Highland Fling

by Emma Baird

  CHAPTER 17

  As instructed, I have Instagram open the next time Jack walks into the house while I am working. Kirsty and the bad boy billionaire exchange plenty of smouldering looks, fingers creeping towards each other on tables and heads tilted to touch. Jack’s eyes narrow as soon as he sees them and I click out, trying to make it seem like a coincidence I was on the site when he came in.

  “You follow Kirsty?” he asks, and I nod, telling him it’s for Mena’s sake so I can tell her what her owner is doing and let Kirsty see pictures—most of which get far more likes and comments than anything else on my feed. He sighs, and his hand goes to his head, rubbing the top. Blast, blast, double blast. For all I thought bad boy billionaire photos were a dumb idea, Kirsty is Christina the Dating Guru. She knows what she’s doing.

  Resolution two, I chant to myself. Throw Yourself into Your New Job. I pull up the new Highland Tours Outlander Experience website I’ve been working on to show him. Jack sent me a list of where he planned to take tourists and what the tour comprised. I spent a few hours with a pen and paper sketching an outline of what it might be like, and voila... here it is, almost ready.

  He looks at it. “What do you need me to do? Write about the tours?”

  I nod. “The thing is... I think you also need to take advantage of your similarity to Sam Heughan and front this campaign.”

  He jangles his keys and regards me warily. “And?”

  “A photo shoot,” I say, watching as he groans and closes his eyes. “In the full get-up, so that as soon as people land on the site, they see Jamie Fraser, aka you.”

  “I was afraid you’d say that. Isn’t it dishonest?”

  “No, because there will be a caption clearly stating your name.” What I don’t add is that it doesn’t matter. People zone in on pictures and skim the text. First impressions will be a tour that is led by actual Jamie Fraser or the actor who plays him, anyway.

  “I know a terrific photographer in Glasgow,” I add. “Christy, a woman who’s worked with me on the Blissful Beauty account. She could get pictures of you when you’re in Glasgow tomorrow kicking your heels waiting for your tourists to finish at the People’s Palace, and she could Photoshop the images of you onto a Glencoe backdrop or something.”

  He agrees after only one further protest, and I phone Christy to arrange the photo shoot for tomorrow, not letting onto Jack that I’d checked out her availability beforehand.

  She phones me the next day. “Gaby, if I wasn’t a deliriously happily married woman, I don’t know how I’d have kept my hands off this guy. I will have to keep most the pics for my portfolio so I can drool—I mean, show them to clients and impress them.”

  When I see them, I’m blown away. Future clients will admire the sharp focus, and the seamless Photoshop use where you couldn’t tell the pictures had been taken in a studio and not in the wilds of Scotland. As for how Jack looks... Most of the time, people are much better looking in real life than they are in photos. Photography flattens eyes and mouths, and liveliness is a big part of what makes us appealing and interesting.

  These photos though. Christy can do magical things with a camera, and that includes capturing a person’s essence or aura. The red-headed man with his arms folded and wearing a warm, welcoming begs you to join his tour. I defy anyone to pass up that invitation. When my screen times out because I’ve stared at the pictures too long, I know Christy has done an excellent job at the same time as not over-flattering the guy.

  I keep the website to a few pages. At some point, Jack plans to merge or re-do his existing website. In the meantime, Stewart has set up a basic WordPress site, done some research on Google Analytics to suggest keywords to use, and set up five pages—a landing page, an ‘about us’, about the tour and some info relating to the filming of Outlander in Scotland. I left it to Jack to fill in the information himself and adjusted the template with boxes, images and formatting.

  “What do you think?” I say to him when he returns on Tuesday night, flicking through the pages one by one and trying not to hover too long on the landing page as I do when I’m on my own. “Your website is ready to go.”

  Apart from grimacing at the large image of himself on the landing page, Jack nods his head. “It’s good, Gaby. Thanks.”

  I deflate at the comment. Good? Flippin’ fan-dabby-dozy would be a better word, but then I’m not working with Dexter. And wouldn’t I rather have a ‘good’ from Jack and no alterations, than three million ‘awe-somely amazings’ from Dexter, along with an extensive list of everything that needs to be changed?

