Chapter Nineteen

By lunchtime the fog and rain were lifting, so Erin put up the CLOSED sign and packed a water bottle, a thermos of tea, an energy bar, and a tin of biscuits into her backpack. She stuffed a waterproof rain poncho in the outer pocket just in case—online radar showed a line of showers still hovering over the area. Pulling on her hiking boots over a pair of heavy socks, she climbed into the car and slogged down the muddy driveway.

She needed to clear her thoughts, and a long ramble across the moors was the best medicine. But first she had a stop to make. Turning left out of the drive, she headed toward Owen Hardacker’s house.

She found Owen mending the stone wall lining his property, bareheaded, his thinning gray hair standing up in wisps in the brisk wind rolling across the fields. A flock of grazing sheep paused briefly to look up at Erin. As she pulled up alongside him, he turned, squinting, and shielded his eyes against the light. The fog had given way to the kind of backlit glare that was more blinding than bright sunlight. She stepped out of the car, holding out his hat.

“Wondered where it got to,” he said, taking it. He turned it over in his hands, as if studying it. “Where’d ye find it?”

She told him, and he nodded, frowning.

“Any idea how it got there?” she asked.

“Aye. Carolyn threw it out t’car.”

“Why would she do that?”

“Because she were angry at me,” he said, picking up a large stone and laying it on top of the wall. “We’d been fightin’.”

“Really?” said Erin. “It’s none of my business, obviously, but—”

“It were about her … problem.”

“You mean her addiction?”

He stared at her. “That obvious, is it?”

“Not to everyone, I think.”

“She don’ like it when I bring it up, but I can’t stand seein’ her destroying herself.”

“How long has it been going on?”

“She lost her job ’bout six months ago, so at least that long.”

“Was that the reason she was fired?”

“I dunno, lass.” He sighed deeply. “She won’ talk to me ’bout it.”

“You think she might talk to someone else?”

“You, y’mean?”

“Possibly.”

“She likes you. Just don’ mention it t’anyone, all right?”

“I won’t—I promise.”

“Cheers—and thanks fer th’ hat.”

“Take care,” Erin said, and started back to her car, but then turned around. “Look, don’t take this the wrong way, but you didn’t—”

“Kill Sylvia? Good lord, woman, I didn’ hate her that much.”

His voice was sincere, but the glare was in Erin’s eyes, and she couldn’t see his face. “Sorry,” she said. “I had to ask.”

As she drove the little car down the winding roads leading to the moors, she couldn’t escape the feeling that Owen Hardacker was hiding something. For all his gruff North Country ways, there was something evasive about him. But who was he protecting—himself or Carolyn? She wondered what Elizabeth Bennet would do. Get to the bottom of things, she supposed, which is exactly what Erin intended to do. But even Elizabeth Bennet was capable of misjudging people, an error Erin hoped to avoid. Owen seemed to be exactly what he presented himself as—a hardworking, gruff, honest Yorkshireman. But was he?

She headed north, toward the North York Moors National Park. Clouds gathered over darkening hills, chased by the wind as it rolled over the fields. After pulling up at one of the trailhead car parks, Erin struck out over the moors. She wasn’t going to let the weather spoil her walk—if you did that in Yorkshire, you’d never go out.

She had walked less than two miles when the sky began to spit a fine mist of rain. Increasing her pace, she spied a figure coming toward her across the moors. Though a quarter of a mile separated them, she recognized his gait. Hands in his pockets, his wind-blown, wheat-blond hair forming a halo around his head, DI Hemming strode rapidly toward her, covering the distance between them so quickly she didn’t have time to compose her thoughts.

“Fancy meeting you here,” he said, only slightly out of breath, though the hills were rugged and steep. Instead of his usual jacket and tie, he wore a brown cardigan over a black turtleneck, and woolen knee breeches tucked into green Wellies. The way the black sweater set off his yellow hair made her catch her breath a little.

“Who’s the stalker now?” she said.

He gave a wry smile. “What do you say we call it a draw?”

“Are you playing hooky today?”

“I get some of my best ideas roaming the countryside,” he said, flashing a smile as the sun made a last-ditch attempt to poke through the rain clouds, glinting off the gold in his hair. Out here, he seemed more relaxed and open, even younger than the stern-faced detective he had appeared to be while on the job.

“Not the best day for it, perhaps,” she said, drawing her jacket closer as a gust of wind hit them.

“I prefer cloudy days.”

Me too—oh, me too, she thought.

“What brings you out to roam the moors?”

“I get my best ideas mucking about out here as well.”

“What sort of ideas?”

“For my poetry,” she said, before she could stop herself. She barely knew him—why was she telling him things she kept from her closest friends?

“You take after your august ancestor, then.”

“Hardly. I lack his talent.”

“False modesty?” he said, cocking his head to one side. She couldn’t help notice how well shaped it was, with a high, noble forehead and prominent cheekbones.

“‘Nothing is more deceitful than the appearance of humility. It is often only carelessness of opinion, and sometimes an indirect boast.’”

“Was Jane Austen talking about you when she said that?”

“What I lack in talent I try to make up for in fervor.”

“As for me,” he said, “what is it Darcy says? ‘I lack the talent of conversing easily with …’ How does it go?”

“‘With those I have never seen before,’” she finished for him. “So you have added Jane Austen to your reading list?”

“Since being on this case, yes.”

“And what have you learned?”

“That ‘we do not suffer by accident,’” he said as a distant rumble of thunder shook the air. “We’re in for it now,” he added as they watched a jagged bolt of lightning jut across the northern sky. “We’re miles from shelter.”

“There’s a stone hut about half a mile that way,” she said, pointing to the direction she had just come from.

“‘Lead on, Spirit.’”

“I’m sorry, you’re only allowed to quote Austen,” she said, as her toe caught a protruding root and she fell forward. Before she knew what was happening, his arms were around her, cushioning her fall. She felt his hands grip her shoulders, the firm fingers long and strong, as she inhaled the smell of him, a piny, woodsy aroma, like smoldering fireplace logs. Feeling the blood drain from her head, she dared not look at him. “Thank you,” she said. Extricating herself from his grasp, she drew into herself like a cat.

“The ground here can be treacherous,” he said as thunder sounded, closer this time, followed by another streak of lightning. Wind whipped across the bare ground, slashing at their faces, nipping their ankles like an angry dog.

“There it is,” she said, pointing to a distant stone structure as fat raindrops toppled from the sky. “I’ll race you!”

“Do you think that’s a good idea?” he called after her as she dashed off across the moors. “You might fall again!”

But with the wind whistling hard and high in her ears, she could not hear him.