Her Brooding Scottish Heir

There was no question of letting Milla stay in the bothy without a water supply. She’d have to spend the night at Calcarron. It was the only solution he could offer.

‘You mean I’ll have to stay at Calcarron House?’

The disappointment he’d seen in her eyes haunted him as he nosed the quad down the hillside through clumps of flowering heather. He realised that staying at the house wasn’t exactly what she’d planned, but her reaction had seemed disproportionate to the inconvenience. Shooting parties paid a fortune to stay at Calcarron; surely she could try to view the experience in a more favourable light. It would only be for one night after all.

Yet when he thought about it now he realised that there had been something desperate in the way she’d overruled him about the safety thing. She’d hurried him out of the bothy and he’d assumed that it was because she didn’t want him around. But now he wondered if there was more to it than that. Perhaps Milla O’Brien wanted time away from the world.

If that was the case then coming to Calcarron would feel like an ordeal, not a pleasure. In some respects it was exactly how he felt himself.

He’d reached the old drover’s trail that led across the moors and stopped as a memory seized him. Two carefree boys, racing each other along the track, off to see the standing stones, or to scramble up to the ridge to make dens...

It was a lifetime ago. He could still feel his friend’s presence everywhere, but the images in his mind were smeared with blood now, blurred into memories of dust and death. It wasn’t that Duncan was haunting him. He was haunted by the guilt of living—because it should have been him who died, not Duncan.

Even this warm breath of late sun on his face and the sensation of wind in his hair felt too much like living, felt like a betrayal of his friend. What unknowable shift in the cosmos had carved out their fates that day? Why had he been spared? He’d often wondered about that, but his thoughts always tangled into knots.

Losing Duncan had stripped the joy from his life. Sometimes he tried to find solace in the thought that maybe fate had a higher purpose for him, but he didn’t feel special enough for such grand designs. If he took the opposite view, and believed that every hand he was dealt, good or bad, was completely random, then it seemed that there wasn’t much point to anything, and that scared him even more.

He hadn’t expected fate to deal him a wild card like Milla O’Brien. She unsettled him, and fascinated him, but it was a dangerous fascination.

After tomorrow, she wouldn’t be his problem any more. He had a busy week ahead and it was going to be hard enough to stay sane without those tantalising green eyes stripping away the veneer he’d so carefully applied since Afghanistan.

He accelerated along the track towards home. He knew his father wanted to talk to him about estate business, or rather, the business of him taking over the estate, but he wasn’t ready for that conversation. As the eldest son, his taking over at Calcarron had always been circled on his life map, but he’d never dreamed that that day might come so soon.

He loved this place, and he loved the prospect of being its caretaker sometime in the future, but not yet. He’d built a different life, a life he loved, and leaving it now—especially now—would feel like admitting defeat. It would feel like running away.

He let out the throttle and pushed on faster. Whatever happened, he had to keep his head and stand his ground. If he could make it through the week he’d go back and ask to be reassessed for active duty. The desk job was bleeding him dry. He needed to get back out in the field. He needed to do something that would actually make a difference.

‘You mean I’ll have to stay at Calcarron House?’

Milla was overwhelmed with disappointment and she hadn’t been able to hide it. He’d rescued her at the roadside, so she’d assumed he’d be able to rescue the water situation, but he had been adamant that fixing it would be a long process, although he’d been determinedly vague about the particularities, which had needled her.

‘But I don’t understand how water can suddenly just stop coming through a pipe...’

He’d shifted on his feet. ‘I’m sorry, Milla. I know it’s inconvenient, but there’s nothing I can do until tomorrow.’ He’d thrown her an awkward smile. ‘The house isn’t all that bad, and at least you won’t have to make your own dinner... There’s even a studio you can use—’ he’d run a hand through his hair ‘—if you want to work this evening, that is.’

She’d wondered why there was a studio at the house, but she had been too nettled to ask him about it. It had been all she could do to keep her emotions under control.

Cormac had looked genuinely apologetic, and she didn’t want to be difficult, but going to stay at the big house was the last thing she wanted to do. She’d have to talk to strangers, and be polite and enthusiastic, and the prospect of such an evening sent her spirits crashing. All the little joys she’d been anticipating about her first night at the bothy were collapsing around her like pillars of salt.

When he’d said he’d go on ahead to make sure there was a room ready for her she’d been relieved. She needed some time alone to adjust to this new set of circumstances.

