TWENTY-SIX
Isabel’s thoughts kept getting away from her. Some of them were about the threats against her, the rest were about Michael. What would he be doing in a year, and who would he be with? She was pretty sure she knew the answer. He would be saving the world, and the woman at his side would be brilliant with a gazillion degrees, and she’d also be quite beautiful. Isabel already hated her.
Did he wonder what she would be doing in a year? Did he ever think about telling her how he felt about her? Or if they had a future together? He was a Buchanan male, so no. Sensitivity was the one gene the males in that family were missing.
After a couple of detours on back roads, they passed through a small village, and Michael spotted a stone house with the first floor converted into a restaurant. A large chalkboard by the front door touted the best fish and chips in Scotland.
“Are you hungry? Or did watching Lachlan eat all that food fill you up?” He pulled to the curb and pointed to the sign. “What do you think?”
“Sounds great,” Isabel answered.
The entire restaurant was no bigger than a living room, with half a dozen tables scattered about. Since it was midafternoon, the place was empty except for three older gentlemen at a table against the wall. In front of each was a cup of coffee. One could easily assume they had been sitting there for quite some time discussing matters of importance. Their conversation stopped as they watched Michael and Isabel walk in and take a seat at a table in the center of the room.
The waitress, a plump woman with a mass of brown curls on top of her head and round cheeks that looked like ripe apples when she smiled, emerged from the kitchen, holding menus in her hand.
After turning in their orders, she returned and said, “I can tell by your accents. You’re Americans, aren’t you? I’ve always wanted to visit America, but it just never worked out.”
“Have you lived here long?” Isabel asked.
And thus began the life story of Moira the waitress.
From past experience Michael knew this brief stop for lunch was going to take longer than expected, so he sat back in his chair and watched Isabel do what she had done before. She let Moira talk. The woman had lost her husband of thirty years in a fishing accident, and Isabel sympathetically listened to her tell several stories about her dear, dear Dorian. Moira then veered into the problems she was having with her extended family, who wanted her to move to a village north of where she was currently living so she could be closer to them.
“It’s beautiful up there,” she admitted, “but it’s just different.”
As she described the area in detail, Isabel began to recognize that she was talking about a place that was very close to Glen MacKenna. She waited patiently for the right time, and then she nodded and said, “I think we heard some people talking about problems in that area. A dispute over some land, maybe?”
“I don’t know anything about that,” Moira said.
Before she could continue her story, one of the older men interrupted. “That’s right. There’s trouble brewing up there.”
Isabel turned to face him. “What kind of trouble?”
“It’s all got to do with a man named Harcus,” he explained. “My son’s place is up in Dunross, and he tells me the fellow is a real bastard. He says he’s made a lot of enemies.”
Michael straightened in his chair. “How so?”
“One of my son’s friends was hired by Clive Harcus to put in new windows in his mother’s cottage. They were double-thick panes and very expensive. After the work was done, Harcus refused to pay. He said the windows rattle during a windstorm and that it was shoddy work. The cost nearly put my son’s friend out of business. There were other workmen who were never paid. I don’t know the details,” the man said. “All I know is that my son is trying to stay as far away from him as possible.”
Isabel and Michael exchanged glances but didn’t comment.
With the break in her conversation, Moira had gone to the kitchen and come back with their food. As Michael and Isabel ate, the three men opened up and began talking about themselves and their views on everything from the younger generation to world politics. The topic never returned to Harcus or the land, and Isabel was being careful not to appear too interested in either. The men had confirmed what she had already learned from Lachlan, and that was enough for now. She spent the rest of the meal letting the three men talk. By the time she left the restaurant, she knew each of their names, their ages, their marital status, and just about everything else about them.
There weren’t many cars on the roadway. “That stop took longer than I had planned, but we’re actually making good time,” Michael remarked.
“Where are we going?”
“North,” he answered. “I’ll know exactly where we need to be when Nick calls.”
“Okay. Would you like me to drive for a while?”
He acted as though she’d just told him a funny joke. “Good one,” he said, laughing.
The clouds opened up again. Isabel looked out the side window but couldn’t see much of anything because of the rain. She leaned back against the headrest and let her thoughts wander, replaying in her mind what Lachlan and the man in the restaurant had told them about Clive Harcus. If only half of what they’d said were true, this Harcus was a terror and needed to be dealt with. She made a mental list of all the things she wanted to say when she confronted the man.
She made the mistake of telling Michael her plan.
He gave her his are you out of your mind? look and said, “Isabel, you aren’t going to get near Harcus. If anything happened to you...” He took a deep breath and then said, “The authorities will take care of him.”