Page 77 of The Clifftop Cottage

“Fair enough,” she said, her voice softening. “Night, Gabe.”

“Night, Sorc.”

He left her at the table, the candle flames still flickering, casting gentle shadows across their parents’ smiling faces.

Outside, the night was dark and cold. He pulled on his jacket, zipped it up to his chin, and stepped out into the quiet. The stars high and still above him.

He stood for a moment in the cold, breath misting in front of him, the night pressing close. He found his thoughts drifting – inevitably – back to Erica.

How quick he’d been to snap at Sorcha. How oddly protective he felt. Maybe too protective. Too sensitive.

And he had to ask himself, not for the first time, why did it matter so much?

And why did she?

26

The wind had changed direction overnight. Erica could hear it scratching at the old sash windows like restless fingers. The cottage groaned in reply, a tired old beast shifting in its bones. She hadn’t drawn the curtains. The hills outside were black shapes pressed against the sky, ink spilled into deeper ink.

She hadn’t left the house since Halloween.

The dress she’d planned to wear that night – Maisie’s favourite, navy with the velvet collar – still hung over the chair. Her phone lay face-down on the rug where she’d dropped it after the fifth missed call from Leah.

And two from an unknown number.

There had been an email, too.

From Andrew Peters.

Subject line: Regarding Recent Enquiries.

She’d seen his name in her inbox and felt something inside her sink. She hadn’t opened it. But it felt like it was waiting.

She could already hear the tone – measured, reasonable, threaded with warning.

She would call Leah back. She meant to.

Eventually.

Lucky let out a small huff and pressed himself closer to her leg, warm and insistently loyal. Erica rested a hand on his head. His ears flicked beneath her fingers.

She had thought isolation would feel like relief. Like exhaling. Instead it was dense and airless, like the fog that clung to the edge of the glen and never quite lifted.

The only thing that cut through it was the research.

It had begun simply – an idle curiosity, an article half read on a slow night. But now the women had taken hold of her. Isobel Grant, especially. Her browser tabs crowded with archives and parish records; her notebook was thick with looping scrawls and question marks.

Can’t pinpoint date in 18th century. Woman accused of witchcraft in Rock Cove.

Laird T – connection?

Illegitimate daughter??

She turned the page.

There it was again – the line she’d written at two in the morning:

Some say she was the Laird’s mistress. Others say she was no more than a servant girl. The records are vague. All that’s certain is this: someone wanted her silence.