Page 60 of The Cottage in the Highlands

Christmas was approaching with increasing speed. I realised with a jolt that it was now only a month away.

The shops, not only in Glasgow but back at home in Silver Ness, were all bursting with glitter, dangling decorations, and trees swathed in lights.

The days were drawing to a close quickly, with darkness wrapping itself around everything at four o’clock in the afternoon, but in a way, that added to the growing excitement and anticipation of the festive season being just around the corner.

I had made the decision to contact Flynn Talbot again tomorrow. It had been a few days now since our awkward meet-up in the tea room and although I suspected he still wouldn’t be prepared to talk to me about what he knew or was concealing about Lily or Merry Wood, I wouldn’t have been doing my job if I didn’t possess tenacity.

I had already sent a couple of new Facebook messages to his account, as well as emailing his photographic studio, which I’d located after a bit of rooting around on social media, but he hadn’t replied to any of them.

That hadn’t been much of a surprise. He came across as a rude man, rather up-himself, I concluded. Handsome but arrogant.

I stopped by the harbour railings with Harley on our evening walk and surveyed the golden ribbon of sand, illuminated under the throng of street lamps along the pier.

We had just returned from another uneventful trip to try and return the letter to Lily.

Harley and I had stood for a while outside her cosy little cottage, trying to ignore the cold nipping at our extremities and the rhythmical rush of the wind through the woods behind us.

Yet, despite the glow of lamps from behind her closed gingham curtains, she had failed to answer my knocks and pleads on the door.

I could understand her reaction in one way. I had let her down. I’d promised her no one would go inside Merry Wood. Now her trust in me was non-existent.

So, dejected and feeling wretched, we had returned to Silver Ness, I had deposited Lily’s letter back at home and then Harley and I had made our way down to the seafront.

The air was punctuated with the bursts of waves hitting the shoreline and the comforting rush as they receded. Stars glittered like shards of glass overhead.

I guided Harley past the steps that led down to the beach and took her by the ice cream shop, Scoops, which was bursting with an impressive window display of sweet pastel flavours and multicoloured Christmas lights. Beside it rippled the striped canopy of the deli, which was closed for the night.

I soon came to the newspaper office.

A garish For Sale/To Rent sign was plastered across the entrance.

I drew up, my heart deflating at the prospect of the once bustling office being reduced to a silent shell. Even the sign proclaiming The Silver Ness News had been removed from above the door, leaving a boarded-up gap in its place.

I peered in through one of the windows. The walls were bare and there were empty plastic boxes stacked in one corner, presumably for Doug and Frances to begin the painful task of clearing their desks.

It was a quaint little former cottage with a spectacular view, so I had thought it wouldn’t be on the market for very long. However, the local gossip was that the newspaper group were being greedy and Clarity Newspapers were asking a ridiculous amount of money from any potential buyer. If they did sell it, they would make a handsome profit.

Pictures drizzled through my mind of me, Doug, and Frances laughing, rattling off copy and debating who deserved the front-page splash that week.

A longing tugged in my chest. It seemed like an eternity ago now.

Goddess was so clinical in comparison, with its starched white minimalist furniture and staff swathed in designer labels.

Guilt nibbled at me. I was grateful to have another job. Of course, I was. Especially in my beloved field of journalism. But I missed the familiarity and cosiness of my local newspaper and the warm, easy camaraderie between the three of us.

Harley and I moved further along the promenade of shops, their lit doorways throwing pools of warm amber light onto the pavement. We soon reached the newsagents on the corner.

Sitting outside on the pavement was a billboard proclaiming:

FIRST ISSUE OF THE NEW DRUMMOND &

SILVER NESS SENTINEL – BUY NOW!

I hesitated, staring at the headline screaming back at me. It just confirmed that times move on and everything changes.

I hovered for a moment, deliberating whether to buy a copy, when my inquisitiveness won out.

I leant into the doorway of Mrs Bradshaw’s newsagent’s, ducking out of the way of a couple of beach balls and a display of postcards which she was in the process of bringing back inside for the night as she prepared to close.