  “Send me an invoice,” he says, “and I’ll get it paid right away. Then all I need to do is wait for the orders flood in, right? As Darcy said, I could end up booked till 2050 should the Lord spare me.”

  Don’t wink at me, I order, while the other part of my brain wills him to, anyway. When he does, the slow, lazy sweep of it does unhealthy things to my pulse.

  After he signs off the work I’ve done on the website, I don’t see Jack for two days, but he drops by later that week. He gives me a quick hello before heading off to pick up the latest group from their trip to Callendar. My heart starts its disobedient fluttering thing as soon as I hear him at the door. It goes into overdrive when he smiles at me right away, the usual wariness absent.

  “Hey,” he sketches me a wave. “What are you working on today?”

  I point at the screen and the updated Lochalshie web pages, and he leans in to study it more closely. “Steady, Gaby,” my mind warns. The swoop in brought him close enough for our faces to be side by side and that heavenly scent of him—pine and warm skin—all around me.

  “Looks good, Gaby-sketch.”

  The nickname is new, and as imaginative titles go, it isn’t up there with the best, but I love it anyway seeing as it comes from him and no-one else calls me that. He stands up straight again and ruffles my hair, a habit I wouldn’t tolerate from anyone else. I’d found an article on the Dating Guru’s website the other day which said hair ruffling was a no-no along with silly nicknames. It was the thing guys did to girls they felt brotherly and not ‘brothely’ towards. Blame Katya for that terrible phrase.

  “Do you want a coffee and some shortbread, Gaby-sketch?” he calls from the kitchen and I shout back a ‘yes’. When I let myself in earlier, I’d been able to smell baking and had so far held back, a heroic triumph of willpower.

  “How are the tour bookings for next year’s Outlander tours going?” I call through.

  No answer. He comes through a few minutes later bearing two steaming mugs of coffee and a plate of shortbread.

  “Ah. Nothing yet from the website.”

  He sets the coffee down next to me and takes the armchair opposite.

  I’m flabbergasted. What on earth doesn’t appeal to people about the Highland Tours authentic Outlander experience?

  I waffle about how it is early days, and the site is bound to take off soon, what with the fancy stuff Stewart has put in place and Darcy’s one-woman efforts to spread the word via that photo of the two of us at Doune Castle.

  But two days later and the situation is the same. Not one booking has come in through the new website. I’m taking it personally. The Outlander tour idea was mine. It took Jack a while to come round to it, but when he did, he wanted me to design the pages for him. And he’s already paid me, a transaction that was excruciatingly embarrassing as I hate taking money from people I know.

  The tickets sale failure offends my professionalism too. I know that websites don’t get found just because they’re pretty. Stewart’s magic should have brought people to the site, so why weren’t they booking up? Had I judged this wrongly? They looked at the pages, decided the design was so dull, Jack’s tours must be boring or unexciting and left straight away? I can’t ask my colleagues at Bespoke Design what they think as the job was what plumbers and decorators call a ‘homer’, in other words done without the knowledge of your primary employer, and cash in hand. If Melissa got wind of
it, her continued tolerance for my remote working would grind to a halt.

  The following day, I ask again when I bump into Jack as I’m leaving his house for the day. Despite it being 8pm, it still feels like broad daylight, the advantage the locals tell me of being that bit closer to the North Pole than England at this time of year. The artist in me admires the way the sun touches Jack’s hair, all rippling, bright gleams of red. He’s wearing aviator sunglasses too, whipping them off to talk to me apologising for being that kind of poser. He can wear them all day if he wants; they’re perfect for his face shape sitting right on his cheekbones and emphasising their slant.

  “Nope, sorry,” he shakes his head. “I have had no bookings through the website. But Kirsty’s been in touch. She’s promised to spread the word among her London friends.”

  Oh, double drat, blast and curses. Where does this fit into the ‘hooking a commitment-phobe’ plan? Might it be step four: make yourself indispensable to him? Kirsty’s a social media star. She knows all the tricks to get a person or website noticed, and she has six-figure followers on all her platforms. Business will fly in. Jack will fall at her feet. Thanks, Kirsty! How did I not notice how useful you are as well as being drop-dead gorgeous? They’ll be engaged in a month at this rate.

