Page 85 of A Scottish Highland Hideaway

I made the decision to call Mum next. “Marcus was just here in a real state. He knows, Mum. He knows about the money you gave Sam.” I groaned. ‘I knew we should have been honest with him.’

“How on earth did he find out?”

“It doesn’t matter.” I screwed my eyes up as my Christmas tree lights dazzled. “Marcus is the innocent victim in all this, Mum. He’s the one who’s hurting and thinking his own family are keeping secrets from him. I should never have listened to you. I should have told him.”

Mum fell quiet down the line.

“If you must know, Samuel’s sister Siobhan moved jobs recently and now works for some advertising agency in Glasgow. She attended the same meeting as Marcus today and they got talking.”

“Oh bugger!”

My teeth ground against one another. “Let’s face it, Mum. You’ve got previous form for meddling in our relationships.”

Mum ignored this, of course. “I’ll speak to your brother,” she said briskly. “Once he realises we had the best of intentions and that it was Samuel who asked for the money with the intention of blackmailing me, he’ll see sense.”

My hackles rose as I honed in on my mother’s use of the word we.

“Oh no. Don’t you dare include me in all of this.” I ran a frustrated hand over the top of my ponytail. “Has Dad made any attempt to speak to Marcus to try and smooth things over?”

Mum was evasive. “Your father doesn’t know everything yet.”

I was incredulous. “Hold on. Are you saying that you didn’t tell Dad you gave Samuel money?”

“Not yet, but I will.”

“I can’t believe you. Are you even capable of being straight with anyone?”

I ended the call abruptly and then hurled a sofa cushion against the far wall.

My bloody family!

All I wanted to do was speak to Marcus. I wanted to explain and to beg his forgiveness and make everything right between us again. Mum’s relationship meddling had been done with what she thought was the best of intentions, but the whole thing had blown up in our faces. In trying to protect Marcus from knowing about Samuel being a money-grabbing bastard, he’d concluded I was complicit by not telling him.

It galvanised my thoughts. No more harbouring secrets and willing them to vanish.

But dear God, what a horrendous Christmas this was going to be!

When my mobile rang a few moments later, I scrambled forward, almost tumbling off the edge of the sofa in my haste to answer it. Was it Marcus? Or Zach?

But it wasn’t either of them. It was my accountant, reminding me about my end of January tax return.

* * *

On Tuesday, I was still festering over what had happened with Marcus. He was stubborn, like me. Mum was convinced he’d still come for Christmas but I wasn’t so sure. The gift I had bought for Marcus – a gorgeous wooden pen set carved from an old Scottish whisky barrel in Tyree – was wrapped up in glossy blue and silver paper. I wasn’t sure whether to pack it, but I decided to think positively just in case. My stomach dipped. I tried to call him again but he didn’t answer.

He wasn’t even picking up the phone to Dad – probably assuming Dad had been in on it too. Needless to say, Dad was exasperated with Mum when she finally told him, but not entirely surprised. My parents’ relationship had always been a mystery to me.

I forced myself to refocus on the shop. Amber asked to leave early as she was in a blind panic about getting a couple of last-minute gifts before tomorrow when Christmas Eve would arrive with all its fanfare. Rowan was helping me tidy up, water the plants and deadhead a few of the flowers before we closed for the day. She was telling me about some gorgeous festive flower table decorations she’d spotted earlier in the week in a department store in town when Ezra suddenly burst through the door. He was out of breath and his eyes were wild.

“I don’t know what to do!” he burst out from under his baker-boy cap.

“Ezra! What’s wrong? Are you ok?” I said.

He scrambled about in his coat pocket and thrust a crumpled sheet of paper at me. “That journalist friend of yours said this might happen.”

I frowned at him and unfolded the sheet of A4 paper. In bold type was printed:

WE KNOW ABOUT YOUR DAUGHTERS. PUBLICLY RETRACT BOOK CONTENTS OR THEY WILL PAY IN KIND.