by Marie Laval
Perhaps she could call at Fergus and Marion’s house. They’d put her up for the night, except that Marion was probably watching her favourite soap after a long day’s cleaning, and Fergus would be doing his model making or his crosswords, and it wasn’t fair to impose on them. No, she’d have to toughen up, be a big girl, and go home alone.
As she drove out of Irlwick, the flashing neon sign of a Chinese takeaway caught her eye. She slammed on the brakes and slid the car in a parking spot at the side of the road. She should have thought of it before. Niall loved Chinese food. She’d get a selection of his favourite dishes and stop at his house for a couple of hours.
Thirty minutes later, she was ringing the bell of Niall’s bungalow, a bulging carrier bag in her hand.
It wasn’t Niall who opened the door but his sister Julia.
‘Ah. It’s you.’ Julia’s voice was as sour as her long, narrow face.
‘Hi, Julia,’ Rosalie started in a forced cheerful voice even if she felt equally unhappy to see her. ‘Is Niall in?’
Julia crossed her hands on her chest. ‘No. He went out with Alice.’
‘Really? Where did they go?’ Rosalie couldn’t help the pang of disappointment that her friends should have gone out without inviting her.
Julia narrowed her eyes. ‘A party in Nethy Bridge. What did you want?’
Rosalie lifted the carrier bag. ‘I thought I could share a Chinese with Niall, but I guess I’ll have to eat it on my own.’
‘What about your fancy businessman – Petersen? Is he not with you?’
‘Marc? Oh no, he went back to London earlier today.’
Julia let out a snort. ‘I see. So now he’s left, you come running back to Niall. Well, I have something to say to you, Rosalie Heart. I’ve had enough of seeing my brother suffer because of your fickle ways. You’ve taken him for a fool long enough.’
Taken aback by the animosity in Julia’s voice, Rosalie gasped. ‘I didn’t … I never treated Niall badly.’
‘You’ve kept him on a tight leash for years,’ Julia retorted. ‘You took advantage of his good nature to get your car repairs on the cheap, you called him when you had nobody to go dancing with, and all the time you thought you were better than him. He would have done anything for you, even closed his garage for a week to drive your cab, but no, you chose that foreigner – that Petersen – and cavorted with him all over town. I told Niall tonight that enough was enough, that he should forget about you and try and enjoy himself with someone else for once! So he called Alice and they went out.’
Stunned and dismayed by Julia’s tirade, Rosalie could only shake her head. ‘You’re not being fair, Julia … but I won’t waste my breath arguing with you. I’ll go home now. Goodnight.’
She started to turn round when something Julia said came back to her mind. ‘Hang on a minute. What did you say just then, about Marc Petersen being a businessman? How did you know? Did Alice say anything?’
Julia shrugged. ‘Alice? No. Why would she? I recognised him, that’s all. When I saw him in the café yesterday, I knew his face was familiar but I couldn’t quite place him. It’s only when I went back to the library that I remembered where I’d seen him before. Wait here, I’ll show you what I mean.’
She turned on her heels and disappeared inside the house, only to come back a couple of minutes later, clutching an edition of Newsweek magazine. ‘There, what do you think of that?’ She shoved the magazine into Rosalie’s free hand.
Rosalie stared at the cover. It showed Marc dressed in a smoking suit and an older man who looked so much like him he could only be his father. ‘Slash, burn … and prosper,’ the headline read. ‘Are Petersen and Son the Vikings of International Finance?’ The article was dated from the summer, before Marc’s father’s fatal accident.
‘It makes for interesting reading,’ Julia added. ‘Geoff thought so too.’
Startled, Rosalie looked up. ‘Geoff saw this?’
‘Aye, he did. You know how he loves spending hours searching through the archives, using the computer and chatting with me about his research,’ Julia answered, looking smug.
‘When did he see that magazine?’