  Disturbing film footage plays in my head—Jack and Kirsty sit on The One Show’s sofa opposite Alex Jones and the farmer guy whose name no-one ever remembers.

  “So, Jack!” Alex trills, everyone in the audience noticing she has to tear her eyes from Jack. “You and Kirsty split briefly earlier this year, didn’t you?”

  Jack can’t help himself, jumping in to answer the question. “Yes. I was stupid and blind. I didn’t realise how awesome and amazing Kirsty is.” (He’s morphed into Dexter in this scenario.)

  “And Kirsty,” Alex’s dulcet Welsh tones continue. “You used a 10-step process to get Jack to commit to you, didn’t you?”

  Kirsty holds up her left hand, waggling her fingers and facing the camera, expression triumphant. On her fourth finger is a diamond ring that re-writes the definition of bling it’s so big and shiny. “Yes, I did, and if your viewers sign up for my online course, they too can find the man of their dreams!”

  “... but I’m not sure if—Gaby?”

  I snap back to the present, relieved to escape The One Show fantasy. Jack stares at me, eyes creased in puzzlement.

  “Are you okay, Gaby-sketch? You went pale there.”

  “Fine, fine,” I mutter, “anyway, gotta go. Mena to feed and all that.”

  I dart off, desperate to escape before I make a fool of myself (again). Brain to speech engagement isn’t my top skill. The longer I stay staring at those cheekbones, the likelier I am to beg him to let me lick them or something.

  See? Safer to retreat.

  CHAPTER 18

  As it often does, the loch calls to me—walk alongside me and your mood will change. Guaranteed.

  A rare evening—the wind has dropped and the waters are glassily still, apart from the small dog who keeps running in and out of the loch just in front of the Lochside Welcome. He spots me and dashes over, little legs carrying him much quicker than you’d expert from a wee, overweight terrier. As soon as he’s in front of me, furious shaking coats my light-coloured jeans in dirty water. Thanks, Scottie.

  “Sorry aboot that, Gaby,” Stewart says. When the loch whispered to me, promising relaxation and calm, she said nothing about Stewart. Ah well. Coding Websites Part 352 coming up...

  “Aye, so a lot o’ people think ye cannae eat porridge in the summer but...”

  Argh. It’s the porridge monologue instead. I settle in for the duration, fixing my eyes at the buoy in the middle of the loch that bobs gently on the surface. In breath, one two three, out breath one two three four.

  “Some folks say if ye eat enough porridge, the midges keep away too, because they dinnae like...”

  I turn up my face to catch the sun’s rays and let Stewart’s words wash over me.

  “So Jack was sayin’ there’s no’ been any bookings through his website yet. But I was looking—Scottie!”

  The yell pulls me out of my trance. Stewart runs towards the water. I rest my hand on my head and search the scene for Scottie, who’s nowhere in sight. I belt after Stewart, and we stop at the loch edge and scour the waters.

  “There!” I yell. In the distance, a small white head bobs, disappears from view briefly and re-surfaces.

  “Scottie, Scottie!” The two of us scream as hard as we can, trying to encourage the little dog to use his strength to battle the current and swim back to us. Behind us, the drinkers in the Lochside Welcome add their shouts. Despite the encouragement, he gets no closer, the effort of keeping his little head above water too much.

  “I cannae swim,” Stewart bleats, wild-eyed and red-faced, and I spot the beginnings of tears in his eyes. “What am I going to do?”

  “Ashley’s got a dinghy. You could use that,” Some helpful soul calls out behind us. “Mind, it’s got a hole in it.”

  I blow out a deep breath. At school, I was a champion swimmer. I even represented Norfolk a few times. But that was when I was fit, exercise having fallen by the wayside when I left school. I was also swimming in large, heated indoor pools and one hundred percent sure of what was under my feet. I stare at the water and see stones, swimming wriggly things and jellyfish. Urgh.

  The greater good, Gaby. I take off my trainers, hand Stewart my bag, breathe in and out as deeply as I can, and wade in.

