Read Chapter 11: A Safe Escape

The hillwalking group gathered at the village green at seven sharp, a cluster of Goreb Bridge’s more outdoorsy residents stamping boots and adjusting waterproofs. Iona had almost backed out twice that morning. But the ceilidh—the anniversary whatever-it-was—had left the village humming with the kind of tension you could spread on toast, and the thought of another evening alone with her notes and the creeping heat of the locket had been worse.

She’d thrown on her sturdiest boots, jammed a flask into her rucksack, and now stood at the edge of the group nodding politely at Morag from the bakery, who was pointing enthusiastic at the sky. “Clear all the way over Ben Bhraggie,” Morag was saying. “You’ll see the sea from the top, lass. Best view in the Highlands.”

“Sound good,” Iona said, shouldering her pack.

They set off up the track in a loose line, chatting, and Iona felt something in her shoulders start to unknot. For a few miles, she was just a woman walking in the hills. Not a vet chasing secrets. Not a stranger whose mother had died in a ditch a hundred miles south under circumstances nobody would explain. Just boots on heather, wind in her face.

They were halfway up the first steep rise when she heard the footsteps behind her.

She turned. Lachlan Blackwood was climbing the path alone, no rucksack, hands in his jacket pockets, his dark hair pushed back by the breeze. He looked like he’d appeared out of the mist itself.

“Mind if I walk with you?” he asked, falling into step at her side. His voice was low, almost gentle.

“You’re not in the group.”

“No. I saw you from the road. Thought I might catch you up.” He paused. “Is that alright?”

Iona studied him. The last time she’d confronted him in his library, he’d been all coiled tension and careful half-truths. Today he seemed different. Slightly off-balance, maybe. Softer.

“Fine,” she said, and turned back to the path.

They walked side by side in silence for a while, the other hillwalkers drawing ahead. The air was clean and cold, the heather purple-brown, and somewhere below a burn rushed white over rocks. The locket under her jumper stayed cool. She tried not to think about it.

“You look like you needed this,” Lachlan said eventually.

“I did.”

“The village can be… a lot. Even when we’re not in the middle of anything.”

“You mean even when you’re not vanishing into caves on the moor?” she said, before she could stop herself.

He didn’t flinch. Instead, he looked at her, and something flickered in his eyes—something almost like regret. “I know I’ve asked a lot of you without giving much in return.”

“That’s one way to put it.”

“I’ll make good on my promise. After.”

“After the full moon,” she said flatly.

“Yes.”

She’d heard that before. Still, she kept walking. And he kept pace.

They reached the ridge where the others had stopped for a breather and a sip from their flasks. Iona sat on a flat stone, and Lachlan sat beside her—close enough she could feel the warmth of his arm through her jacket. He looked out at the view, the coast a silver glimmer far below.

“My mother died when I was twelve,” he said suddenly.

Iona went still.

“Her name was Ailsa. She used to walk these hills every morning, winter and summer. That’s what everyone said at the funeral. That she’ll be up there on the ridge, watching.” He picked a blade of grass and turned it over in his fingers. “It didn’t make the loss easier. You know? The poetry of it. It was still just… gone.”

Iona felt the familiar press behind her sternum. “Mine died when I was eleven. Maeve. The village where we lived—Glasgow, actually, the southside—said it was an accident. A car, out on a side road. No witnesses.”

She hadn’t meant to say the last part. It had slipped out past her guard, past all the fences she’d built around that memory.

Lachlan turned his head to look at her fully. “You don’t believe it was.”

It wasn’t a question.

“The police called it an accident because they had nothing else,” Iona said. “She didn’t drink. She wasn’t upset. She was coming home from a late shift at the practice and she just… went off the road. Straight into a tree.” She swallowed. “I was in school. I remember the headmistress calling me to her office and I thought I was in trouble. And then she said—” Iona stopped. Breathed. “She said my father was coming to pick me up.”

Lachlan was quiet for a long moment. Then he said, “You don’t talk about your father.”

“No.”

“Why?”

She shouldered her pack and stood. “Because he left. And then he died, too. A few weeks ago. In Inverness.” She looked down at him. “Hunting accident.”

Something passed across Lachlan’s face—too quick to read, but there. A flicker of knowledge, or fear. He kept it hidden and got to his feet beside her.

“We have that in common then,” he said quietly. “Parents taken too soon. Questions left behind.”

“And secrets,” she said.

“And secrets.”

They started walking again. The rest of the group was cresting the peak, small figures against the sky. Iona and Lachlan climbed the last stretch in silence, but it wasn’t uncomfortable. It was the silence of two people who knew there was more to be said later.

At the summit, the group pulled out sandwiches and pastry, laughing and pointing at distant islands. Iona found herself more than once glancing at Lachlan, who stood slightly apart, watching her in a way that made her stomach do something annoying.

They lingered until the light began to turn gold, then made their way down. The pub in Goreb Bridge—the Thistle and Thorn—was warm with lamplight and the smell of peat smoke. Morag from the bakery waved them over to a table in the corner, and somebody bought a round. It was, Iona realized with surprise, the first time she’d felt like part of the village. Even if she was part of it standing next to the man who was lying to her about everything.

Later, when they stepped out into the cold night air, Lachlan stopped under the pub’s sign, the lantern glow softening his sharp features.

“Iona,” he said.

She turned. He pulled his phone from his jacket pocket, tapped it, and handed it to her. A blank contact page, cursor blinking on the number field.

“Put your number in. Or take mine. Whatever you prefer.”

She took the phone. The screen was warm from his hand. “Why?”

“Because I meant what I said. If you ever feel in danger—any danger, from anyone—call me.” His eyes held hers. “I’ll come. No questions. No conditions. I will come.”

She stared at him. Her locket warmed against her collarbone, a slow thrum that started at the base of her throat and spread outward. It wasn’t the fever-pitch heat of the cave, or the sharp burn of discovery. It was something stranger. Something tender.

“You can’t protect me from the truth forever, Lachlan.”

“I’m not trying to protect you from the truth,” he said. “I’m trying to protect you from what the truth will do to you once you have it.”

She typed her number. Handed his phone back. Their fingers brushed, and neither of them pulled away for a second longer than necessary.

“Goodnight,” she said.

“Goodnight, Iona.”

She walked back to her cottage through the quiet village. In her pocket, her own phone buzzed. A message from an unknown number:

*I meant it. Stay safe. L.*

She stood in her doorway a long moment before going inside.