“I’m coming.” He slung the case over his shoulder, descended the stairs quickly, and took his coat from the front hall. “Grab your keys. You’re driving today.”
Kylee looked surprised, but she took her rucksack and followed him outside to where her Volkswagen was parked behind his Ford Focus. The tiny cars in the United Kingdom had been a surprisingly difficult readjustment after years in the United States. He’d tried to talk Kylee into something a little bigger and a little safer, but she had insisted on this supermini in case she moved to the city center at some point. A reasonable plan, but it still meant feeling like a sardine squeezed into a can whenever he rode with her.
He didn’t complain when she turned the radio to a pop station the minute they crossed the Skye bridge—those were the rules: the driver chose the music—and instead cracked open the web-design book.
After a few minutes she glanced over at him. “What are you reading?”
“XML and CSS. Thrilling, right?”
“Sounds like good craic. My next question is why?”
“I asked Serena to take over the hotel’s social media. I’m working on tying it in to the hotel website.”
“That’s a good idea!”
He shot her a wry smile, even though she missed it because she was responsibly keeping her eyes on the road. “Don’t sound so surprised, Kylee. It does happen every once in a while.”
“Sorry. You know that’s not what I meant. I didn’t know you even had an Instagram account.”
“Well, now that I’ve retired my eight-track and you’ve shown me those newfangled things called MP3s, I figured I’d go all the way with the technology.”
Kylee snorted, but she didn’t apologize. With typical teenage centricity, she assumed that anyone over the age of twenty had no idea what was going on in the world, never mind the fact that Malcolm had made a career of writing software for cutting-edge technology. He just smiled to himself and returned to his reading. Despite the adjustment inherent in the move back to Skye and taking on a responsibility he’d thought was still years in the future, he liked Kylee. She was smart and funny, just like Nicola. When she started singing along with the radio, he reminded himself to add talented to the list. God only knew where she had inherited her singing ability, because when the rest of the family sang, the neighborhood dogs joined in.
He’d refreshed his cascading style sheet knowledge and gotten a disturbingly thorough education on the Top 40 by the time Kylee made the turnoff to the small commercial section of Fort William, where her voice teacher was located. She made a quick detour and pulled up in front of a pub called the Blooming Fuchsia. “Pick you up in two hours?”
“I’ll be waiting. Have fun.” He climbed out and watched the red car drive off before heading inside.
It was early to be in a pub, but the Blooming Fuchsia opened at seven o’clock and served an excellent breakfast. As soon as he set foot in the clubby interior, with its dark paneling and polished mahogany bar, a young blonde woman appeared from the back, wearing a bright smile.
“Morning, Malcolm! Your usual?”
“If you wouldn’t mind, Janine. I’m going to grab a booth.”
He settled in at one of the large corner booths, knowing the pub didn’t start picking up steam until after noon on Saturday, and took out his laptop. He nodded his thanks to Janine when she left his tea, mixed with milk and sugar, and then he brought up a code editor on-screen. He’d already found some open source social media widget code; all it would take was a few tweaks to make it work with their existing site and save him hours of coding and testing.
“Kylee at her voice lesson?”
Malcolm looked up as Janine set his Scottish breakfast order on the table. “She is. How have things been around here?”
“Not bad. My mum’s moving to Aberdeen with her new boyfriend. Just been helping her pack.”
“Do you still have family in the Highlands?”
“My dad, but I don’t see him much. Leaves me lots of free time.” She looked flattered by the question, which made him regret that he’d engaged. She always seemed to leave openings as if she were hoping he’d ask her out. Which wasn’t going to happen. Not only was she at least ten years younger than he—he guessed about twenty to his thirty-three—but she wasn’t his type. He’d never gone for the slender blondes, especially when they reminded him so much of his niece.
Unbidden, Serena’s image rose in his mind by means of comparison. Hard to pretend that he didn’t at least have a little bit of a thing for his boss when that happened with such regularity. He cleared his throat. “Nice to see you, Janine, but I need to finish this before Kylee comes back.”
“Oh, right. Sure. Just let me know if you need anything. I’ll be right over there.”
Definitely flirting. Malcolm smiled vaguely. “Thanks, I will.”
He hadn’t finished the changes by the time Kylee walked into the pub, but he was close. He saved his work and shut the laptop. “How did it go?”
“Good. We’re working on one of Rosina’s arias from The Barber of Seville. Which is brilliant, because it’s for a coloratura mezzo-soprano, and I’m almost a true contralto.”
He only understood about five words of that sentence, though he was pretty sure the opera was an Italian comedy. He remembered because he’d thought it was funny that a story set in Spain was written in Italian. Still, he gave her an encouraging smile. She wasn’t at all an operatic singer—she wanted to be a singer-songwriter, after all—but she threw herself after anything that would help her reach her ultimate goals. He wanted to encourage that kind of work ethic. “Ready to go, then? You can tell me all about Rosana in the car.”
“Rosina.”
“That’s what I said.” He ruffled her hair, knowing it irritated her, then waved good-bye to Janine behind the bar.
They walked out to where the Polo was parked at the curb, dodging a foursome on their way into the pub. Kylee grinned at him. “You know that girl has been wanting you to ask her out for the last six months.”
