Max took a bite of the teething biscuit. “If they did go to lunch, I’d be interrupting their get-acquainted time. These things aren’t bad.”
“Try dunking them in banana pudding for a real delicacy. Does Henry feel hot to you?”
Max laid the back of his hand against Henry’s forehead. “He feels fussy-warm, not sick-hot. I could text Elias.”
“You have the uh-oh feeling, don’t you?” Jeannie asked, beginning another lap around the kitchen with Henry.
“Something like it. Maura is unhappy with me, and the staff reports haven’t been reassuring. She’s shutting them out, spending more time in her room, less time in the garden. She loves to make things grow.”
“Then she and Violet should have a lot to discuss.”
True, because Violet Brodie was a farmer whose agricultural know-how was growing into a thriving e-commerce business.
“I’ll give it another thirty minutes.” Though Max had asked Elias to call him, to let him know how Maura had taken to a meal shared with strangers. She could be shy, but she liked most people, and most people liked her.
Or pretended to. Whatever her shortcomings, Maura could tell the difference more accurately than Max could.
If Elias blows this…
“Henry’s asleep,” Jeannie said, leaning against Max. “Wake us in forty-five minutes, please. If I let him have more than that, we’ll be up all night again.”
She kissed Max’s cheek and left the kitchen, Henry in her arms.
The uh-oh feeling, as she’d called it, stayed with Max. He got out his phone and scrolled to Elias the Earl in his contacts.
The phone rang as Max was pressing his finger to Elias’s number. His lordship calling. “Maitland, I know you’ll want a report.”
Elias’s tone was annoyed, but then, Elias was usually annoyed with Max, and that sentiment was mutual.
“First, I’d like to hear about that time little Elias got lost in the wine cellar. Sounds like a terrific version of My First Hangover, and don’t think to hold out on me because Granny MacPhee will tell me anything now that we’ve shared a wee dram of the Islay.”
“Why in God’s name….?” He broke off to say something to somebody on the other end. Max couldn’t make out the words, but the tone was worried. “I wasn’t lost in the wine cellars,” Elias went on. “I was lost in the tunnel between the wine cellars. Somebody came along and shut the cellar door, cut out all the light, and there I was, in complete darkness for hours. Amazing how easy it is to get disoriented when you’re virtually blind in a strange place, but that’s a tale for another time.”
An odd sensation prickled over Max’s nape. “What tunnel?”
“The tunnel between the wine cellars,” Elias said slowly, as if speaking to a simpleton. “A proper Victorian dinner party could go through a hundred bottles of wine, and having the help scampering all over the hillside at all hours wasn’t the done thing. The wine cellars for the Hall and the castle connect, as do their root cellars, though they use separate tunnels, not that any of this matters now.”
Tunnels. “Where are these damned tunnels?”
“We can discuss the damned tunnels later, Maitland.”
“Right. How’s Maura?” A slight pause on Elias’s end had Max forgetting all about tunnels. “Elias?”
“This is what I’ve been trying to tell you. Maura has either gone for a walk without telling anybody or she’s missing. The staff doesn’t know whether she left last night or this morning. In any case, it’s too soon to file a missing-persons report, though a public alert might be in the works. I’m sorry, Max. The staff has been desperately hoping she’d turn up, and they aren’t required to notify you until she’s been gone for twenty-four hours. Violet and I got here fifteen minutes ago, and I’ve spent fourteen-and-a-half of those minutes yelling.”
Chapter Nineteen
The night had been long and hellish.
Max had spent hours poking around in the Hall’s cellars and basements, more hours exploring the castle’s dungeons. Every thirty minutes, Elias or Violet had texted an update on the search for Maura, though most of those updates had degenerated into “nothing to report.”
A housemate had revealed that Maura was intent on traveling to Scotland. The authorities at Baltimore-Washington International Airport, Reagan National, Dulles International Airport, and Newark Liberty International Airport had all been alerted, all to no avail. Maura’s ATM card hadn’t been used since Friday morning, she hadn’t left a note, nobody had seen her leave the property.