‘It was back in July. I had just put it on display when it caught his eye. He flicked through it, found the double page with the article on Petersen and spent almost ten minutes muttering to himself before leaving with it. I had to run after him to get it back. He looked weird, he hardly heard me. Naturally I was curious to read what he’d been so upset about. Well, there’s one thing I can tell you for sure. These Petersens –father and son – they sound like real nasty individuals.’
She suddenly stared at Rosalie, her eyes shining with curiosity. ‘So what’s Marc Petersen doing in Irlwick? It’s all a lie, isn’t it, that he’s learning to drive a cab?’
Suddenly all Rosalie wanted was to be alone and read the magazine. ‘That’s none of your business. Thank you for the magazine. I’ll bring it back tomorrow.’
And before Julia could object, she turned on her heels and walked down the path back to the cab. Sliding behind the wheel, she put the magazine and the carrier bag with the Chinese takeaway on the passenger seat and started the engine.
It didn’t take long to drive back to Raventhorn. The roads were empty, and it had stopped snowing. The castle stood, dark and ominous against a very dark, cloudy night sky. The security lights came on. An owl hooted as she got out and fished for the keys to the kitchen door inside her anorak pocket. She punched the alarm code in, opened the door and flicked the light on. Heavy silence closed in like a thick cloak around her. Feeling lonely and miserable, she slipped her anorak off, put the takeaway cartons in the microwave oven and filled the kettle to make some tea.
Was it only last night that Marc had made love to her? That he had held her, kissed her, made her feel alive and cherished? Tonight the castle felt cold and sad, and as hollow as her heart.
She dished out some fried rice onto a plate, made some tea and sat down, the magazine open on the table in front of her. She looked at the photos first. There were a number of them, of Marc’s father, of his mother Cécile, who the journalist said now lived in the South of France and still modelled occasionally, and of Marc and Kirsty Marsh – the same Kirsty Marsh who had called him last night.
Rosalie’s heart missed a beat. The woman was stunning. Her honey blond hair cut in a smooth bob framed a beautiful face, her elegant dark blue dress emphasised her perfect figure. And to make matters worse, Marc had his arm wrapped around her slim waist and looked as if he never wanted to let go.
Of course … Kirsty must be Marc’s girlfriend. That was why he had warned her the night before that he didn’t want a relationship, that he could only give her the here and now. Rosalie was even surprised he’d found her attractive enough to make love to her.
Feeling suddenly sick, she pushed her fried rice away and made herself focus on the article. Julia was right. It did make for interesting reading. The reporter retraced the story of how Marc’s father had earned his fortune and risen from a humble beginning as a salesman in agricultural machinery in Denmark to make the Sunday Times’ rich list for the past twenty-five years. It was basically what Marc had said. His father bought failing companies, closed them down and sold their assets to the highest bidder. Sometimes he restarted them, hired new staff, injected a lot of cash then sold them off for a huge profit. No matter how many jobs were lost, how many families or communities were thrown into dire financial circumstances, he never negotiated, never changed his mind, never altered his course of action.
His son Marc, the reporter wrote, was, like him, an astute businessman who kept his eyes firmly set on the company’s balance sheet. After successfully managing and expanding Petersen’s Paris office for several years there were now plans for him to relocate to New York together with Kirsty Marsh, one of the firm’s bright new stars.
The reporter speculated that the move may be seen as a damage limitation exercise following the suicide of Patri
ck Van Bernd, an industrialist from Northern France. Van Bernd’s luxury chocolate production and distribution outfit had been bought up by the Paris branch of Petersen and Son. It had been forced to shut down – only to re-open under a new brand name and with a completely new set of staff a few weeks later and to become one of Petersen’s success stories. Van Bernd had asked, and been refused, the right to return to his former company as executive manager. He had suffered a severe mental breakdown, his family had disintegrated – his teenage daughter had been killed in a drink driving accident, his wife taken an overdose of sleeping tablets shortly after. The evening after his wife’s funeral, Van Bernd had driven his Jaguar to a local beauty spot and shot himself.
‘Oh my God.’ Rosalie pressed her fist to her mouth.
