The Secrets of the Glen (Scottish Highlands #2)

Chapter 33

Seated at the kitchen table, Robyn idly stabbed at the food on her plate with her fork.

‘Not hungry?’ Gayle said. She was sitting opposite, finishing her bowl of muesli. ‘That’s not like you.’

Robyn looked down at her plate and nodded. She felt bad that Gayle had gone to all the trouble of cooking her breakfast, but she’d lost her appetite. Reluctantly, she put her fork down and pushed the plate away. David was outside, helping Marty with the garden – although for the life of her, she couldn’t see what help David could be. He didn’t know the first thing about landscape gardening. She knew that he was avoiding her.

‘So, you and David had a fight.’ Gayle said matter-of-factly, pointing the spoon at her. ‘Well, that’s how you know.’

Robyn looked back at her curiously. ‘Know what?’

‘You aren’t really serious about each other until you’ve had your first fight.’

They’d already fallen out, on New Year’s Eve, and again when David had left hospital after his knee op. They’d patched things up fairly quickly. But this felt different.

‘And which self-help guru said that little gem?’ Robyn asked sarcastically, not feeling in the mood to talk about it.

Gayle hadn’t asked her what their argument had been about, but Robyn decided that maybe she did want to talk about it after all, and get it off her chest.

She lowered her voice, even though they were the only ones in the house. Nick was out on his early morning run with Olive. Marty and David were in the back garden, and Doris had been picked up and taken to the community centre for a coffee morning with her old friends.

She leaned across the table. ‘Something happened …’

‘Yes, I realise that. That’s why you two have fallen out.’

Robyn shook her head. ‘No, I meant something happened in David’s past that he won’t talk about.’

Gayle sighed, and sat back in her chair. ‘Ah, I know what this is about.’

Robyn looked at her I surprise. ‘You do?’

‘Of course. He won’t talk about his accident – the one that ended his career.’

Robyn nodded. ‘It’s true – he won’t. How do you know? Have you asked him?’

‘No, I haven’t. It was a good guess, though, obviously. I’m sure he’ll talk about it, when he’s ready.’

‘You’re wondering why I’m making a big deal about it.’

‘I didn’t say that.’

‘But you were thinking it.’

‘What I don’t understand, is why, after all this time, are you bringing it up now?’ Gayle reached for her dish and finished her cereal. ‘You know he doesn’t want to talk about it.’

Robyn had got a text from Melissa to apologise and say that she’d been so busy at university after the Christmas break that she hadn’t had a chance to look into David’s past. She would be back for the Easter break and had said she was looking forward to researching the case. For some reason, Robyn hadn’t appreciated her calling it a case . It was her boyfriend that Melissa was talking about.

Robyn grimaced at the thought. She didn’t want to wait for her to come back and start digging around. Gayle was probably right: David would tell her … in time. But there wasn’t time to wait. After the makeover three months earlier, Melissa had boldly asked Brodie from Wilbur’s bookshop out, and not surprisingly, he’d accepted. Melissa had insisted on following through with her side of the bargain; to do the favour for Robyn that she’d promised, despite Robyn trying to ask her to leave things be.

She’d almost forgotten about Melissa’s mission to delve into David’s past until the text out of the blue had reminded her. The Easter holiday was nearly upon them. Melissa would be returning to Aviemore soon. The text had prompted Robyn to come right out with it and ask David bluntly about his so-called accident.

Not surprisingly, David still wouldn’t talk about it. She’d had it on the tip of her tongue to bring up the newspaper article she’d found about the incident in his father’s shop, but before she’d had a chance to mention it, he’d stormed out into the garden, refusing to join her for breakfast.

Gayle put her spoon down and moved her cereal bowl to one side. Her arms stretched out across the table and her soft hands enveloped Robyn’s. She looked up at her.

