Kilt in Scotland: A Ewe Dunnit Mystery
Kilts & Quilts 8
Patience Griffin
Contents
Books by Patience Griffin
Kilt in Scotland: A Ewe Dunnit Mystery
PRONUNCIATION GUIDE OF NAMES
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Coming March 2021
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Books by Patience Griffin
To Scotland with Love
Praise for Patience Griffin
"Griffin has quilted together a wonderful, heartwarming story that will convince you of the power of love."
-New York Times bestselling author Janet Chapman
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“Griffin’s lyrical and moving debut marks her as a most talented newcomer to the romance genre.”
-Publishers Weekly starred review
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“A fun hop to scenic Scotland for the price of a paperback.”
-Kirkus Reviews
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“Start this heartwarming, romance series!”
-Woman’s World magazine
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“With the backdrop of a beautiful town in Scotland, Griffin’s story is charming and heartwarming. The characters are quirky and wonderful and easy to feel an instant attachment and affection for. Be forewarned: You’re likely to shed happy tears.”
-RT Reviews
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“Ahhh, this series is my own little vacation to a land I love, even if the land in this series is a fictional Scottish fishing village where the men are braw, kilt-wearing, and have full respect for women.”
-Gourmonde Girl
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“The best thing about this series is the way that it touches you as a reader. The characters are deeply written, with flawed characteristics that make them seem familiar – like real people that you know and see every day.”
-Ever After Book Reviews
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“I dearly loved this romance, and I dearly love this series.”
-Book Chill
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“Patience Griffin gets love, loss, and laughter like no other writer of contemporary romance.”
-Grace Burrowes, New York Times bestselling author of the Lonely Lords series and the Windham series
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“Patience Griffin, through her writing, draws the reader into life in small town Scotland. Her use of language and descriptive setting had me feel like I was part of the cast.”
-Open Book Society
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“Griffin has a knack for creating characters that I find engaging from the opening page. I love the Kilts and Quilts series.”
-The Romance Dish
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“I love Patience Griffin!! These Kilts and Quilts books are among my favorites EVER!!!”
-Margie’s Must Reads
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“Ms. Griffin paints a vivid picture of Gandiegow with the ever meddling members of the Kilts and Quilts. Fans of LuAnn McLane and Fiona Lowe will enjoy The Accidental Scot.”
-Harlequin Junkie
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(About The Laird and I) “I have read it. I'm reading it again. *laughing* It is like putting on your softest nightgown and slippers.”
-Becky, a reader
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“This author has a way of choking me up in parts and that does not happen a lot to me. If you are looking for a great series to fall in love with then I suggest you give this one a try.”
-www.AHollandReads.com
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““Patience Griffin seamlessly pieces compelling characters, a spectacular setting, and a poignant romance into a story as warm and beautiful as an heirloom quilt.”
-Diane Kelly, author of the Tara Holloway series
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Books by Patience Griffin
Kilts and Quilts® series:
Romantic Women’s Fiction
#1 To Scotland with Love
#2 Meet Me in Scotland
#3 Some Like It Scottish
#4 The Accidental Scot
#5 The Trouble with Scotland
#6 It Happened in Scotland
#6.5 The Laird and I
#7 Blame It on Scotland
#8 Kilt in Scotland
Kilt in Scotland: A Ewe Dunnit Mystery
Copyright © 2019 by Patience Griffin
First Printing October 2019
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All Rights Reserved
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This book and parts thereof may not be reproduced in any form, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopying, or otherwise without prior written permission of the author and copyright holder, except as provided by the United States of America copyright law. The only exception is for a reviewer who may quote short excerpts in a review.
Cover art by Amy Lockard Ness
Cover design by Kathleen Baldwin
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ISBN 978-1-7320684-5-2
This is a work of fiction. Names, character, places, an incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual person, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locale is entirely coincidental.
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Published by Kilts & Quilts® Publishing
This last year has been incredible and I have a lot of people to thank for helping me with this book…especially PhD, who brought me salads for those nights when I was too busy to cook and for accepting that I’m at my computer night and day.
Special thanks goes to Amy Lockard Ness for creating the beautiful artwork for the cover. You are such a talent. Oh, how this cover makes me smile!
A big thank you goes to Sue Carter and Carin Shaughnessy for being my pattern writer, quilt piecers, and most importantly my friends. You two make me smile and laugh. A lot!
I’m blessed to have Cagney, who drops everything to give me a readthrough.
Thank you to Duckie for stepping in to be my assistant.