Kirsty Marsh was quoted as saying that the world of business was indeed a harsh place and that not everybody was cut out for it. Under no circumstances could Sigmund and Marc Petersen be held responsible for Peter Van Bernd’s decision to end his life. Van Bernd had played, and lost, and there was nothing more to say. She also said that Marc had acknowledged not letting Van Bernd return to work had been an error of judgement on his part but did not admit any responsibility in the tragedy.
A knot curled and tightened inside her, her mouth went dry. A man was dead, a whole family destroyed, and Marc talked of error of judgement? What kind of cold, ruthless man had she fallen in love with? Her breath came out fast and shallow, and she felt so dizzy she feared she might faint.
In her haste to grab hold of her cup of tea and sip some of the hot drink to calm herself down, she almost missed the short fixture about Marc’s family and the old sepia photos of the North Jutland farm where his ancestors had lived and worked for centuries.
She blinked, put the cup down and lifted the magazine closer to her eyes. ‘I don’t believe this.’
In the far corner of the photo of a very tall man dressed in a dark suit, holding a wide-brimmed hat, was a standing stone depicting a series of runic inscriptions around what appeared to be the carving of a large raven surrounded by a dozen smaller ones.
Pushing her chair back, she jumped to her feet and searched the kitchen cabinets for the magnifying glass she knew Lorna kept to read her old recipe books. Surely she was mistaken. There were hundreds of carvings of ravens on standing stones in Denmark, what were the odds that the Petersen stone had the same design as Harald’s shield?
She took the magnifying glass from the cabinet and held her breath as she pressed it against the photo. There was no mistake. It looked exactly the same. No wonder Geoff had walked away from the library in a daze. He must have thought this was the breakthrough he’d been waiting for all these years. At last he could trace Harald back to where he came from – Hantsholm in North Jutland.
And even more accurately, the farm of Marc Petersen’s ancestors.
The magnifying glass slipped from her fingers onto the table. Did it mean that Marc was a descendant of Harald’s? Suddenly Geoff’s decision to sell Raventhorn to the Petersens took on an entirely new meaning. Perhaps it wasn’t so much because Geoff needed money that he’d approached Marc and his father, but because he wanted to reunite them with their family history. Perhaps he believed they could help him find Harald’s treasure at last.
If only Geoff would wake up and she could talk to him!
She looked at Marc’s photo again. If he and his father hadn’t slain and murdered men in battle like Harald had, they had driven men to despair and destroyed families in their relentless pursuit for wealth. Shaking her head in disgust, she threw the magazine on the table and walked out of the kitchen and went up to the drawing room, where she drew the curtains and made a fire. How cold she felt – how numb, lonely, and lost.
A soft, melancholic tune behind her startled her. It was the ringtone from Marc’s new phone, which she quickly located, jammed between the cushions of the sofa. She pulled it out, flipped the cover open and saw a text from Carl FitzPatrick.
Need to meet at your Paris office asap. Please.
She recalled Marc’s cold voice as he spoke to the man. It was clear that he was another of his business victims – a man desperate enough to beg. Disgusted, she threw the phone so hard it bounced off the leather sofa and landed near the waste-paper bin. Just how many people had Marc and his father driven to despair before profiteering from the company they had set up and had been unlucky enough to lose? She would phone the office number Marc had given her and relay FitzPatrick’s message in the morning.
As she picked the phone up, she spotted the writing on a piece of paper in the bin. She pulled it out. I’m watching you.
She gasped in shock, and glanced around, almost expecting to see a threatening figure step out of the shadows. Then she remembered the note Marc had peeled off the windscreen after their lunch at Alice’s café. He hadn’t said anything, because he probably didn’t want to worry her.
So, once again, someone was trying to intimidate her.
Well, whoever they were, she wouldn’t give them the satisfaction of seeing her running scared. She wouldn’t abandon Raventhorn, and she certainly wasn’t going to give up Love Taxis. She would carry on as normal. She scrunched the note into a ball and threw it into the fire.
Chapter Twenty
‘It’s been almost two weeks since his bypass operation. Shouldn’t he be awake by now?’
