Page 11 of Wild Scottish Rose

“Awkward, full throttle, often with a side of embarrassment.” With that I pivoted and marched to the door, praying I didn’t do something else stupid like ask him to leave so I could avoid a month of embarrassing myself in his presence.

Owen’s laughter brought a smile to my lips, even though I was deeply embarrassed, and I glanced over my shoulder.

“My phone number is on the list. Text or call if you need anything.”

“Thanks, Shona. I’m just going to crash for the night. I’ll let you know if I need anything.” He stood by the bed, an amused light still in his eyes, and I closed the door behind me, needing to gulp the cool night air.

“Bloody eejit,” I muttered, stalking across the dark garden, needing no light to find my way through the flower and vegetable beds which Iknew every inch of.

Five minutes later, while I paced my kitchen and tried not to beat myself up for being so foolishly awkward, my phone buzzed with an incoming text message from a US number. Thumbing the message open, a laugh broke out.

An image of Owen, his face pressed into the mattress, accompanied the text.

You’re right, this is the perfect way to test a mattress. I stand corrected.

My finger hovered, but I couldn’t resist responding.

A tried-and-true Scottish tradition. You’ll fit in just fine.

That’s the plan. Good night, Shona.

Good night, Owen. Welcome to Loren Brae.

CHAPTER FIVE

Shona

It was a dark and stormy night when Sabrina went missing.

A rumble of thunder mirrored the mood of the true crime podcast that I was listening to as I finished potting the last of my dahlias to bring inside for the winter. Humming, I moved on to my chili plants, knowing that Lia liked to add some of the spicier ones to dishes at Grasshopper. Even though it was early autumn, I worried for an early frost that could harm some of my tender plants, and I’d already started the process of moving my more vulnerable plants into the greenhouse.

Dragged through the bushes, the police found footprints in the mud on the trail.

A blur of movement caught my eye, and I stopped, tilting my head at a bed of tomato plants across thegreenhouse. A shiver of awareness rippled across my skin, and my hand tightened on the trowel I held. Not that I was sure what I’d do with said trowel, but the podcast had me on edge. If it was a rat, I’d have to set a live trap like I normally did, not bludgeon the poor thing to death with a gardening trowel. Despite many of the farmers at the market poking fun at me for my tender-hearted ways, I’d never been able to bring myself to use kill traps for rodents. I liked to think they’d developed a level of respect for me over the years, or maybe just enjoyed the scraps I left for them out front of the cottage and away from the gardens, but either way, I now rarely had problems with them.

A crack of thunder boomed overhead, and I jumped, a nervous giggle caught in my throat, as I bent and peered at the tray that held several large thriving tomato plants.

“Well, hello there. Who are you?” I laughed down at a gnome statue that one of my assistants must have tucked into the bushes. While the red hat was cheerful, the biker vest, tattoos, and tartan kilt threw me a bit. Not your traditional gnome, that was for sure, though the long grey beard looked on point. “Grumpy wee lad, aren’t you?” I booped his nose, then shrieked when he jumped backwards.

“The only thing wee is your smarts, lass.”

“What the?—”

“Hey, Shona, sorry we didn’t knock, but it’s a dreich day out.”

I whirled, my heart hammering in my chest, as Agnes and Sophie rushed into the greenhouse, closing the door quickly behind them to keep out the rain.

Blood was spattered across the hood of the abandoned car.

“Yeesh, what are you listening to?” Agnes crinkled hernose as my podcast continued in the background, and I tried to catch my breath. Glancing back at the tomatoes, I saw that the gnome was nowhere to be seen.Had I hallucinated him?

“Are you okay?” Sophie, the American lass who had inherited MacAlpine Castle, asked. With strawberry-blonde hair, a curvy body, and an open smiling face, Sophie was as fresh-faced as my daisies on a pretty spring morning. She wore a tattered UCLA sweatshirt, jeans, and thick-soled boots along with a jacket. In contrast, Agnes looked like the funky bookshop owner she was, with slim-fit mustard-yellow corduroy pants, a deep teal jumper, and a slew of necklaces at her throat. “I could have sworn I heard a scream.”

“Maybe it was this grisly podcast?” Agnes mock shivered, and I reached in my pocket for my phone to turn the podcast off. My hand shook as I stared down at the screen, my thoughts piling on top of each other like cars colliding, and I blew my breath out in a slow steady stream to calm my heart rate.

“You’re not looking so good. Might I suggest listening to a romance audiobook instead? Just as much tension as true crime, but the payoff is much sweeter,” Agnes continued. I met her eyes, blinking slowly as her words registered, and then shook my head to clear my thoughts.

“Sorry, my mind is on other things. Hoping things are okay with the new guest.” I glanced surreptitiously behind me, but the gnome was nowhere to be found. If there even had been a gnome.

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