I’m so lucky to have made a friend in Karen Gibbs, a fabric genius, also the Creative Director at Banyan Batiks. You’ve made my fabric journey so much fun!
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For Kathleen Baldwin for creating my book cover and for being on the other end of the phone to talk about writing, family, and well, about everything!
PRONUNCIATION GUIDE OF NAMES
Aileen (AY-leen)
Ailsa (AIL-sa)
Bethia (BEE-thee-a)
Buchanan (byoo-KAN-uhn)
Cait (KATE)
Deydie (DI-dee)
Moira (MOY-ra)
Ryn (ren)
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DEFINITIONS
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Blue Badge Guide—An accredited tourist guide who must complete a 1,300-hour training course, plus exams to lead tours in Scotland
céilidh (KAY-lee)—a party/dance
Coach—bus
Dreich—a word to describe cold, dreary weather
P&L—profit and loss statement
Tatties—potatoes
Torch—flashlight
Tavon—pronouncedˈtæv-ɪn
&nb
sp; Trackies—sweatpants
Wynds—pronounced wʌɪnd—narrow street or alley
1
Glasgow, Scotland
Guy Fawkes night
Remember, remember the fifth of November
Gunpowder, treason and plot!
* * *
Tilly Dixon couldn’t get out of her head the chant that she’d heard on the street earlier. Between the stress of finishing the next book in the Quilt to Death series and the noise of Glasgow gearing up for Guy Fawkes Night, Tilly was wound tighter than usual. Her muscles ached. Her eyes hurt. And her brain was fried. She closed the lid of her laptop and stood, stretching, trying to ease the tension from her body.
She felt older than forty-two. Her sister, Marta, younger by two years, had plenty of spring in her step. Spring, though, wasn’t quite the right word. Marta strutted through life, parading around like a queen bee. Tilly trudged. Hours of slumping over a computer and waiting on Marta hand and foot caused Tilly’s misery.
Tilly bent over and tried to adjust the computer chair again. But it was no use. She missed the little things when they were abroad. Her worn, comfortable chair in Marta’s New York apartment for one. They always roughed it when they were here in Scotland, but it seemed as if Tilly was the only one who suffered.
Marta didn’t seem to have a worry in the world. And she didn’t care one whit that the accelerated deadlines of the last three books with Three Seals Publishing had nearly killed Tilly.
Stiff as a corpse, Tilly went to the window of her sister’s fifth-story apartment and gazed out. Marta loved the city. Tilly didn’t. Too loud. Too crowded. She preferred the peace of the Scottish countryside, or the lapping waves along the beach of one of the fishing villages. A place like Gandiegow, which she and Marta had visited once. The memory made Tilly sigh.
November evenings came early in Scotland, the sky ink-black at only four in the afternoon. Anticipation of the celebratory bonfire lay upon the crowded streets below. Tilly wasn’t looking forward to the crack and boom of the fireworks later, hating how they frazzled her poor nerves more than they already were.
The apartment door opened and Tilly turned to see her sister flounce into the room as if she was a twenty-something and not middle-aged. Her new editor, Rance Bettus, trailed behind her and Tilly cringed. It wasn’t just his slicked-back hair, or his fading good-looks that made her skin crawl. His skeevey, unethical behavior was repulsive to Tilly, but apparently, flypaper to Marta. Over the years, there’d been scads of men just like him. Charmers, looking for something in return—money, fame, power—all subpar men. Not the kind of men I write about. The way Marta and Rance were acting, the affair was in full swing, despite Rance being newly married to another.
The affair aside, Tilly couldn’t stand Rance for a lot of reasons—he smoked, he was loud, and he treated Tilly as if she wasn’t even there. But at the top of Tilly’s list was his awful taste in books—all things dystopian. He’d told Tilly once that he couldn’t get enough of the rising body count in Hunger Games and Game of Thrones.
He stood in the doorway carrying a cardboard box the size their author copies usually shipped in.
“Set them on the desk,” Marta commanded.
As he made his way across the room, Rance leered at Marta, skimming her with his eyes, as if he were using his irises to peel off her body-hugging designer suit.
Tilly gagged, a common occurrence when the two of them were around.
Rance wasn’t paying any attention and she had to rush to move her laptop before he crushed it beneath the carton.
She adjusted a flap on the open box so she could look inside. “What’s this?”
Marta pulled out a novel and tossed it to her. Tilly wasn’t expecting the pass and fumbled it. The book was upside down, so she shifted it, bringing the sinister-looking cover into view.
