Page 2 of Highland Games
Zoe was white with fear but Prosecco made her bold. ‘Shoo! Shoo! Be off with you!’
The bear raised itself to its full height.
‘A loaf of bread? You threw a loaf of bread at me?’
Oh god, it was a man. A man-bear. Out of the frying pan into the fire. ‘I’ve got a gun! Get off my land! Or… I’ll shoot you!’
The man-bear slouched back against the outhouse, tossing the loaf from paw to paw. ‘No, you don’t, and this isn’t your land.’
‘Yes, it bloody well is!’
Zoe was furious. She was thirty per cent cold, sixty per cent drunk and one hundred per cent scared so stupid she’d thought bears roamed wild in Scotland. To top it off, some intruder was now saying this wasn’t her land? She reached back into the bag, grabbed a can and threw it with pinpoint accuracy, hitting him on the shoulder.
It bounced off.He must be made of steel.
‘Let me guess,’ he drawled. ‘Baked beans?’
She pulled out another and threw it at him. ‘Get! Off! My! Land!’ she yelled; each word punctuated by another grocery item sailing through the air. When the bag was empty, she balled it up and threw it after her food. It unravelled and fell to the floor by her feet.
‘Have you finished?’
Zoe was silent, thinking of what else she had left. Her boots? The man-bear walked towards her, holding the loaf at arm’s length. The wolf – okay, dog–at his heels, wagging its tail. They climbed the steps to the porch where she was standing.
‘Yours?’ If words were an eyebrow, this one was arched.
Zoe snatched it, squinting up at him. His face was obscured by the darkness. ‘I told you,’ she hissed, ‘get off my fucking land.’
He leaned in and she leaned back. ‘It’s not your fucking land,’ he whispered.
‘Yes, it bloody well is! My great-uncle gave it to me.’
He stepped back, surprised. ‘Mad Willie?’
‘It’s great-uncle Willie to you!’
He crossed his arms in front of him. ‘So then, niece ofgreat-uncleWillie, is the land freehold or leasehold?’
Zoe paused. How did he know? ‘I own the leasehold for the next thirty years.’
‘Ahh, so it’s not really yours then. It belongs to the Kinloch estate.’
Zoe was beyond anger, beyond fear. This massive oaf had nearly given her a heart attack and now he was telling her it wasn’t her land? She took a big breath, intending to let him have it, when he interrupted.
‘So, may I ask why you threw a loaf of bread at me?’
Zoe stopped, set off course. ‘I thought you were a bear,’ she replied without thinking.
Silence.
Then the man-bear started laughing.
The sound was even bigger than him, splitting the darkness with unrepressed joy and echoing across the loch to the other side of the valley. Zoe’s toes tingled as the deck reverberated under her feet. He laughed as if he couldn’t stop, his huge frame doubled over as he gasped for breath. He was wheezing now, each howl punctuated by ‘A bear! Abear!’
‘I don’t see what’s so funny.’
The man tried to control himself. ‘It’s Scotland, not bloody Yellowstone! Have you come here looking for pixies? Maybe a little Nessie spotting?’ He started laughing again at his own joke, guffawing at her.
‘I’m here to live, you buffoon! And it’s not funny. You scared the shit out of me. And anyway, who the hell are you? And what are you doing sniffing around my house in the dead of night?’
