Midway through the day, Motts heard her phone beeping. She scrambled out of the spare room, trying to find her mobile. It wasn’t in her pockets or in the pockets of any of her hoodies and coats, and eventually she found it stuffed between the cushions of her sofa.
Who is texting me?
She didn’t immediately recognise the number. It didn’t belong to any of her friends or family. She sent a message back asking the person to identify themselves.
Why is Danny Orchard texting me?
In his message, Danny claimed to want to meet up with her. She wondered if his granddad’s arrest had given him the courage to speak. He wanted to meet in private to avoid anyone in the village knowing.
Hughie had asked her to stay in the cottage. The coastal path was technically behind her cottage. And it definitely offered more privacy than arguing on the street outside the Orchard nursery.
There was a long pause between her message and a reply. Danny agreed to meet up with her in an hour down the path. There was a small trail off The Warren leading down to the cliff and a Spy House lighthouse that tourists loved to photograph; Motts had walked it a few times herself.
“Is this a bad idea?” Motts glanced up at Cactus, who sat on the back of the sofa, watching her pulling on her walking boots. “Hughie did say to stay home. But what if Danny wants to confess that his granddad murdered Rhona? I could solve the case.”
Meow.
“Alright, fine. I’ll send Teo a text.” Motts could’ve called him or Hughie, but the idea of talking on the phone only added more stress to the situation. “He might have some advice for what to ask Danny.”
With her text sent, Motts decided to get a head start down the path. She enjoyed walking. The fresh air off the sea might help clear her mind.
It didn’t.
Her anxiety levels continued to rise. Maybe I should’ve waited to hear from Teo? She’d checked her phone every few seconds, but nothing. If he were interrogating Mr Orchard, perhaps he’d left his phone in the office.
Any knowledge Motts had of police procedure came from podcasts and YouTube videos on true crime. She didn’t think they always got things right. Would Teo keep his phone on him while questioning someone?
Checking her phone for the tenth time, Motts found a text from Danny saying he’d be a little late. Brilliant, more time to stress. She finally reached the lighthouse. The day had turned grey and blustery, so she had the viewing spot all to herself.
She sat on one of the steps leading down beyond the lighthouse and tucked her hands into her pockets. Her fingers gripped the phone in her pocket. Heading home began to sound like an incredibly brilliant idea.
Why did I agree to this?
And why didn’t I put on my coat or a thick jumper instead of this hoodie?
Motts pulled her mobile out of her pocket when it rang. She answered on the fourth ring. “Teo?”
“What are you doing?” He sounded angry, but his voice kept cutting out.
Motts walked up the steps a little way. “I can’t hear you. It’s really windy. What’s happened?”
“Go… Orchard… almost there… hello?”
Motts pulled her phone away from her ear when they were disconnected. She tried to call him back, but the signal wouldn’t go through. “Bugger.”
Pacing back and forth for several minutes, Motts decided she’d made a massive mistake. Danny could come by her cottage if he wanted a chat. She shoved her phone into her pocket and turned to head home.
“Noel.” She found herself not completely surprised to see him.
“Hello.” Noel Watson stood on the steps above her. She hadn’t heard him approach with the wind coming off the sea. “Danny couldn’t make it. He lent me his phone.”
“Oh?” Motts didn’t quite believe him and wondered if Danny had been hurt. She stumbled back down the steps until she was leaning against the lighthouse. “Why would he lend you his mobile? I don’t even like people touching mine.”
Okay, that’s not the point to be worried about.
Why is he looming over me?
Why did I agree to meet Danny?
Noel held the phone out, pointing it at Motts like a weapon. “Danny told me all about your questions. He demanded to know if I’d hurt Rhona. If I’d been jealous. Jealous. What a load of absolute rubbish. Me? Jealous of him. He’s done nothing with his life but work for his family.”
“You run your family’s charity shop.”
“Shut the bloody hell up.” Noel jabbed the phone into her shoulder. “He didn’t deserve her.”
Motts shifted further to the side, trying to keep her footing on the slick steps. It had started to drizzle, which did nothing to stop her shivering from cold and fear. “And you deserved Rhona?”
“I had plans and dreams. Danny only wanted to dig around in the dirt with plants.” Noel sneered. He still held the phone tightly, waving it around while he shouted. “She could’ve had me.”
“Could she?” Motts didn’t know what the right way was to calm the situation. Noel had definitely gone beyond the point of being reasoned with. He seemed content to throw a temper tantrum. “Rhona loved Danny.”
“He didn’t deserve her,” Noel reiterated. He slammed Danny’s phone against the ground. It bounced down the steps, past the railing and down toward the sea. She definitely had no intentions of following its path. “I told her I loved her.”
“And how did Rhona feel about you?” She wanted to draw out the conversation. One, because she wanted answers, but also in the hopes someone would come along and notice them. “Was she in love with you?”
Her questions sent Noel off on another tangent. He ranted about Rhona turning him down. Motts tried to edge away from him, out of reach, while he called the woman he claimed to love vile names.
Cursing her curiosity, Motts watched Noel warily. He hadn’t worn himself out yet. She wondered how everyone had missed his obvious stalker tendencies towards Rhona.