  The shock of the water hits me at once. It’s so cold my fingers and toes numb. The ground beneath sinks away quickly and I’m forced to swim—a good thing as now I don’t need to worry about sharp stones underfoot. I take a few seconds to work out which direction to go but then Scottie’s little white head appears and I sum up all my years of five am training and plough through the water to reach him.

  When I get there, he barks at me feebly, and I swear his tail wags underwater. But how am I going to get him back to the shore? It comes to me. Those five am training sessions included a lot of backstroke sessions. As a front crawl competitor, that wasn’t my discipline, but our coach made us do everything and emphasised the backstroke because it was so good for building core strength and engaging the upper back muscles.

  “Scottie,” I say through chattering teeth, “please be as good as gold and go along with what I do, right?”

  He barks, and I assume agreement turning from my doggie paddle beside him and pulling him on top of me. It’s far from ideal. Those backstroke sessions didn’t involve carrying a weight. Stewart has slipped his dog too many slices of pizza under the tables at the Lochside Welcome, but after a little wriggling around, Scottie settles back against me. I use alternate arms and as much leg strength as I can muster to propel us both back to the shores.

  By the time we reach the shallows, we are both shaking so much you can almost hear our bones rattling. I clutch the dog to me and stumble out, spitting out mouthfuls of loch water. The sun’s still out, but it does nothing to warm me up.

  Stewart races towards me. We have gathered a small crowd as well as the Lochside Welcome drinkers who line the fence at the back and give me a round of applause.

  I hand over Scottie and Stewart pulls the dog towards him. “Ye bad wee dog! I’ve telt ye before about running off. C’mon. Let’s get you home and dried off.”

  He only just remembers to look back as he hurries away. “Thanks Gaby! Awfy obliged to ye. Again.”

  Ashley shouts out I can have a pint for free if I want.

  A pint? It’ll freeze rock-hard the moment it makes contact with my lips. My fingers are blue with cold.

  “N-n-no, th-th-thanks. I’ll j-j-just get back to the h-h-house.”

  “Here, have this.” Jack materialises beside me, armed with a thick, dark green coloured woollen blanket he must have fetched from his house. He throws it around me, pulling it close so I’m encased from head to toe. It smells of him and I wonder if he sleeps in it, the
thought making me tingle.

  He takes out a small hip flask. “Take a mouthful or two of this.”

  “I don’t like whisky,” I squawk, but he tells me to drink it, anyway. I obey, and fire hits the back of my throat. It’s followed by a warmth that seeps through my body and stops the bone rattling.

  Mhari, one of the evening drinkers, wanders over to join us.

  “I havenae swam in the loch for years! It’s Baltic in there. But fair play to you, Gaby. I got it all on film. D’ye want to see it?”

  She flashes her phone in front of my face. I close my eyes. The adrenaline, the cold and the whiskey have combined to make me shaky on my feet, and I start to sway.

  Jack grabs hold of my arm. “Come on, I’ll take you home,” he says. “I’ll call my mum out to take a look at you.”

  I don’t know if I can put one foot in front of the other, and I wish he’d sweep me up in his arms and take me back to the house. Even if it is a silly romantic cliché. I settle for stumbling after him and when he notices, he slows down and wraps an arm around me. If only that didn’t feel so amazing. I can’t work out if it’s the blanket or him I can smell, that heady mix of pine, skin and whatever deodorant or aftershave he wears.

  My hands shake too much to put the key in the door lock, but Jack still has his spare key, and he opens the door and bustles me in. Thanks to the large windows at the front of the house, the all-day sunshine has turned the living room into a greenhouse, all-enveloping warmth. I sway on my feet, and Jack takes my arms and lowers me into the depths of the armchair near the window, allowing soft cushioning to envelop me. Behind me, I hear him opening and shutting doors in the kitchen and he returns minutes later with a steaming mug.

  “Hot chocolate,” he says. “I should have given you that first, rather than the whisky. My mum will be here in ten minutes.”

  Sadly, it’s more like five minutes. When she opens the door and bustles in, I’ve not even finished my hot chocolate. Off-duty, I had the doctor down as a tweed and mum jeans wearer, but she’s dressed in a 50s style dress and make-up that would do Marilyn Monroe proud. And she’s mastered the Victory Rolls, a hairstyle I’ve tried and failed hundreds of times.