‘People deal with loss in different ways. Perhaps he still isn’t ready to talk about what happened. I’m sure that in time …’

Robyn stared at Gayle, not listening to the self-help psychobabble that was spilling out of her lips. It wasn’t her thing at the best of times, but Gayle was her friend, and she respected her even though she didn’t have time for such thinking herself.

Robyn lowered her voice. ‘Did you know that there was an attempted robbery in Mr Gillespie’s store?’

‘Oh, my god! When? Are you okay? Is Duncan?’

‘Oh, sorry. I didn’t mean recently.’

Gayle put a hand to her chest and exhaled in relief. ‘Has this got something to do with David? Is that what you’re saying?’

‘Yes, I am. It turns out that when David was on a night out with his friends two years ago …’ Robyn told her all about the burglary. Robyn watched intently for Gayle’s reaction as what she said slowly and deliberately cut across Gayle’s self-help monologue. ‘He didn’t want to tell me because it turned out that he killed someone.’

Gayle stopped talking. ‘What did you just say?’

Robyn had her attention. She repeated herself word for word slowly and deliberately.

‘What on earth makes you say a thing like that?’ Gayle was clearly shocked. She released her hands from Robyn and sat back in her chair.

Robyn reached into the pocket of her dungarees and withdrew a folded piece of white paper.

Unfolding it, Robyn lay it flat on the table and smoothed out the creases before slipping it across the table to Gayle. She sat back as Gayle picked it up.

‘What’s this?’ Gayle looked at Robyn.

Robyn nodded her head at the piece of paper, motioning for Gayle to read it. Robyn watched Gayle’s eyes move over the page.

‘Where did you get this?’ she said, slowly putting the piece of paper on the kitchen table.

‘The library,’ Robyn said, certain that Gayle would believe her now. ‘From the newspaper archives. It’s a printout.’ She decided not to tell her about Melissa and the research project she was doing – or would be when she got home from university for the Easter break.

‘Aren’t you forgetting something? If David did this,’ Gayle tapped the piece of paper with her finger, ‘like you said, killing a man, even if he was a burglar, wouldn’t he have been arrested for murder or manslaughter? Even if he pleaded self-defence and was let off?’ Gayle looked at the article. ‘That’s what it says in the article.’ Gayle read out loud, It is not yet known whether criminal charges will be brought against Mr Gillespie.

‘I know.’ Melissa had told her that if someone breaks into your property, and you hurt them – or worse – then it’s you that could be arrested. She’d said that you can plead self-defence, but that won’t stop the police charging you with a crime.

‘I couldn’t find out what happened next.’

‘Why is it so important? He’s not in prison now – if he ever was.’ Gayle eyed her. ‘Is it because you found out he killed someone?’

‘Yes … no. I don’t know. I just have a feeling that it’s important somehow.’ That memory of turning up at David’s house with Duncan, and recognising the place, kept playing on her mind. That didn’t mean it had anything to do with the burglary at Duncan’s store. Why would it? But still, something was nagging away at her that she couldn’t put her finger on. Perhaps if her memories returned, then there would be nothing to worry about.

Worry about? Even that thought had Robyn over-thinking, wondering why that notion had just popped into her head.

She looked at Gayle sheepishly and decided not to share what was on her mind in case Gayle came out with some self-help tosh and gave her a book to read from her extensive library.

‘I think you’re over-thinking things.’

Robyn sighed. Trust Gayle to realise that.

‘Next, you’ll be telling me that there’s some conspiracy, and Joe was in on it, keeping his brother out of gaol.

‘Do you think that’s a possibility?’ If that came to light, Joe would lose his job. Maybe that was it. David was protecting his little brother. That would explain a lot – why he wouldn’t bring up the burglary, let alone tell her what happened.

Gayle shook her head and tutted. She got up from the table, scooped up both plates and gave Robyn a quizzical look before she walked over to the sink.

‘What?’ Robyn held up her arms questioningly as Gayle returned to the table with a cloth.

