must have sensed my interest, because he swung his head in my direction, then turned slowly and sprang across the base of the hill, disappearing from sight.

Glancing down at my laptop, I found a short e-mail message waiting in my inbox. It had been posted several hours before and it was from Ami Pederson.

“I’m excited about tonight’s whisky tasting,” she wrote, as though she were the one going. “What do you think Leith will wear under his kilt?”

That again? You’d think she’d have some interest in what I was wearing. I suspected that Ami was living vicariously through more than her own fictitious tales.

Ami is a bestselling historical romance author. By bestselling, I mean mega-famous. And she’s a push-and-shove kind of woman who always gets her way in the end.

“Shoes and socks,” I wrote back, grinning as I hit the send button.

I owe so much to Ami in spite of her annoying persistence regarding my future and even though she has a one-track mind when it comes to my personal life—she’s obsessed with getting me “hooked up.” She feels it’s her personal obligation to do so.

Immediately after my shoes and socks reply, an e-mail from her came bouncing through cyberspace. What was the woman doing awake? It was the middle of the night in Chicago.

This time, after one “LOL” and several “snort, snorts,” she switched subjects. “Are you letting your characters get naked?”

“Of course,” I responded, with more of a quip than I was feeling.

Sex scenes are extremely difficult for me to write. They definitely don’t flow naturally, and I made the mistake of sharing this with Ami, who has always had a pat answer. “That’s because you need more hands-on research. You can’t write what you don’t know.”

In spite of her implication regarding my virginal sex status, she knows I’ve been married. As hard as I try, though, I don’t remember any passion in our relationship.

Instinctively I must have taken her references to my lack of experience as a challenge, because I proved her wrong when I finished Falling for You, sex scenes and all. Once Ami read it, she’d changed her tune. Although she managed to stick with the same theme but with a new twist.

“All that fragile desire and suppressed longing bottled up inside you translated into some beautiful sexual encounters,” she’d raved. “Keep doing what you’re doing.”

Which wasn’t much in the way of romance, or even much platonic male companionship. I’d had several outings with Leith, and the inspector has shown me a few sights, but that has been pretty much it. That night’s whisky tasting was going to be the closest I’d come to an actual nighttime date. And as it turned out, it hadn’t been initiated by Leith at all. He’d thought I’d been the one doing the inviting.

The more I considered the mix-up, the weirder it seemed. I picked up the invitation I’d received in the mail and reread it. So odd. But I told myself that I’d never met Henrietta McCloud. Maybe she was a flake.

Pulling on a quilted wool coat and knee-high boots, I made my way along the shoveled path, with Coco and Pepper racing ahead of me. Vicki wasn’t at the main house. I left the dogs inside, walked down the lane, which had also been plowed, and found the open sign illuminated and her inside Sheepish Expressions.

“You don’t have to open this morning,” I suggested. “No one is going to be out unless they have to be.”

“I need to take care of a few things anyway,” Vicki said, seeming a bit subdued. “So I might as well. It’s a good time to get caught up on inventory.”

I did a little theorizing. Sean Stevens should have been back from Fife last night, but I hadn’t seen his car outside the main house as one would expect if he’d arrived as scheduled. Either he was still away, or the snow had stopped him.

“How did you sleep?” I asked subtly.

“All right,” she said with a shrug, removing a pair of reading glasses from the end of her nose. “Though I was expecting to get not a wink. But Sean couldn’t get through. I knew in my heart he wouldn’t make it, but I so wanted him to. The roads were closed. But, of course, they’ve reopened now.” She sighed in exasperation. “All those weeks away from each other, and it doesn’t seem right that we have to wait even longer. Why couldn’t the snow cooperate?”

“There’s always today,” I said.

Vicki smiled and gestured toward the open sign. “Yes, and I’ll pull that plug the minute he shows up. Are you ready for your big night?”

I told her about the invitation snafu. When I finished, she said, “Henrietta McCloud is usually more organized than that. But I hear that her health isn’t good at the moment, so she could have slipped up. It doesn’t matter, does it?”

“I’d like to look into it.”

“Why on earth would you bother? Go to the tasting and enjoy yourself.”

I shook my head, remembering the feeling of distress I’d experienced on awakening. “Something about it doesn’t feel right.”

“That police business you’re involved in has you imagining dark secrets in every corner.”

There might be some truth to that. Still . . . “I think I should call and speak with Henrietta McCloud. If there’s a chance the invitation was extended in error, Leith and I shouldn’t show up at all. I have absolutely no connection with the distillery or the family who owns it, so why on earth would I receive an invitation?”

“But you do have a connection,” Vicki said. “Leith.”

“Do you have a private phone number for Henrietta McCloud?” I insisted. “Or one for Bridie Dougal?”

Vicki didn’t press it further, knowing by now that when I set my mind to something, I follow through. She replaced the reading glasses and shuffled through a phone directory she’d pulled from a drawer. “Henrietta McCloud is a member of my skein-of-the-month club, so I should have her contact information someplace. Yes, here it is.” Then she couldn’t resist and added, “But I still don’t see why you’re making such a big deal of a little misunderstanding.”

