She remembered now that Carr had said he’d be away today, down in Edinburgh on business. She’d arranged to meet Billy at two for the tour of the estate, but that left what remained of the morning clear.
She found her way through to the estate office at the rear of the castle where she spotted Aileen immediately, sitting at her desk by the big picture windows. The woman’s role was an odd one: Carr had described her position as part of the team looking after the house. She seemed to be responsible for the living accommodation, she’d served dinner the night before, and she clearly worked here in the estate office. Jenny guessed “head housekeeper” probably best summed up her role, but in her head the woman was, simply, house mom.
“Hey there,” said Jenny.
The older woman looked up, peered at Jenny as if trying to place her, then nodded and said, “Good morning. Did the breakfast suit you?”
Jenny nodded. “It was good, thanks.” She almost asked for coffee instead of tea next time, but checked herself. She was a guest here, and she knew she had been granted privileged access – no need to push things. “I’m seeing Mr Stewart later,” she said. That starchy formality thing was clearly catching. “I was just wondering if Ms Lee was around? I mean Dr Lee.”
“Aye,” said Aileen. “She’ll be up at the Lodge. Shall I call ahead to let her know you’re on your way?”
The Lodge – Lilian’s laboratory complex was in the building up the hill she’d described as an old hunting lodge. “No, thank you, but that’s fine. I know my way. It’s another fine day, so I’ll just walk up there and see what I find.”
And it was, indeed, another lovely day. All she’d been led to believe in advance was that the weather in this part of the world was, at best, variable. All four seasons in a day was how Carr had described it. But now, as she stepped out through a narrow door that led onto a small courtyard garden at the side of Craigellen Castle, Jenny paused to breathe deep. There was a genuine heat in that sun, and the colors all about were vibrant: the greens of vegetation, the vivid blue of the sky, the pinks and blues and purples of the flowerbeds.
She heard a mewing cry from high up in the azure sky and remembered Lilian telling her that was the call of a buzzard when she’d heard it the day before.
She headed for the trail that led through the forest to the labs.
She could get used to this.
§
There was a keypad on the outer door of the laboratory building, so Jenny pressed the Call button and spoke into the panel when it buzzed back.
“Hey there. I was looking for Lilian Lee. It’s Jenny Layne. I was here yesterday.”
The door buzzed and clicked and this time when she pushed it yielded.
Immediately inside she was met by a tall, white-coated Chinese guy with a wispy mustache. He looked about fourteen. He’d been one of the lab guys working in the area Jenny had seen through a glass viewing screen on her visit the day before.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “Dr Lee isn’t here right now.” His accent was a sing-song blend of Chinese and Scottish and something else she couldn’t quite place.
It seemed that no-one was around at Craigellen this morning. “No worries,” said Jenny. “I just called on the off-chance. Do you know when she’ll be back? Could I leave a message?”
“Sure. I’ll pass on a message. I’m afraid I don’t know when she’ll be back. She’s... well, a bit erratic, you know?”
Jenny remembered Carr’s description of Lilian: eccentric, but you’ll like her. “So I’ve heard,” she said. She couldn’t help but wonder at how willing the guy was to say something like that about the head of his lab. Was there some kind of discontent here? Jenny gave her best winning smile and said, “Lilian was telling me about the work you guys are doing here. It all sounded... well, a bit fringe, you know? You think she’s onto something?”
She studied him closely. She’d deliberately left her probing vague: let him decide what she was talking about.
Now, he studied her, as if trying to work out how much to say. Finally, he said, “Dr Lee is a genius. Some scientists are methodical and precise; others have heads crammed full of so many ideas the rest of us can barely keep up with a fraction of it. That is what I mean when I say Dr Lee is ‘erratic’.”
She felt as if she’d been slapped. She’d misread him completely, taking his comment as criticism when it was anything but. “I... well, sure. I mean, I just wondered how the work was going?”