And Zebedee Brodie, the previous earl, hadn’t left any clues about where the tunnel entrances had been.
Max sat on the front steps of the Hall, morning sun warming his face. Fergus, Hugh, and Dinty had been briefed as soon as they’d reported for work, and half the crews were loose in the bowels of the castle, tapping walls and telling each other to shut up.
Hours ago, Jeannie had set a plate of bacon, eggs, and toast before Max, kissed his cheek, and told him to get some rest.
He couldn’t rest, not while Maura was missing, not while Sutherland was plotting the ruin of a great project—and destroying Max’s future with Jeannie.
Sutherland had sent out an email alerting the other investors to a possible board meeting at two p.m., the earliest possible time to hold such a meeting. Maguire had kindly forwarded that email to Max, along with a terse direction to “plan accordingly.”
Max had several theories regarding Maguire’s agenda. The Irishman hadn’t promised to thwart Sutherland, but neither had he asked Max to resign. Max did not for one instant consider Maguire an ally. At best, Maguire was “my enemy’s enemy.”
Please, God, let Maura be safe.
The eagles were enjoying the midday air, cruising thermals and gliding over the treetops. In the pastures, shaggy red cattle and wooly sheep munched grass, and closer to the village, a tributary to the Dee sparkled silver in the summer sunshine.
“I will be damned if I’ll let Sutherland wreck this.”
Max was too keyed up to sleep, too worried to relax, and too frustrated to sit still. His feet were taking him into the village before he’d made the decision to leave the porch. The Earl’s Pint was open—Sutherland’s meeting was in less than two hours—and Max’s body needed fuel.
He did not need to see Shayla Walters coming out of the Pint. She looked well rested, her hair was in a tidy bun, and her blue jeans and blazer were her normal construction-site attire. She wore some sort of hiking boots that looked both chic and safe, and her signature rose perfume wafted on the air along with the scent of fish and chips coming from the white paper bag in her hand.
“Max. Hello.” Not a hint of sheepishness.
“Shayla. I gather you’ve been invited to Sutherland’s meeting?”
“I’m available if Pete needs an engineering perspective on any unresolved issues.”
Oh, right. “Maguire said he might attend as well.”
“We’ll patch everybody in for a video con, if it comes to that. You can still resign.”
Which we was she using? Certainly not the Scottish we, not the castle’s we, not any we Max wanted to be a part of.
“I won’t be resigning. If you and Sutherland want to take that castle, you’ll have to fight for it with everything you’ve got, and you’ll still fail.” He walked past her before he said anything less civil. Maura is missing, Sutherland is a flaming jerk, and this is not a game.
“Max, it doesn’t have to be like this. Business is business.”
He let the door to the Pint swing closed and stayed on the porch. “When did business become an excuse to act without a conscience? When did business become synonymous with ‘three for me and none for anybody else’? When did business become permission to carry on like a hypoglycemic three-year-old overdue for a nap? Engineers build the future, Shay. That’s business. We solve problems. That’s our business. We fix what isn’t working, we improve what is. That’s what we do. The rest is noise, greed, an
d distraction. When did you forget that?”
She stared at him as if some snappy comeback had disappeared from the tip of her tongue, and Max left her on the steps, trying to get her designer sunglasses disentangled from her hair.
“Mr. Maitland,” Fern called from behind the bar. “Will it be fish and chips?”
Over in the corner, Granny MacPhee and her partner in crime were playing cards with the solemn focus of chess masters. A white terrier was curled at the feet of an old guy with a half-dozen fishing lures pinned to his deerstalker hat.
In the kitchen, somebody was singing Ae Fond Kiss.
“Fish and chips, with lemon if you have any.”
“Ma—another fish and chips,” Fern bellowed. “Granny stole the garnish tray, if it’s lemon you’re after. Approach with caution.”
Max saluted with two fingers and made his way to the gin tournament. “Sorry to interrupt, ladies.”
“That’s gin!” Granny crowed, laying down her cards. “You’re my good-luck charm, Mr. Maitland. Save me a dance on Friday.”