“The fact you called her a girl is exactly why I would never do it. She could be one of your friends.”
“You know, you could totally date. It would be okay with me.”
Malcolm got into the car, hoping that she would drop the subject on her way to the driver’s seat, but she persisted.
“Really. I mean, I feel bad that you and Teresa split up when you left—”
“That was Teresa’s doing,” Malcolm said, “not yours. So don’t waste any thought on that. Besides, there’s no point in dating when we have no idea where we’ll end up next.”
He expected her to turn on the ignition, but she just sat there. “What if we stay in Scotland? The University of Glasgow has a good music program, and I’ve already been accepted.”
He frowned. “What’s this about, Kylee? I thought you were keen on going to America.”
She swallowed hard and reached into her pocket, then brought up an e-mail on her phone. His stomach sank as he read the return address: UCLA. He read only as far as it took to see it was a flat rejection. She reached over him to swipe to another message, this one from Berklee College of Music, her first choice. He steeled himself for the bad news.
“Wait, this isn’t a rejection,” he said. “You’re on the waiting list.”
“Same thing. It’s not like any spaces are going to open up. Everyone who gets in attends.”
Malcolm clicked off the screen and handed the phone back to her. “I’m sorry, Kylee. I know how much you wanted this.”
She shrugged, her throat working and her long lashes fluttering as she blinked away tears. “It’s okay. I knew it was a long shot. I mean, at least they didn’t reject me, right? They thought I had talent, but it’s not like I’ve had the world-class training here that some of the other kids had. I’ve heard the program is hellishly competitive.”
Malcolm hesitated and then put an arm around her and gave her a tight hug. “I’m proud of you, Kylee. You’re so
talented, I have no doubt that you’ll end up where you’re supposed to be. You can always try a couple of years at Glasgow, and then if you still want to go to America, transfer in as a junior. Or you can do your undergrad program here and then apply for a diploma program at Berklee. You told me admissions for that are less competitive.”
“You’d do that? Stay here in Scotland?”
“Of course I would. We’re a family. That means we look out for each other.” He gave her a little nudge. “Now let’s get going. It looks like rain.”
Kylee was quiet on the way home, but not mopey. He was proud of her maturity. He would have had difficulty dealing with that kind of disappointment at her age, but here she was considering all the options. With her determination, there was no doubt she would make her way in the music business one way or another, even catch the eye of a record label. She had her father’s brains, her mother’s tenacity, and plenty of God-given talent. Malcolm might not be able to claim any credit for that, but at least he could give her every opportunity within his power.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
SERENA FIT THE KEY INTO THE LOCK, balancing a box on her hip as she pushed the door to the croft house open. Even though clouds still threatened overhead, the ever-present rain had finally tapered off, giving her a small window in which to move her trunkful of possessions into their new, if temporary, home.
She wandered into the kitchen and set the box on the table, where she found a note in Malcolm’s messy scrawl: Welcome home. I’ll be back at 8 if you need any help getting warmed up.
Very funny. Leave it to him to lace an innocent welcome note with innuendo.
Except maybe he didn’t mean it as innuendo. Serena shivered and rubbed her arms. The outside temperature had risen several degrees, but the inside remained as cold as it had been when she first looked at the croft house. Hadn’t he turned on the heat as he said he would? She went to the unit on the far side of the kitchen and touched the radiator coils. Frigid.
Too late she remembered her insistence that she could handle the job herself. She knelt before the unit and searched for the knob that would open the valve to let the hot water in. And realized that there was no knob, only a screw that required a spanner to open.
She sat back on her heels, frustrated. She could wait for Malcolm to come home from work and do it for her as part of his duties as landlord. Or she could drive to the hotel and get a set of adjustables. Both of which felt like letting Malcolm win. No doubt he was expecting her to do one of those very things.
Instead, Serena got back into her car and turned toward Broadford, where the nearest hardware store was located. She really should have tools at hand anyway, especially this far away from the nearest handyman. Forty-five minutes later, she was back with a full set of adjustable spanners in different sizes. After checking that the boiler had been filled—it had been—she turned it on to heat the water while she put away the few kitchen items she’d brought from home. This croft house, unlike the cottage rental on Sleat, had only a handful of pots, utensils, and plates in the kitchen cabinets. She would have to go home for the rest. No point in owning a spare set when this was just a temporary arrangement.
Serena had their clothes hung in their small wardrobes and folded into the narrow chests of drawers when the boiler finally came up to temperature. She went around to the main radiator in the lounge and bled out the air from the system until water spurted into the catch bowl she placed beneath it. Then all there was left to do was open the rest of the valves.
Malcolm had to think she would be waiting on him to come home and turn them on for her. He probably imagined her shivering in her winter coat and cursing her own stubbornness. Clearly she didn’t need him, evidenced by the heat beginning to radiate from the metal coils.
She spent the next several hours cleaning every surface of the kitchen and bath with supplies she’d brought from Nairn, until she was satisfied she had banished every last germ. Only then did she allow herself to plop onto her sofa and sit back contentedly. The croft house was perfect. Quaint and traditional but still comfortable. It was just what she’d had in mind when she envisioned their island interlude on Skye.
