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He stepped back, an invitation to enter that Liam accepted. “What then?”
Alan Mac poured a second cup of tea, pulled bread from a cabinet, set out butter and jam. Whenever Liam wasn’t occupied with the loch, he tried to eat as much as he could. Otherwise he just didn’t have the time.
Between bites, Liam related all that he knew. In the process, he discovered that Kris had never told the constable she’d been shoved off the cliff.
“Did ye see anyone?” Alan Mac asked.
“No.”
“She could have slipped.”
“Which is probably why she didnae tell ye.” Liam took more bread, loading it with both butter and jam. “Ye never believe what she says.”
“That’s my job, if ye recall.”
“Yer job is to make sure no one knows what I’m up to. It isnae to make women who’ve been attacked believe they’re crazy.” Liam fixed Alan Mac with a glare. “Dinnae do it again.”
Alan Mac swallowed as if he’d just downed a dry biscuit with no tea. “Aye, Uilebheist.”
Liam narrowed his eyes.
The constable straightened. “Aye, sir.”
“Find out all ye can about Marty Daniels,” Liam ordered, gaze on the window, where the dark had now truly begun to lighten.
“Do ye want me to round up the man? Ask him a few questions at the station?”
Liam shook his head. He doubted Alan Mac would be able to “round up” Marty. The guy hadn’t stayed out of sight this long by being bad at it. Besides—
“He willnae tell ye anything. Best to let me ask.”
Liam could be quite persuasive when he was of a mind to be.
He remembered Kris’s face in the dim light of the cottage. That yearning sadness, the past memories of hurt.
He was definitely of a mind to be.
“Find out where he’s been,” Liam instructed. “Why is he here? What does he do? Where does he do it? Ye ken?”
“Aye.” Alan Mac nodded. “Ye can count on me.”
*
Kris was still trying to get her mind around her brother being in Scotland when her computer screen shimmied. She was reminded of the front window of the starship Enterprise, which sometimes shimmied exactly like that right before a transmission came in from a Klingon warship. Instead, a transmission came in from Edward Mandenauer.
The old man appeared as tired as Kris felt. What was going on out there in the world?
Quite a bit, and all the time, from the looks of him.
His gaze paused on her bruised cheek, as everyone’s would until the mark healed, but he merely narrowed his eyes momentarily, then spoke in his usual manner—as if he had somewhere else to be and yesterday.
“I’ve found similarities to other murders.”
“In Drumnadrochit?” If that was the case, these people were really good at keeping secrets.
“No. There have been a string of deaths throughout the world matching the manner in which a local legendary being might kill.”
Kris, who had picked up the yellow legal pad on which she’d first doodled Effy’s tattoo and begun to sketch the others, glanced up. “I don’t understand.”