Gayle picked up the article Robyn had given her to read. ‘You know what I think of this?’ Gayle tore the piece of paper into four pieces, then casually walk over to the rubbish bin. She tapped the lever with her foot, held the pieces of paper theatrically in the air, then dropped them into the bin. She let her foot off the pedal, and the lid clanged shut. Gayle turned around. ‘You need to let this go – whatever this really is.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I think there’s something you’re not telling me.’

Robyn didn’t know why the dwindling cash in the rucksack suddenly came to mind. A lot of it was now gone – spent on Gayle’s garden, and doing up her house, along with the money to set up her little interior design outlet.

Robyn rose from the table. ‘I’m going to find David.’

‘Robyn?’ Gayle called out as she was about to step out the room.

She turned around. Robyn could tell by Gayle’s expression that she had something on her mind. ‘What is it?’

‘This memory thing. I know you still can’t remember. I don’t think it helps, you know. I think your imagination might be running away with you or …’

‘Or?’

Gayle said in a small voice. ‘You’re starting to get paranoid.’

Shaking her head, Robyn opened her mouth to deny this, but no words came out. Instead, an uncomfortable truth had struck her. Could Gayle be right? Perhaps David wasn’t the problem. Perhaps she was.

Gayle shook her head solemnly. ‘You want David to tell you the truth about his past. Have you considered the possibility that he’d like the same consideration from you?’

Robyn stared at Gayle.

‘After all these months, David doesn’t really know a blessed thing about you, does he?’

‘That’s just not true. You’ve talked to him about me. You must have when David stayed here that one night when I was staying with Duncan the night he got out of hospital.’

Gayle didn’t deny it. She shrugged. ‘We’ve just assumed that you’re a nice ordinary, sane person. For all we know, you could have some crazed, gun-toting, knife-wielding jealous husband or boyfriend on your trail. Or, heaven forbid, I could be hiding a fugitive who has escaped from prison and is in all kinds of trouble, having committed some heinous crime.’

Robyn was completely taken aback, surprised that she could think such horrible things about her. ‘But you don’t believe that – do you?’

‘Well, honey, anything’s possible.’

‘But … we’re friends.’ Robyn protested.

Gayle walked around the table, and reached for two more breakfast plates – Nick’s and her mum’s. She stood in front of Robyn with one in each hand. ‘Well, there’s the rub. I do know you, and I wouldn’t believe a word of it if someone told me those things about you.’

She walked to the sink and deposited the dirty dishes into the sink. She turned around. ‘And I know David, and I don’t believe a word of that article either. I don’t think he could bring himself to shoot a man – even if it was in self-defence.’ Gayle started washing up. Then Robyn could see that something had occurred to her. She put a dish on the draining board and turned around, soap suds dripping down her sleeve. ‘Your memory really hasn’t improved any?’

‘No,’ Robyn said crossly. She steered the conversation back to David. ‘If that newspaper article wasn’t true about David shooting the burglar, then what did happen?’

‘What did I just tell you? Let it go, Robyn,’ she nodded her head wisely. ‘I think you’re losing some perspective on things.’ She turned back to the sink. ‘Why, just the other afternoon I was watching Dr Phil on Oprah Winfrey, and he said …’

Robyn closed her eyes. She obviously wasn’t going to get through to Gayle. Robyn thought of Melissa; despite her reservations, she was now very happy indeed that Melissa was still on the case. Thank goodness someone believes me , she thought .

Gayle washed the dishes as she poured forth her self-help sermon, but to Robyn’s relief, her monologue was promptly drowned out by the sound of an approaching car on the gravel outside the kitchen window. Gayle lifted a soapy hand and waved.

Curious, Robyn got up from the table and stood beside Gayle to look out of the window.

A police car came to a stop at an angle, centred in the driveway ‘What’s a police car doing here?’ Robyn said suspiciously.

‘Maybe he’s come to arrest his brother for murder.’

Robyn shot Gayle a look. ‘That’s not very funny.’

‘I know. Maybe they’re here for you.’

Robyn’s heart leapt to her throat. That wasn’t funny either.