He said nothing, just glowered at her.
Jenny stepped back, into the sunlight. She squinted at the lab guy, puzzled by his manner. At first he’d seemed almost confiding, and then snappy, quite violently so. It seemed Lilian wasn’t the only erratic one around here.
“Well, if you could just let her know I called by.”
She backed away again, feeling stupid for not wanting to turn her back on him. But still... she’d had enough direct experience of guys on the edge, and she’d followed enough cases where victims hadn’t spotted the warning signs. On the whole, she’d rather be safe.
Now, the man nodded, let go of the door and let it thud shut.
Jenny took a deep breath. So what in Hell was all that about?
She turned, and followed the trail back along the face of the hill.
In the shade of the trees, she started to breathe normally. Had that been as strange as it seemed, or was she just highly strung this morning for some reason?
Heading down towards the castle, she peered all around, remembering what Carr and Billy had said about their shared youth, learning the lie of the land, reading the signs of nature. If you understood your environment you could read it like a book. Those scuffs on the trees: were they the signs of deer trying to eat the bark, or SUVs getting too close? Were those bird cries alarm calls or contact notes, or mating songs? Walking back, she realized just how little she knew even about the landscape she’d grown up in back home, let alone this foreign setting.
Down at the castle, she considered going back to her room, but instead climbed into her little Toyota. Time to start asking around a little more widely.
§
The village wasn’t much more than a handful of buildings clustered around an intersection: houses, the pub, a small shop and the church. The buildings were all constructed from those unevenly shaped and sized stones, jigsaw-like mosaics of browns and grays, with bright splashes of yellow and silver lichen.
Jenny parked at the side of the Calder Arms again. It looked like the place was open and she wondered if Mr McQueen would be in there already.
She walked on down the hill to where a rocky stream cut through the village and paused on the little humpbacked bridge, leaning against its chunky stone wall to look around. Maybe twenty houses huddled together here, nestled into a cleft in the land surrounded by hills and forest. Probably the same number again of larger places were set back from the roads that cut through the village.
She wondered which of these houses was the one where Billy lived. Had her hunch been right that he had a room with the McQueens? Probably not. Billy struck her as a much more independent spirit. He needed his own space, would have to do things his way, not fit in with others.
She tried to get her bearings and remember how this place had looked on the map. That mountain rising up beyond the hills to the left must be Beinn Madadh, so Craigellen Castle would be just beyond that run of hills. The estate came right up to the village here on the west side, and extended north to the river. In fact, if she remembered correctly, this stream marked the boundary here, so that line of cottages would be estate properties. She imagined that at one time the entire village had existed purely to serve the estate.
Seeing it laid out like this, any conflict between the interests of the estate and locals made more sense: if you lived here the estate really was up close and in your face. Carr’s proposals would put wolves on the doorsteps of these folk. Little wonder they weren’t so happy.
The village shop occupied one corner of th
e intersection at the heart of the village. Big picture windows on two sides displayed tinned goods, bottles and jars, a tiny deli counter. A board on the wall held cards and laminated flyers for events long past, thumb-tacked one on top of the other. The woodwork around the door and the board above the windows were all painted a uniform naval gray.
When Jenny pushed at the door, a bell jangled and almost immediately a small woman, her hair the same naval gray as the woodwork, emerged from somewhere out back. “Hi,” Jenny said.
“Good morning,” the woman said. “You’ll be yon American come tae ask questions aboot the folk at Craigellen?”
Jenny stared at her, jaw sagging. Then she laughed. A simple “Hi” had been enough for the woman to identify her as the nosy American. “I am,” she said, finally. The shop was small and crammed with goods, packed shelves right up to the high ceiling.
“Aye, aye,” said the woman, a twinkle in her eye. “Word travels fast. Jim McQueen tells me you’re writing something aboot the place?”
“I am,” said Jenny. “About the work they’re doing there. Do you know much about that?”
