Page 130 of Journey to the Scottish Highlands

Once I’d got Grandpa comfy in the passenger side, I arranged my face into what I hoped was a winning smile and switched on Marlene. She purred into life.

I edged us out of the parking space.

The evening June sunshine was pushing through the trees and gliding across The Ramblings windows, serenaded by the birds.

It was a stunning, contented scene, and yet inside I was still torturing myself over what might have been.

It had been a mess, which we could have unscrambled together. But Evan had decided to return to London, and I’d realised too late that he had his reasons for being Fox and not divulging his secret in the first place.

Grandpa persisted with his concerned glances across at me as I edged up the driveway and towards the country lane.

Alison, Bennett, Cayla and Louise’s pensive faces wavered in my rear-view mirror.

‘You ok, Daisy chain?’ Grandpa asked.

I nodded. ‘I’ll be fine.’

I clutched the steering wheel and watched a couple of cars flash past. ‘It’s ok. I mean, I’m ok.’

Grandpa shook his head. ‘You don’t have to pretend with me, sweetheart. I can see how much you’re hurting over Evan … Jesus! Look out!’

I slammed on the brakes as Dane’s bashed-up, white truck came swinging round the corner of the hedgerow, almost smashing into the front of Marlene.

‘For goodness’ sake, Dane!’ I erupted. ‘You took that corner far too fast…’

My voice petered to a stop.

Sitting beside Dane in the passenger seat and staring out at me, as though I were a ghost, was Evan.

The second Dane switched off his engine, Evan leapt out of his side of the truck.

He kept looking at me, oblivious to everyone and everything else.

I just gazed back at him through my sun-splashed windscreen trying to fathom what was going on.

‘Well?’ said Grandpa beside me. ‘Are you just going to sit there and gawp at him, or are you going to speak to the poor lad?’

I blinked for several moments out at Evan, as though I couldn’t move, before my fingers fumbled to unclip my seatbelt.

I clambered out.

My heart zoomed into my throat as I drew closer to him.

I was so preoccupied that I barely noticed Dane slipping out of his truck, too.

Evan walked to meet me halfway on the gravelly drive. The sun was brushing through his hair.

‘What are you doing here?’ I blurted. ‘I mean, I thought you said you were returning to London.’

‘I was. But I didn’t want to. I thought you didn’t want anything more to do with me after you found out I was Fox.’ He motioned his head back, indicating Dane behind him. ‘I’d switched my mobile off for a while because of all the texts and calls I was receiving after going online. But when I turned it back on, I saw Dane had messaged me repeatedly.’

Dane shrugged and delivered a bashful smile.

I was struggling to sort everything out in my head. ‘I thought you had a gig tonight?’ I asked him.

He coughed dramatically. ‘Had to postpone it. Think I might be coming down with something.’ Then he winked at me.

What was going on here?