Still holding Geoff’s hand, Rosalie turned to the nurse.
‘His body is in shock, you must give him time,’ the nurse replied, whilst checking the wires connecting Geoff to several machines that beeped and flashed by the bedside.
What if time didn’t make any difference? What if Geoff never got any better? What if he was going to die, just like her mother? Rosalie swallowed hard and looked at the man she had loved like a father for as long as she could remember. His face was sallow and thin, with deep grooves at the sides of his mouth. A drip kept him fed and hydrated, but the operation had taken its toll. He looked like the ghost of the vibrant man he had once been.
‘Keep on talking to him. Even when they’re asleep, hearing the voice of a loved one can do patients a world of good.’ The nurse gave her an encouraging smile before leaving the room, the rubber soles of her white shoes squeaking on the lino flooring.
Rosalie squeezed Geoff’s hand again and bent down to kiss it.
‘You’ll get through this,’ she said in a choked voice. ‘You have to. You may be the most annoying man I’ve ever known, but I miss you.’
She didn’t know how much he heard or understood, but once she started talking the words kept tumbling out. ‘The police still haven’t found any clue regarding the Porsche. I still can’t believe anyone tampered with the brakes and caused you to crash, but then again many things have happened since that I didn’t think possible. You selling Raventhorn, for a start.’ And me falling in love with the most unsuitable man alive.
The room was silent except for the medical equipment whirring and beeping softly. It was warm too. Her body weary and her head fuzzy from exhaustion, she slumped back in the chair and closed her eyes.
She had been far too restless to sleep the night before. After reading the article about Marc and his father once again, she had retrieved a bunch of keys from the study and climbed the stairs to the second floor gallery where Geoff kept the artefacts generations of McBrides had collected over the centuries. It was one of the few rooms that were always locked.
It had been a while since she’d ventured into the turret she used to call the treasure room when she was a child. The wooden door squealed as she pushed it open. Switching on the light, she’d breathed in the dusty smell that permeated the place. Tall glass cabinets lined the walls, filled with a collection of random objects – combs and hairbrushes, claymores and dirks, belt buckles, diaries and old recipe books, amulets and a few items of jewellery that hadn’t been sold off to pay for fuel or tax bills.
Geoff’s prized possession glinted dully from behind the glass –Harald’s shield,
which had been found on the shore of Loch Armathiel after the Dane swam to Isobel’s rescue. The raven engraved at the centre stared straight at her. It was the same design as on the runestone on the Petersen’s Danish farm.
Rosalie opened her eyes and leaned closer to Geoff. ‘Julia Murray gave me a copy of the magazine with the article about Petersen,’ she said. ‘I saw the photo of the runestone on their family farm. The raven looks exactly like Harald’s shield, doesn’t it? Is that why you sold Petersen the estate – because you thought there was a connection between his family and Harald?’
She waited a few moments but there was no reaction.
‘Talking about Petersen,’ she added, ‘something very strange happened a couple of nights ago.’
She told Geoff about Marc swimming into the loch in some kind of trance and how she’d helped him get out. ‘He denied it but I’m sure it had something to do with Isobel.’ She sighed, and pushed away the memories of what had happened after they had returned to the manor house. ‘I never really believed in your ghost stories, but Marc said he’s seen her before, even if he thinks it’s only somebody playing tricks. Now I’m not so sure, and I can’t help thinking that he was lucky … very lucky.’
She paused, and stroked Geoff’s cold hand. ‘By the way, Rupert came to Raventhorn the other night, supposedly to retrieve some documents he said he left behind, together with a diary too … I think he’s up to something.’
This time Geoff’s fingers trembled under hers. Rosalie leapt to her feet and leaned over the bed. Geoff’s eyelids twitched a few times, as if he wanted to open his eyes but was too weak.
‘Geoff? What is it?’
His hand slid sideways on the covers – a small, jerky movement only, but a movement nonetheless. Frantic, she looked at the window and the nurses’ station outside the intensive care room and gestured to one of the nurses.