“We can hear the wolves,” said the woman. “Howling away at night. It’s no’ a sound anyone in their right mind wants to be hearing.”
“The estate’s land comes right up to the stream, doesn’t it?”
“Aye, right to the burn. But wolves don’t care about boundaries. The wolves go wherever they want.”
“You say that as if they’ve already been released,” said Jenny. “But Mr Carr doesn’t have a license yet. I’ve seen the wolves: they’re kept in an enclosure up by the old hunting lodge, across the valley from Beinn Madadh.”
“Is that so?”
An idea occurred to Jenny, then: “Perhaps Mr Carr should have some kind of open day – get the locals up to see what he’s working on? Do you think people would be up for that? Get local kids up to see the squirrels and feed the deer. That kind of thing.”
The shopkeeper was smiling. “Jim said you were a keen one,” she said.
That pulled Jenny up. What story was she writing here? Was she digging beneath the surface to see what an eccentric millionaire was up to? Or had she already become his PR person?
“Aye, maybe,” the woman went on. “But showin’ us wolves in a wee cage doesn’t exactly prove there aren’t others roaming free, now, does it?”
“What do you mean?”
“People here know this land. Take my lad, Iain, for example. He grew up here, he lives and breathes this place. He can tell where’s best to catch the salmon just by looking at the surface of the water. He can tell by the tracks in the mud how heavy a stag is and when he passed. And he can tell when a big predator has been roaming free, so I tell you.”
“He’s seen tracks?”
The shopkeeper shook her head. “No, no tracks. But ye can tell. The whole atmosphere of a landscape changes when a big beast’s aboot.”
17
Billy was waiting for Jenny outside the castle. She’d had time to freshen up after returning from the village, then rush back down and there he was, leaning back against a mud-spattered Land Rover, arms folded, that wry, almost arrogant, smile on his face.
“You’re late,” he said.
“You’re early.” Had she really come close to kissing him last night? It must have been the alcohol.
That deep blue sky had been a thing of the morning. Now, an even grayness had spread, dark enough that she thought rain must be imminent. The air carried a chill dampness, too. This was far more what she’d been expecting of the Highland weather.
“So,” she said, “the grand tour. What are you going to show me?”
“Hop in,” he said. “And hang on. The road’s a wee bit bumpy.”
His dark eyes followed her as she walked around the Land Rover. Then she faltered and stopped, realizing she’d been heading for the passenger seat but it was on the wrong side.
The interior of the Land Rover was almost as muddy as it was on the outside. This was clearly a working vehicle. “I’m glad I hung onto the boots,” said Jenny, indicating the riding boots Lilian had given her.
“You don’t have mud in Brooklyn?”
“This isn’t just mud,” said Jenny, looking around the car’s interior. “It’s an entire landscape.”
They set off on the trail up to the labs.
“I was down in the village this morning,” said Jenny. “Talking to the lady who runs the shop. Has your friend Carr been entirely straight with me, Billy? Have you been?”
He cocked his head to the side, looked across at her, then back at the track. “What do you mean?”
“The wolves. She says the locals – her son, Iain, was one she mentioned – believe you guys have already released wolves into the estate’s grounds. They think the pack up here at the Lodge is just for show. Mr McQueen said the same thing yesterday.”
Billy had started to shake his head as soon as it became clear where she was going. “No,” he said now. “No, that’s not true. You have my word on that, and I would know. Mr Carr is very strict about following our legal responsibilities to the letter. Her Iain’s a canny lad, but he’s a bit of a prima donna. The lad likes to spin a tale if it makes him the center of attention, you know? I wouldnae put much store by what he’s been saying.”
They came to a halt before the lab building. “And talking of wolves,” said Billy, “I just want to check on the pack before we head up to Loch Ellen. Winston Tsang called this morning to tell me they were a wee bit unsettled.”
“Tsang? The lab guy, right? I was up here this morning. If anything, he’s the unsettled one.”
