Here With Me (Adair Family 1)

I smiled at the thought, thinking how different it was living in a village compared to Boston. Growing up, Mom complained all the time how much things had changed since she was a kid.

“This used to be a community,” she’d gripe. “Now my neighbors can barely look me in the eye long enough to say a goddamn good-morning.”

But here, in Ardnoch, people cared enough to send a card to someone who’d only lived among them for a few months. Deciding to open the cards first, I brought the pile into the kitchen, made coffee, and sat at the table. There was one from Gordon and his wife. One from Morag and her husband. Chen and her husband Wang Lei, Janet from the tourist shop, Suveer and Moira from the chocolate shop, and even a bunch from villagers I didn’t know well or hadn’t even met. A card from Arrochar, and one from Thane and the kids. There was even one from Jock and his family.

I was just reading a cute little card from Fergus when something prodded the back of my mind.

To Robyn,

Hope you feel better soon.

Fergus

I squinted at the handwritten card with its succinct, straight-to-the-point message. What was so familiar about it? Irritated, I took another sip of coffee, but I couldn’t tear my eyes off the words.

What was—

I tensed with dawning. “No way.”

It wasn’t the words that were familiar—it was the handwriting.

Suddenly, I was running through the cottage and only the tender scream of my ribs slowed me as I attempted to hoof it upstairs. Damn it, I huffed, irritated at my body. I still hurt from the crash.

Grabbing my laptop, I hurried downstairs and ignored the jarring pain of it against my bruised ribs. I was too excited to slow down.

Back in the kitchen, I reopened the card after opening Lachlan’s case file. I’d transferred it from Mac’s laptop to mine weeks ago.

Zooming in on the photo of the Post-it Notes Mac was obliged to hand over to the police, a chill brushed down my back.

We missed it. We should have ordered all of Ardnoch’s staff members to write something down for handwriting forensics to analyze.

I placed the get-well card up against the screen, my eyes bouncing from it to the Post-its bearing the message “Why don’t you see me?” Those were the ones that had been placed all over Lachlan’s stage office at the castle.

There was no mistaking it.

It was the exact handwriting.

Fuck!

I’d suspected the little shit weeks ago when Mac was first attacked, but I’d let his good-boy attitude and the Adairs’ belief in him sway me from questioning him further.

The handwriting was something, but we would need more evidence. Fergus was working at the estate because it wasn’t his day off and Lachlan hadn’t furloughed him. Quickly checking the file I’d obtained from Mac with staff addresses, I memorized Fergus’s.

I should call Mac. Yet I knew he’d leave me behind and go after Fergus without me. I wanted the satisfaction of getting the evidence to nail this prick. Call it stupid pride, call it vengeance, but this was personal. And it wasn’t like I’d go alone. I couldn’t.

There were two bodyguards waiting outside in a car.

Grabbing a few supplies, as ready as I could be, I locked up the cottage behind me and walked over to the car with the alert security guys. I slid into the back seat, and the two men turned to look at me.

“I’m Robyn,” I introduced myself. “You are?”

“Gillies,” the driver said.

“Smithy,” the other replied. “Problem?”

“Yeah. I need you to take me somewhere.”

“Okay.” Gillies switched on the engine. “Address?”

I told them, and he popped it into his GPS.

Only a few minutes later, I realized we were driving toward Arrochar’s bungalow. But then we veered off onto a quiet cul-de-sac with an ugly-looking, midcentury apartment block situated around a pretty courtyard. Arrochar’s home was a mere few minutes from here.

Probably coincidental, right? There weren’t a lot of places to live in a small village like Ardnoch.

“Don’t drive any farther,” I ordered as we approached and gestured to a spot outside a neighboring bungalow. “Park here.”

Gillies did as I instructed, and both men looked at me over their shoulders as if to say, “What now?”

If they accompanied me, neighbors would definitely be suspicious. They looked like the Men in Black.

“Wait here.”

“No,” Smithy said flatly. “We’re under strict orders to stay with you at all times.”

“You’re not exactly inconspicuous, and it’s important that no one sees me. Now, I could have easily lost you by taking off through the backyard of my dad’s cottage, but I’m not an idiot, I’m not at my physical best, and going anywhere alone right now would make me a moron.” I leaned into them. “But where I’m going, no one is home. I just need to check some things out. I have my phone. If you give me your number, I’ll call you from up there”—I gestured to the apartment block—“if I need you.”