“That would be my pleasure.” If I’m still here. “Are you ladies done with the garnishes?”
Somebody had left a single green olive on a plastic sword toothpick.
“Could do with a bit more lemon for my tea,” the loser said. “Do you play cards, Mr. Maitland?”
She was some relation to Dinty, a great-aunt or second cousin. Mrs. MacIntyre?
“I played hearts some in law school.”
“’Tis a fine game, in its way,” Granny said, stealing the last olive. “In my grandmama’s day, they had grand card parties up at the Hall. The men would play poker for days, and the ladies always had a table or two of their own. Scandalous stakes, my gran said, and scandalous goings-on too, sometimes.”
“Your grandmother attended those parties?”
“Ach, of course not, Mr. Maitland. The MacPhees are humble folk. My grandma was an inside maid for Countess Mary, helped her set up the first infirmary during the Great War. When I was a girl, Gran took me all around the kitchens and pantries, showed me the little trolley that ran from the distillery to the cellars, and let me have a wee ride in it.”
Mrs. MacIntyre began collecting the cards. “Dinty says the tracks are still there in the old brewery. Ready for another round, Augusta?”
Max took an unoccupied chair because his knees had abruptly gone unreliable. “You toured the kitchens when you were a girl?”
Granny patted his hand. “Decades ago, laddie. Nothing to see there now but a lot of dust and cobwebs.”
“Do you recall where the tunnels were that connected the castle and the Hall?”
“Which tunnel are you asking about? One runs from the Hall’s butler’s pantry to the castle’s brewery—the old brewery, which Countess Eulie turned into a still room, and another runs from the castle’s old wine cellar—the one that was a dungeon—to the Hall’s laundry.”
“That’s the porcelain room now,” Mrs. MacIntyre said. “Mrs. Hamilton can show you if she hasn’t already. The Hall has a fortune in china and silver. Zebedee would lend it out for weddings and wakes. Are we playing another round, Augusta?”
“Could I ask you ladies to draw me a diagram of the tunnels?”
“If you fetch me some more olives, I’ll be happy to.”
Max set a clean napkin and pen on the table and switched out a full garnish tray for the one Granny had plundered.
“There’s your diagram,” Granny said. “Zebedee didn’t want anybody using the tunnels after Elias got lost that time, but those tunnels date back to Roman times and are part of the reason nobody could besiege the castle. We always had a back door that was easy to defend.”
There it was in black and white, and when presented as a schematic, the location of the tunnels made perfect sense. The Hall and the castle nearly touched footprints, and the tunnels traversed the short distance between them.
“Ladies, I can’t tell you how useful this information is. You’ve saved the castle.” He kissed them each on the cheek, collected his lunch from Fern at the bar, and left the Pint at a fast jog.
“Where’s Maitland?” Fergus asked.
“I don’t know.” Jeannie kept her voice down, because Pete Sutherland and an obnoxiously trim brunette were poring over site maps at the conference table across the room. The lady had signed in on the visitor’s log as Shay Walters, PE. She’d slapped on a hard hat and stuck her nose into nearly every corner of the castle, though Fergus had promised not to let her out of his sight.
Was Shay short for Shayla? What were the chances…?
“Do we have time to tour the Hall?” Ms. Walters asked.
“If there’s one thing I do not respect in a woman,” Fergus muttered, “it’s using her kitten voice in a professional setting.”
“If there’s one thing I do not respect in a man,” Jeannie retorted, “it’s judging a woman for doing what she must to get her ideas across in a male-dominated workplace. Who’s this?”
A tall, auburn-haired man was striding across the bailey, peering about at the walls as if deciding where a trebuchet would be best positioned for hurling boiling oil.
“Another bloody investor, would be my guess,” Fergus said. “Time I put on my ‘I’m just the poor dumb site manager’ hat. Phone Maitland and tell him the vultures are converging.”
“You phone him. They can’t start their meeting until two p.m.”
“It’s after one,” Fergus said. “Maitland better get his arse in gear if he’s going to stop this invasion.”