There was enough time to go to the co-op for groceries before she had to pick up Em and Max from Muriel’s. Maybe there would even be time to bake some of her signature shortbread together before supper.
When she brought her children to their new home, their reactions were exactly as she’d hoped. “This is it?” Em asked, jumping out of the car the instant Serena parked. “It’s so tiny and cute!”
Serena retrieved Max from the car seat, and both children bolted for the front door. “You each have your own bedroom. Go have a look.” They darted inside as soon as Serena unlatched the door, but she lingered on the front porch for a moment, her eyes drawn to the house next door, barely visible through the bare trees on the property line. The drive was empty. She didn’t expect to have much contact with Malcolm outside of work anyway.
“Mum, look!”
Serena dragged herself inside toward Em’s excited voice. After the children explored every corner of their new home, she set them up at the table to help her measure and mix ingredients for shortbread.
“I love it here,” Em said, her eyes shining over the dusting of flour on her nose. “It’s like a little fairy-tale cottage, isn’t it?”
Serena smiled over her shoulder. “It certainly is. Our own little place in the woods, just the three of us.”
Serena started awake, her eyes snapping open and searching the dark. Her alarm clock showed it was just after eleven. What had woken her? Was it simply the unfamiliar sounds of their new accommodations, the settling of the old house? As she listened, she caught the sound again, faintly: Max, calling her name.
She threw aside her duvet and took the stairs as quickly as she dared in the dark. Once she reached the bottom floor, she knew something was wrong. The cold damp hit her like a physical force, the contrast between her toasty loft and the icy lower floor causing gooseflesh to break out over her bare arms and legs.
When she entered Max’s room, he was sitting up in bed, his eyes wide. “It’s really cold, Mummy!”
She placed a hand on his radiator, even though she knew the answer. Frigid.
“Mum?” Em poked her head into Max’s room, her duvet wrapped around her shoulders. “My room’s cold. What happened to the rads?”
“I don’t know, sweetie, but the one upstairs is working. Why don’t you climb into my bed while I figure it out?”
They immediately scampered out of the room, their feet pounding up the wooden steps. Serena leaned against the wall with a groan, then jerked away when her bare skin hit cold plaster. Clearly the insulation in this old house left something to be desired if the temperature had dropped so quickly after the radiators turned off.
Blast Malcolm. But no, she had only herself to blame. Had she taken his offer of help, he would have turned them on and tested them thoroughly on Friday. Could they wait it out until tomorrow? The sprawl of her already-sleeping children across her bed answered for her. If she were to get any rest tonight, she’d have to swallow her pride, no matter how bitter it tasted. Maybe Malcolm would still be awake. She found her mobile phone and dialed his number. It went straight to voice mail.
Serena wavered for a long moment. Then she yanked on flannel bottoms and her cardigan, thrust her feet into her wellies, and marched next door. Light glowed through the upstairs window. He’d said they had the same view through their bedroom windows, so that had to be his. He was still awake.
This is a bad idea. A very bad idea. I should just leave.
She forced herself to raise her hand and knock.
The porch light flipped on, and moments later Malcolm opened the door, dressed in a T-shirt and flannel pajama bottoms not unlike hers, his feet bare. He looked over her disheveled state, a lazy smile stretching his lips. “Why, hello, Mrs. Stewart. I didn’t expect a middle-of-the-night visit from you. At least not so soon.”
Serena resisted the urge to roll her eyes. Like it or not, she needed his help. “The radiators died. It’s getting cold in the house.”
“Is that right?” He braced a muscular arm against the doorframe, his smile widening to full amusement.
The infuriating man was going to make her say it. “The kids’ rooms are freezing. Can you . . . will you come over and take a look?”
“All you had to do was ask.” He straightened and dropped his arm. “Go on back. I’ll get my tools.”
Serena had to swallow down a lump that tasted like pride and gratitude mixed, neither palatable. “Thank you.”
“Was it that hard?”
For once he seemed serious, not as though he was baiting her. She gave him a lopsided smile and stepped off the stoop. “You have no idea.”
“I’ll be right there.”
She walked quietly back to the house, her chest feeling tight for a reason she couldn’t pinpoint. She should be grateful, and she was. He could have given her a much harder time about rousing him in the middle of the night. He could have refused. But he’d done neither.
When she let herself into the croft house, she wavered before giving in and heading to the bathroom to brush her teeth and smooth her hair into a ponytail. She was just checking on Em and Max again when a light knock sounded at the door.
Malcolm had dressed in jeans and a heavy jacket, and his toolbox was in hand. When she let him in, he pitched his voice low. “All the rads are cold?”
“All but the one in the loft.”
“Okay then.” He flicked on the lights as he went and knelt before the radiator in the lounge, feeling the coils. “They were working earlier?”
She nodded.
“In that case, they probably just need to be balanced. The hot water likes to stay upstairs, and it can’t get back down to the ground floor.”
“Max and Em are sleeping in my bed, though.”
“I’ll be quiet.” He pulled a torch and a spanner from the toolbox, then gestured for her to precede him up the stairs.
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