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She snorts, derisive. He’d proved, hadn’t he, just how wrong that statement is. “So she wants us to, like, find stuff?”
“Yep. It’s Christmas-themed and everything. And you want to know the best part?” He leans in, close enough that she has to tilt her head up to look at him, so that her eyes have to travel over the mouth that is just a little crooked. “We’re on the same team.” She wonders if he is doing it deliberately, challenging her with his eyes like that. Probably. Maybe he’s trying to get her back for shouting at him earlier.
“Of course we are,” she mutters. Well, maybe that’s a good thing. If they’re on a team just the two of them, they don’t have to talk to each other, do they?
“Ready?” He gestures toward the kitchen door. She squares her shoulders like she’s readying for battle, nods. All right, then. Game on.
Chapter Eight
As it turns out, it is not just her and Finn on a team. They’re in teams of three, with Susan remaining behind as the judge. Hattie has opted to be with Mel and Finn—meaning there is no let-up in the pretending-to-be-a-happy-couple charade. To foster “team spirit,” Hattie insisted on driving into the village with Finn and Mel, riding in the back of the car, meaning Mel feels like she’s on display, with sharp eyes on them the whole time. At one point in the car journey, he reached out, put a hand on hers on her lap. She flipped her hand, dug her nails in, hard. After that, he turned the radio up, both of them insisting they wanted loud music when Hattie complained.
Luckily, the countryside is epic enough that she can get away with staring out of the window and not look like she’s trying to avoid the man sitting next to her. Of course it’s epic—it’s a national park—but, still, she wasn’t quite expecting the scale of it, the feeling that you could drive for hours each way and still be lost in wilderness. High snow-capped mountains loom in the near distance, and they pass pinewood forests that look like something out of a fairy tale. There is a river, glinting in the bright winter sunlight, which sweeps past a castle in the background.
As instructed by Susan, they stop in a car park near the center of Ballater, and Hattie informs them the village is on several lists of the most beautiful villages in the Cairngorms. Given Mel doesn’t know how many villages there actually are in the national park, she has no idea if that’s an accomplishment or not, but it’s incredibly charming—she’ll give it that. Rolling hills span the horizon, with Highland cattle grazing in nearby fields. The houses feel as if they’ve been untouched by time—granite stone buildings with slate roofs, all nestled on narrow streets next to small shops and at least one inviting-looking pub.
They all get out of the two cars, and Susan beckons them into the middle of the car park, holding out an envelope for each team. Mel has a moment to admire Susan’s commitment to the whole thing as she takes the envelope, pulling out a list with the scavenger items they need to collect as well as a map, indicating the route they should take—with a café circled in green as the finish point.
“First team to find me in the café with the most items on the list wins,” Susan says, smiling at all of them.
“What do we win, exactly?” Mark asks.
“Pride,” Susan says easily.
“Bragging rights,” pipes up Hattie.
“And something special for you,” Susan says, winking at Freya, who bounces on her toes, looking up at Kristen from under a snowflake hat, complete with earmuffs.
“What about you?” Kristen asks. “Will you be okay, waiting for us?”
Susan pats her handbag. “I’ve got my cozy Christmas crime novel waiting for me—I’ll be fine. I just want to see you all have fun.”
“We are on it,” Hattie promises, then grins down at Freya. “On your marks…”
Freya doesn’t wait for the “go,” but tugs Kristen into a run, heading down past the river, with Mark reading out the items behind them both.
Mel scans their list, which includes a photo with a robin, a reindeer, an icicle, a Christmas tree, a frosted web, and a star made out of twigs. Okay, well, the sooner they get this done, the sooner she can return to the cottage and shut herself away under the guise of working.
“How on earth are we supposed to find a reindeer?” Hattie asks, peering over her shoulder.
“There are reindeer in the Cairngorms, like a whole herd of them,” Finn says. They both look at him and he shrugs. “I looked up some facts when I knew we were coming here.”
“So…what, does she want us to lasso one?” Hattie asks.
“We need a game plan,” Mel says. “We’ll do the Christmas tree first—that should be easy, given there is a whole forest of them—then we can work our way through, depending on where we are and we should be back in no time.”
Hattie glances at Finn. “Don’t you just love her ‘take charge’ voice?”
He smiles. “I do.”
Mel doesn’t quite like the softness there—or what it does to her insides. She distracts herself by leading the way out of the car park and through a line of trees, some bare, some evergreen, so that it feels colorful, even though it’s only a mix of green and brown. And white. Susan was right about there being snow here—not this far down, but Mel can see it farther up.
Her breath steams out in front of her as they walk, and she welcomes the warmth in her limbs, the cold on her face, as Hattie and Finn follow on the trail behind. It’s been too long since she let herself do this, just walk in nature, given she’s bound so often by the four walls of either her flat or her office. They pass a little loch to their left, fringed by trees, the surface sparkling in the sunlight. A thin layer of ice hugs the edges of the water, and as they watch, a large brown bird swoops down on the other side.
“Do you reckon there are icicles down there?” Hattie asks behind Mel, referring to one of the items on the list.
“Christmas tree first,” Mel says firmly, indicating a row of pine trees farther up.
“Yes, ma’am.” Hattie pulls ahead, posing in front of one of the trees by pretending to be reaching to try to put a star on top, though it has got to be about thirty meters high. Mel clicks a photo on her phone, and finds herself smiling.