Henry was being blessedly quiet after the weekend’s uproar, and neither Mr. Sutherland nor Ms. Walters had said anything about the oddity of having a playpen in the project office.
The auburn-haired man let himself into the office. “Hullo. I’m looking for Max Maitland.”
Aren’t we all? “I’m sure he’s on-site somewhere, sir. Is there something I can help you with?”
“You’re Jeannie Cromarty. I know your cousin Elias. My name’s Connor Maguire.”
Shay Walters emerged from the other room. “Mr. Maguire. This is an unexpected pleasure. I’m Shayla Walters.”
Shayla was also working a smile and a walk that frankly impressed Jeannie. Just the right blend of welcome and confidence, with a hint of territorial prowl.
Maguire didn’t shake her hand; he merely held it, Continental style. Point to the gentleman, because that gesture caused Ms. Walters to blush. “A pleasure, Ms. Walters. Is that Sutherland’s voice I hear?”
“Pete is wrapping up a residential purchase,” Ms. Walters replied. “The closing was yesterday, and he had to courier the documents to some lawyer’s office in Aberdeen. Have you seen the castle?”
It’s not your castle to show him. Rather than add that helpful fact to the conversation, Jeannie texted Max: Maguire flirting with Ms. Walters. Score is tied. Where the feck are you?
As if her text had conjured him, Max strolled into the project office, looking like Dinty on the losing end of a shinty tournament. His jeans were dusty, his Oxford shirt was streaked with dirt, and the knuckles of his left hand were scraped.
“Greetings, Maguire. Ms. Walters.” Max didn’t offer anybody a handshake. “Has the firing squad assembled?”
Maguire’s smile showed a lot of teeth. “I’m not sure why we have the pleasure of Ms. Walters’s company, but I’m here because Sutherland might call a board meeting in a very few minutes. Then too, I like to see where my money’s going. You must be Max Maitland.”
“Connor Maguire,” Pete Sutherland said, jamming a phone in his pocket with one hand and sticking out the other as he emerged from the conference room. “I thought I heard your voice. Glad you could make it. Welcome to Brodie Castle.”
It’s not your castle to welcome him to.
“You’ve interrupted my fishing, Sutherland,” Maguire said, “and my impatience with poorly run meetings is deservedly legendary. What are we doing here?”
“I can answer that,” Max
said. “But perhaps we can conduct this discussion in the conference room, rather than in Ms. Cromarty’s office.”
“Fine idea.” Sutherland’s tone was overly hearty. “The conference room it is.”
“Ms. Cromarty will join us,” Max said.
“Why?” The question came from Shayla Walters, who had no business asking anybody anything.
“Because I’m the project controller,” Jeannie replied. “To the extent that any decisions made rely on schedules, budgets, incurred costs, or labor hours, I’m the expert.” A simple fact, not even a threat.
Ms. Walters turned a simper on Jeannie. “While you’re being so expert, who will watch the, um, baby?” She waggled a thumb in the direction of Henry’s playpen.
“He’s fast asleep. If we leave the door cracked, I’ll hear him when he wakes.”
“Half of Deeside will hear him,” Max said, “and this should be a very short meeting.” He led the way into the conference room. Jeannie brought up the rear, and she left the door wide open.
In case anybody was inclined to toss Ms. Walters out on her rubbishing ear.
To have to conduct this meeting while Maura was missing was a handy summation of everything wrong about working for Pete Sutherland and his usual gang of greedy idiots. Elias had sent along some silver linings: Maura hadn’t been spotted at any bus terminals, airports, or train stations, most of which had excellent security. The weather in Maryland had been mild and dry all weekend. No significant withdrawals had been made from her bank account.
She was either safe or…
Max cut off that thought, because it was too awful to allow. He’d not informed Maura of his second change of plans until midmorning Sunday her time. She’d been discovered missing less than two hours later. With any luck, she was camping in some field near her cottage, having a good mad, and missing indoor plumbing.
And the instant Sutherland adjourned his witch hunt, Max was heading straight back to the airport.
“We don’t need to do this the hard way,” Sutherland said.
Scotland to the Max Page 27