As the sound of the quad receded she climbed the stairs to the mezzanine. Cormac had put her holdall at the foot of the bed, and she toyed with the zip. There didn’t seem much point in unpacking it now. She sat down on the mattress, then fell backwards and stared at the ceiling.

If only she didn’t have to go. This room was a cosy nest and she wanted to hide herself here and never leave. She closed her eyes, then turned over and curled herself into a ball. ‘This is all your fault, Dan. Every single bit of it.’

Dan had been in his final year when she’d arrived at St Martin’s to start her foundation course. He was a big personality—wild, mercurial—and she’d been surprised that he’d even noticed her. She’d felt unequal to him in every way, but when he’d kissed her that first time, whispered that she was his rock, his port in a storm, she’d felt needed in a way that answered some longing deep within herself.

Her father and her brothers had said he was fake. They’d teased her about his ‘Mockney’ accent, laughed at the way he knotted his hair into a bun, and they didn’t get the ink on his arms or the ring through his nose.

Milla had forced herself to ignore them. She had a small tattoo of a stag inked onto her own ankle, and a row of piercings made in her left ear, but deep down she’d hated it that her family wouldn’t buy in to her dream of a life with Daniel Calder-Jones.

She felt sure that her mother would have appreciated Dan’s talent, because Colleen O’Brien had been a teacher and an accomplished artist in her own right. It was through her mother that Milla had learned the language and love of art, discovering a passion which ran through her own veins too.

After her mother’s cancer diagnosis they had still visited galleries together, Colleen’s bald scalp defiantly wrapped in a brightly coloured scarf. How she missed her... Milla felt the familiar tears sliding down her face and let them come.

Dan had relished her family’s disapproval—it had been another layer of drama to fuel his creativity. He was adept at harnessing the ebb and flow of his own life and using it to inspire his art—so good at it, in fact, that he had been offered a residency in Berlin.

Absorbed with her own postgraduate project, Milla had encouraged him to go. She’d thought Berlin, with its vibrant and exciting art scene, would inspire him, and the international experience and contacts would be good for his career.

The night before he’d left, he’d taken her for dinner at their favourite restaurant and proposed. She’d gazed at him, open-mouthed, while everyone in the restaurant had stilled in anticipation. The thing was, Dan didn’t believe in marriage. He’d always said that, and yet there he’d been, gazing at her, waiting for an answer. She’d spluttered a tearful ‘yes’ and to rapturous applause he’d popped a dazzling diamond ring onto her finger.

She’d been so happy. Finally she’d known where the relationship was going—now her family would have to believe that Daniel Calder-Jones really loved her.

He’d been eager to set a date, so they’d agreed on September—he’d be back by then, and she’d have finished her project. It hadn’t left much time to plan a wedding, but she’d thrown herself into it.

She’d found the ideal venue for the country wedding she’d dreamed of—a marquee with pretty bunting. She’d organised a whisky bar for Dan, and trestle tables, wild flowers and traditional music. She had even found the perfect dress—vintage silk and lace with tiny pearls. She’d cried in the bridal boutique because Colleen hadn’t been there to tell her how beautiful she looked.

Everything had been falling into place. And then, three months ago, Dan had flown home unexpectedly to tell her that he’d fallen in love with a German artist called Maria.

Milla had been devastated. To have won his commitment only to lose it again had been too much to bear. She’d stopped eating, stopped sleeping, stopped working.

When her tutor had called her in for a talk she’d ended up crying on his shoulder. He’d advised her to take up photography. He’d suggested taking pictures of anything that caught her eye, for whatever reason. It had been good advice. Instead of trying to create images, she’d spent her days looking for ready-made scenes.

When she’d collated her photographs she had seen a pattern. Pictures of back streets, a single figure in a doorway, a soulful face staring from the window of a café, a couple perched on a broad step, their heads turned in opposite directions...

‘You’re attracted to loneliness,’ her tutor had remarked. ‘Your images remind me of Edward Hopper’s stuff. You should use them to take your work in a new direction.’

And then he’d handed her a brochure.

‘A change of scene might help you get back on track. I’ve stayed at Strathburn Bothy myself. Peace. Isolation. No phone signal, no internet, no distractions. It might be just what you need.’

She sat up and wiped her cheeks with her hands. She looked around the mezzanine bedroom which she was yet to claim as her own. Peace. Isolation... No distractions.

There would be no isolation at Calcarron House, and probably no peace either. As for distractions...

Cormac’s eyes stirred in her memory and she pushed the image out of her head. She would try to make the best of it; it was only one night. Tomorrow she’d be back in this room, and her healing process could really begin.

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