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“I have no idea.” His lips parted in a genuine smile that had her smiling back. “So … dinner? Between friends and fellow anti-Nessie-ites?”
“I’d like that.”
“The restaurant is called Cobbs after John Cobb. He was killed on Loch Ness in 1952.”
“Nessie?” Kris asked dryly.
“Of course.”
“Tell me.”
Dougal’s expression became intent. He appeared to enjoy telling Nessie stories as much as Kris liked hearing them. Probably because he rarely got to share them with someone who agreed that they were hogwash.
“Cobb held the land speed record at the time—just over three hundred and ninety-four miles per hour—and he was trying to break the world water speed record. His boat disintegrated on its first run.”
“That’s odd,” Kris said, though she had no idea if it was odd at all. In her opinion, driving a boat at speeds over fifty miles per hour was more stupid than odd.
“They say the boat bumped several times, then disappeared in a spray of water like no one had ever seen. When it reappeared there were pieces of it all over the place.”
“And Cobb?”
“They pulled him out alive, but he died before they could get help. They’ve never been able to prove what happened.”
“But they’ve theorized,” Kris said.
“Waves. Mechanical failure. Human error. He could have hit a piece of driftwood.”
“Named Nessie?”
“If that were the case, wouldn’t the monster be in pieces, too?”
“What is there about monster that you don’t understand?” Kris murmured.
“And we’re back to the concept of a supernatural entity,” Dougal concluded. “In my opinion, if the only way to explain something is by magic, that isn’t an explanation at all.”
The man made a good point. Probably because it would have been her point. He was handsome, funny, intelligent, rational. They shared an interest and a point of view.
So why wasn’t she more excited about going out with him?
*
Liam shivered despite the warmth of the sun. He had never become acclimated to the temperature here. Considering he’d always been here, every attempt he’d made to leave resulting in disaster, he couldn’t understand why.
He watched Loch Side Cottage from the shadows, the lap of the water lulling him half to sleep. If he kept this up, sooner or later someone was going to see him, and then what?
There’d be shouting and pointing and problems. There always were.
Floating on a river of exhaustion, Liam drifted. He dreamed of walking along the loch, hand in hand with Kris in the sunlight. They’d talk of their lives. He’d tell the truth. She’d kiss him and laugh and say it didn’t matter.
Talk about a fantasy.
Liam found his fascination with her strange, which only made him more fascinated. In the past, he had been the one who was stalked. Women were captivated by him to the point of ridiculousness. How many had sworn to give their lives for his love?
How many had?
*
After agreeing to an early dinner with Dougal, Kris had been debating a snack or a nap—deciding on the latter as she remembered she had nothing in the place but coffee, tea, and milk; she’d eaten the small amount of bread and jam already—when another knock came at her door.