He went on and on about how he’d followed Rhona and Danny on their dates. He even tried to warn Innis and Rose. Motts wondered if the young woman had had any inclination she was being tracked around the small village so closely.
“She wouldn’t listen.” Noel stepped closer to her. “I warned her. I told her Danny would only drag her down.”
Motts cringed away from him. His breath washed across her, and he’d definitely had a few pints before tricking her into meeting. “What happened to Rhona?”
“She loved chocolates.”
Motts tilted her head in confusion. Chocolates? What? “Did she?”
“She did.” Noel’s smile wasn’t anywhere near as friendly as Hughie’s or as unique as Teo’s. His felt menacing and terrifying. “My mum makes chocolate truffles. I added a special ingredient. Crushed up the seeds myself. Saved the petals, had to put them in my little memory box as a memento of our special time together.”
Their special time together.
“Foxglove.” She knew the flowers in the tin had been connected to Rhona’s death. “The dried petals.”
“Picked them straight from the Orchards’s garden.” Noel seemed pleased with his cleverness. “She chose him. Him. Over me. She never appreciated my worth. My intelligence.”
Jealousy did strange things to people. Motts remembered her dad once talking about how envy and possessiveness could poison any relationship. She’d never seen it manifested so violently in person.
Then again, how many true crime podcasts had she listened to where the killer in a case had been driven by jealousy?
“I wanted the cottage to be mine.”
Motts's head snapped around toward Noel in surprise. “What?”
“I could’ve bought the cottage if you hadn’t decided to move in.” Noel clearly didn’t know her family well; River would’ve taken the home if Motts hadn’t. “She wouldn’t be able to tell me to go away then.”
Right.
His angry confession made her wonder, though. Had Noel been the one to try to run her over? Maybe it hadn’t been a warning but an attempt on her life.
“You drove into me,” she accused.
Noel sneered at her. “I missed.”
“Not from my perspective.” Motts mentally berated herself. She didn’t need to antagonise him. It wouldn’t keep her alive. “Was the bracelet yours? Why bury the tin in the garden? Why not keep it with you?”
While Noel proceeded to brag about his own brilliance, Motts glanced around, trying to figure out how to get away from him. She had no intentions of letting him attack, if that was the plan. He stalked back and forth on the step in front of her, creating a physical block in the path.
I will get out of this.
Someone has to take care of Cactus and Moss.
“You’re not listening,” Noel complained. He stomped his foot like a toddler having a temper tantrum over a broken toy. “You’re just like her.”
“Not really.” Motts dodged out of the way when he lunged for her. They slipped on the rain-slicked steps. Her head smacked against the side of the lighthouse, and her vision blurred slightly. “Bugger.”
“Why couldn’t you mind your own business? You had to dig around in the garden.” Noel struggled to get to his feet. He kicked out at her, and Motts rolled out of the way of his foot. “You nosy cow.”
“You left a body in my garden. And I refuse to have another unsolved mystery on my conscience.” Motts scrambled for purchase on the steps. She kept slipping closer to the railing and the edge of the cliff beyond. She caught her foot on a pole and saved herself from going further down. “It didn’t take a genius to figure out who did it.”
Technically, I didn’t figure it out.
He doesn’t need to know.
“I won’t leave a body this time.” Noel managed to get to his feet and started towards her. “You’ll be another tragic case of a tourist getting too close to the edge of a cliff. Happens all the time.”
I am not going over the edge of a cliff.
I’m not.
There was no purchase for her hands in the ground around the lighthouse. Noel loomed over her, trying to shove her with his foot. He bent to push with his hands when that failed.
Motts slipped closer to the edge, her feet dangling off it. She gripped tightly to the safety railing. “Listen, you absolute berk. I am not going off this cliff. It’s not happening.”
Noel kept trying to peel her fingers away from the pole. “Let go.”
“No.” Motts wanted to laugh at the absurdity of the surreal aspect of the moment. Did he genuinely believe she’d just voluntarily slide over the edge? She wanted to scream for help, but who’d hear her? “Will you stop it?”
Noel ignored her. He managed to remove one of her hands from the pole. She slipped further down. “Rhona died so much easier. Why won’t you cooperate?”
“Berk.” She didn’t get a chance to say anything else. Noel suddenly disappeared from her view. “I should’ve stayed in bed.”
Terrifying moments in life, Motts decided, happened both insanely fast and in slow motion. She’d been dangling halfway down an incline toward the edge of a cliff one second, then was yanked up to safety in the next instant. Teo crushed her in his arms, twisting her away from the view of Constable Stone and Inspector Ash, who’d wrestled Noel to the ground.
“You didn’t say freeze. Police always say freeze.” Motts trembled in his arms. She was drenched to the bone, but her shivering had nothing to do with the chill and damp from the rain. “Freezing felons fancy frolicking.”
“We’re not on some show on the telly.” Teo laughed, though it sounded a little strained. “Let’s get you to the hospital.”
“I’m fine.”
“Your head is bleeding.” He carried her quickly up the stairs, around Noel and the police pinning him to the ground. “Let’s get you out of here.”