Billy laughed. “Winston is okay, just disnae know how to talk to a woman. I bet he was staring at his shoes the whole time you were there.”
She followed him through the lab building, thankful that there was no sign of Tsang. She didn’t care if he was painfully shy or not: she’d seen enough of him to know she didn’t want to spend any more time in his company than absolutely necessary.
“What if the rumors are nothing to do with the release program?” said Jenny, as they came to the door out back to where the wolves had their enclosure. “What if it goes back further than that? Could there be wild wolves already here? Some kind of remnant population that’s survived from when there were more wild wolves? Maybe they’ve been drawn here because of Mr Carr’s pack.”
Billy was shaking his head again. “No, really: we’d know. The Highlands may seem like a big wild landscape, but it’s not. There are towns and villages and farms in even the most remote parts. The landscape and wildlife have been studied extensively. The land has been managed for shooting and fishing for generations. A viable population of wild wolves would not have gone unnoticed for nearly three hundred years.”
They came to the enclosure, and for a few seconds Jenny thought it was empty. Then she spotted movement, over on the far side. Two wolves lay full stretch under a craggy outcrop. Slender beasts, either females or juveniles – Jenny couldn’t tell at this distance. “They don’t seem too unsettled to me,” she said, nodding her head in the direction of the two wolves.
But Billy wasn’t looking. His eyes were fixed on a pattern in the shadows. At first Jenny didn’t see anything, then there was another movement and the shadow started to change, resolving itself into the big alpha male as it came out into the open, approaching the two humans cautiously. The big beast held itself low to the ground as it moved, its fur smoothed back, ears tucked in, tail low. Its lips were drawn back into an expression that looked somewhere between a grimace and a cartoon grin.
Billy made a clicking noise with his tongue and the wolf stopped, dropping so low it was almost lying.
“He’s nervous,” he said, his tone musing, as if he was thinking aloud. “Scared, even. I’ve not seen him like this before.”
“What’s up?”
Billy shook his head. “I don’t know. Probably nothing. I’ll ask Winston to get the vet in, just to check him ov
er. You need to be so careful with these beasts.”
Jenny looked at him. His words were so true. She just hoped Carr and his team were being careful enough.
§
She hadn’t even noticed the trail that forked off the main roadway, close to where the ATVs had been parked the day before. Here, a faint track – little more than a pair of parallel indentations in the heather – climbed the hill at a most improbable angle.
Billy took a sharp left off the main track and attacked the slope, the Land Rover’s gears groaning in protest.
Jenny clung on tight, one hand on the side of her seat, the other gripping a handhold above the door, her knuckles white. “If you’re trying to scare me you’re doing a pretty good job,” she said.
“Just a wee bit of off-road,” said Billy. He was clearly enjoying himself.
A short time later, the slope leveled and Jenny peered around. They were out on the open moor now, the heather fuzzed over with a sheen of purple. A heavy brown bird with a long, down-curved bill flew up ahead of them, giving a loud, wailing call. She’d seen a stuffed one of those in a glass cabinet at the castle.
“Isn’t this place beautiful?” said Billy.
There was a sigh to his voice, and Jenny understood why. This landscape really was spectacularly picturesque.
She looked across at Billy. He was so different here. This was his place.
“You should do this for the locals,” she said, remembering her moment of inspiration from this morning. “Let them see what’s being done here. Let them know the estate is in the hands of people who love this place. Invite them in so that any opinions they have are based on knowledge, not misinformation. It’s the lack of information that stirs up the gossip and mistrust. You love this place, I can tell. Let them see that, too.”
“They know I love the place,” Billy said, a defensive tone to his voice. “I grew up here.”
“Then let them see what you’re doing here.”
“Maybe.” Then: “You sound like you’ve taken Mr Carr’s job offer. Are you staying?”
Last Alpha: A Highland shifter romance Page 8