When the title and author registered, it knocked Tilly sideways.
“You wrote a book?” It couldn’t be. Tilly was the writer in their family of two.
But it was indisputable. Marta Dixon was splashed across the top, just like the other nine novels in the Quilt to Death series —a collection of cozy murder mysteries set in the Highlands and centered around the Buttermilk Guild. Tilly turned the book over to see the spine, and sure enough, #10 was printed there, plain as day.
“Hot off the press,” Rance said cheerily. “We better hurry if we’re going to make the launch party in time.”
“Launch party?” This was crazy. Tilly would’ve known. “A launch party. . . for this book? I don’t understand. I’m just finishing book ten! I thought we were in Scotland for a break.”
Marta snatched the paperback from her. “I told you, but you must’ve forgotten. Again. I’ve been working on this book for several years now.”
Which explained why Marta had sequestered herself in her office last year for months, and then Marta had a series of meetings with Three Seals Publishing. When Tilly had asked what the meetings were about, Marta had claimed they were the same-old-same-old.
Marta waved a hand in the air. “It makes no sense that you’ve been slaving away on book ten. You see, the book is done. I’m afraid you’re losing it, Tilly.”
That was a lie. More often these days, her sister would insinuate that Tilly had gone mental, forgetting things Marta had never told her. Always, it turned out, things Marta didn’t really want her to know. But Tilly certainly wasn’t imagining the stabbing pain she felt now. Maybe it was the knife her sister had just plunged into her back.
Marta straightened her scarf, not meeting Tilly’s eyes. “You’ve probably also forgotten that this is the last book. The series is done.”
“Done?” Tilly couldn’t breathe. She wanted to push up the window to get some air. She just couldn’t believe it was true.
Five years ago at a quilt retreat, Marta had come up with the idea of writing a mystery series featuring a group of quilters and suggested that the two of them split the responsibilities. Tilly would write the novels while Marta did everything else, including being the face of the brand. Whenever Tilly felt like she was being taken advantage of, Marta would remind her: You have the easy job—writing. I’m the one who has to do all the heavy lifting. It’s not a walk in the park being Marta Dixon and running this empire. Besides, you hate the limelight. You always have. It was true. Tilly would rather sit in a room alone with the Buttermilk Guild pouring from her fingertips than sign books with a mob of strangers surrounding her.
Marta’s charisma had made the Quilt to Death series a huge success. Tilly stayed in the shadows where she felt comfortable, the ghost writer behind the scenes and, to the outside world, Marta’s assistant.
Tilly crumpled into a chair. “Why would Three Seals sign off on this?”
“I made them an offer they couldn’t refuse.” Marta didn’t elaborate but instead tapped the book against the desk. “We’re done discussing this. The book was released today. The fans are waiting. Now, go get dressed. The book signing starts in an hour.”
“Book signing?” Tilly felt another whammy.
Marta rolled her eyes. “Yes, the book signing is at the bookshop across the street.” She shook her head as if she felt sorry for Tilly. “You must’ve forgotten that, too.”
Tilly stood up and looked through the window and down at the street. A line had formed outside the bookstore.
Marta laid the book on top of the box. “Three Seals has assigned me a new publicist for this book. Her name’s Diana. She seems okay. She and her team are there waiting on us. It’s a big night.” Her sister looked around as if she’d lost something. “Where’s the quilt for the new book? Diana wants to hang it up behind the table where I’ll be signing books.”
Tilly exhaled, feeling as if Marta had dropped an elephant squarely on her chest, breaking her heart in the process. “Is that why you wanted me to get the quilt done so early?” Usually the quilt and corresponding pattern didn’t need to be ready until the novel was released.
&nbs
p; “Seriously, Tilly. I think you’re slipping. I told you all about this.”
But Marta had said nothing. And both she and Marta knew it.
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Gandiegow, Scotland
Deydie hobbled to Quilting Central as fast as she could, paying no mind to the North Sea as the spray hit the walkway, splattering her sturdy Wellies. She wasn’t a spring chick anymore, and this wet morning had her feeling all of her seventy-nine years. But she was on a mission. She’d heard from Bethia, her dearest friend, that it had arrived.
Deydie reached the entrance to Quilting Central and slung open the door. As it was still early, the tables and sewing machines sat unattended. In the reading corner, though, she found the lass she’d been looking for and rushed to her. “Sadie, where is it?”
“Where’s what?” Sadie looked guilty as hell, as if she’d messed around with Deydie’s scissors and ruined a piece of Deydie’s favorite fabric. A capitol offense.
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