Actually, at this point, I wasn’t sure myself.

But true to form, I made the call.

A woman answered. I asked to speak with Henrietta McCloud and was put on hold. After a rather lengthy wait, the same woman’s voice came on and said, “This be Henrietta. But herself wishes to speak with ye instead.”

Herself? I attempted to explain myself. “I’m afraid there’s been a mistake, which I hope to rectify. I was calling to speak with you about tonight’s whisky tasting and the invitation I received. It seems that . . .”

She cut me off. “I’m aware o’ the reason fer yer call, and as I stated, Bridie wishes tae speak with ye.”

“That’s fine. I’ll need her telephone number unless you can connect me.”

“In person, herself says.”

“The roads will be slippery. Does she have a driver?”

There was a pause, then Henrietta said, “There’s no fireplace like herself’s fireplace.”

Huh? Oh. I was being summoned. “An hour, then.”

“Ye know the way tae the distillery, ye do?”

“Yes.”

“Drive around the eastern end, and ye’ll see the house. She’ll be expecting ye.”

I hung up. Things were getting stranger and stranger.

“I’ve been asked to meet with Bridie Dougal,” I told Vicki, who had been immersed in sorting through a new shipment of woolen wear. At my announcement, she glanced up sharply and said, “Now what could you have done to catch the attention of the chieftain of the entire Dougal clan for a private audience?”

“Chieftain? A woman is head of a clan?”

“And why is that such a big surprise?”

I stammered around a bit, at a loss for words, embarrassed by the realization that I might actually have prejudices I didn’t know about and they were raising their ugly little heads.

Why not? Why couldn’t a woman be a chieftain? The idea appealed to my senses. This day was getting more interesting by the minute.

Vicki went on, “Not that the Scots care much about clans and lineage in this day and age. It’s a much bigger deal in the States. But Bridie will enjoy being treated like royalty, if you decide to bow to her.” Vicki giggled.

“Should I really bow?” I didn’t know the proper protocol, having never met the head of a clan before. I imagined a Highlander wielding a broadsword, adorned in tartan, kilt, and sporran, living among misty Scottish hills. A reclusive woman residing in a distillery just didn’t do justice to that romantic image.

Vicki was laughing now. “I should encourage you to bow for the fun of it. But really, in this more modern world, chiefs can be gardeners or hill farmers or pub owners. Clans were needed long ago—for basic protection and sustenance. Solidarity was necessary to defend territories. As to proper etiquette in this century, treat her with the same politeness and respect as you would any other elderly woman with massive wealth, privilege, and title.”

“Oh, great, thanks. I feel so much more confident now.”

Vicki was having great fun. “Call her Bridie. Everybody does. And she isn’t the chief of the clan. She’s a chieftain, which means she’s the head of one branch of the Dougal clan.”

I hadn’t realized there was a distinction between chief and chieftain. Okay, that didn’t seem quite so formidable. Which was what I told myself as I trudged to the barn where we kept our cars during the winter months. Predictably and thankfully, John had cleared away the snow that had drifted against the barn doors. Vicki’s brother-in-law might be a burly Welshman of few words, but he knew how to keep the farm running on schedule.

Jasper, our resident barn cat, had developed his winter coat and appeared to be twice as large as he really was. When the days and nights grew colder, I’d made a fuss about leaving him outside in the elements and even tried to bring him into the cottage. But he wanted nothing to do with what he apparently considered nothing short of incarceration and was very vocal with his opinion on the matter. He also expressed himself physically by shredding my kitchen curtains in protest. After that, I was forced to accept his decision, but I still didn’t agree with it.

I spent a few minutes cuddling with him now that we were on speaking terms again, enjoying his purring machine. Then I eased the old Peugeot out through the large barn door. I was an old hand at working the clutch and maneuvering through the gears that were housed on the left side of the driver’s seat instead of the right. When I drove again in the States, I’d have to relearn what had come naturally to me in the past.

I focused on sustaining my continuing good health after sliding out onto the main road from the lane, quickly realizing that the roads might be clear, but the surface was still snow covered and treacherous.

After white-knuckling the steering wheel for what seemed like forever, I turned off the main road onto the one leading to the distillery, which was located just above Glenkillen, directly before the descent to the harbor and the village. The distillery appeared and I followed Henrietta McCloud’s directions, heading for the east end of the distillery, driving along the expanse of its nondescript brown stonework. A few moments later, what I first thought must be a royal castle appeared before me.

The stonework structure didn’t have a moat, drawbridge, or battlements. And I would bet there wasn’t a dungeon below a circular staircase. But the granite building was stately with Gothic gables and soaring turrets. Altogether fitting for what I imagined was the residence of the chieftain of Clan Dougal.

I drove the car into a circular driveway, got out, gazed around me at the carpet of snow, and then rang the bell, hearing it resounding within.

And resisted the urge to hum “Hail to the Chief.”