“Well, just suck it -” Devon started to say.
She was interrupted by a sharp and loud knock at the door. She and Danny shared confused glances before Danny put her book down and hurried over to open it.
“Devon Childs?” the man on the other side asked, a strong Scottish accent making it almost impossible to understand what he was saying. “I have a proposition for you.”
Danny looked him up and down.
“I might take you up on it,” she said with a sly smile. “I do like a Scot. However, I’m just a lowly teaching and research assistant. You need the lady by the desk.”
Danny stepped aside and let the man into the office. He turned to look at her pointedly. She giggled and did a strange squatting dance.
“I’ll just be going now,” she said quietly. She turned and headed out the door.
Before she shut the door though she mouthed all sorts of obscene and dirty comments at Devon from behind the man’s back. Devon fought hard to hide her laughter and smile.
“Professor Devon Childs?” the man asked again once the door was shut. “Monster hunter?”
“Yes, that is me,” Devon said, standing to shake the man’s hand before she sat back down again. “What can I do for you Mr…?”
“McCallum, Jim McCallum,” he said, taking the seat opposite Devon without prompting. He leaned back in his chair and crossed one leg over the other, resting his ankle on his knee. His arms spread over the back of the seat. He looked like he owned the place. “I need your help.”
“Most people do when they refer to me as a monster hunter,” Devon said. The back of her neck was itching and she shifted in her seat. “So, what exactly do you need my help with?”
“I’m an entrepreneur Miss Childs,” Jim said.
“Professor,” Devon said quickly.
She blinked. Jim blinked. She was slightly taken aback at herself. Normally she didn’t care about her title being used correctly but in this instance she felt like she needed to make it clear exactly how accomplished she was.
“Professor Childs,” Jim said slowly. “I specialise in the leisure industry, particularly hotels and resorts that cater to all kinds of people, from the more relaxed to those seeking a little more… adventure.”
“Ok…” Devon said. “And how do I come in to this?”
“I’m looking to build a new series of resorts on Loch Ness,” Jim said. He looked at her, staring almost.
“Oh…” Devon said. Her mouth thinned until her lips were nothing more than two slim lines. “I see.”
“I thought you would,” Jim said with a cocky smile. “Needless to say I’ve been having a bit of difficulty with the locals. They’re very much opposed to my building around the loch. Nessie is big business for those guys, it’s one of the main reasons the local villages still exist. They think that if I build around the loch then Nessie will get scared off and no more tourists will come to see her. Him. Whatever. It’s all crap of course but their disagreements are making it difficult for me to acquire the local permits.”
“I see,” Devon said quietly. “And you want me to prove, once and for all that there is no Loch Ness Monster, despite the fact that for decades people have been doing just that.”
“Exactly,” Jim said proudly. “Unfortunately the locals tend to ignore those people. They’re not recognised in their fields as having the right background or knowledge.”
“And what makes me any different?” Devon asked. “To be honest Mr. McCallum it sounds like a waste of time for everyone involved.”
“It isn’t!” Jim said, shooting to his feet and planting his hands on the desk. “You’re a well-known monster hunter. You have a history of proving time and again that monsters don’t exist. You are a recognised and respected expert in the field of make believe monsters and proving they’re not real.”
“Cryptozoology,” Devon said coldly. “And I never set out to prove that cryptids don’t exist. I set out to see if they’re real and find out the truth.”
“Miss Childs… Professor Childs,” Jim said. “We both know that there’s no such thing as the Loch Ness Monster. Everyone knows it but these guys up at the loch won’t let it go. If you can provide documented evidence that Nessie isn’t real then I can get my permits.”
“It’s been done Mr. McCallum,” Devon said with a sigh. “I’d be going over ground that’s been trampled over a thousand times before. There’s nothing new in it for me, no mystery, no excitement. I enjoy the thrill of the chase and the chance, even for a few days, that the cryptids I’m looking for might be real. There is nothing like that for me there. I’m sorry but you’ll need to find someone else. I can give you some names but I won’t be coming.”
“Will £500,000 change your mind?” Jim said suddenly. “It’ll be easy work after all, everyone’s already done the work for you. You come, you poke around, do whatever it is you do and then say there’s no Nessie.”
Devon kept her eyes locked on the desk. Her heart was racing. That amount of money was more than she could ever have hoped for. She could fund her research for a very long time with it. She could travel and go to the places that she’d never been to before but always wanted to go to. She could search for cryptids that were international legends. She could set up digs in dozens of countries. She glanced up at Jim. He had a cocky smirk on his face and she wanted to knock it off but the money. Oh god the money.
“I do things my way,” she said firmly. “If I’m going to do this I do it the way I always do. You have to understand that I’m not setting out to disprove Nessie’s existence. I’m doing it to see if she’s there or what other reasons there might be for the stories. Do you understand?”
“Of course,” Jim said with a firm nod. “When can you leave?”
“In a few hours,” Devon said, climbing to her feet. “I’ll pack my bags, sort out some time off with the dean and get Danny to arrange my flight up there. If I feel I need them once I’m there, my team will join me in a few days.”
“Don’t worry about the flight,” Jim said firmly. “I have a helicopter at the local airport. We can head up there together.”
“Oh. Ok,” Devon said quickly. “I’ll meet you at the airport in a couple of hours.”
“Wonderful.” Jim said. He reached out and shook Devon’s hand. “It’s wonderful doing business with you.”
He turned and let himself out of the office. Devon watched him go and collapsed on to her chair. She gave a disbelieving laugh at what had just happened. Danny slowly edged in through the open door.
“You ok boss lady?” she asked quietly. “You kind of look like you’ve been told something either really scary or really amazing.”
“I think it’s both,” Devon said. Her voice was breathy and airy. “Oh my god. What did I just do?”
“What did you do?” Danny asked. “Who did you do? Oh my god! Did you do the Scottish Hottie?!”
Devon blinked and returned to herself. She stared at Danny.
“The Scottish Hottie?!” Devon asked. “Where do you come up with this stuff?”
“What?” Danny said with a shrug. “He’s hot and he’s Scottish. I thought it was obvious.” She threw herself into the chair that Jim had previously been sitting in, her legs dangling over one arm. “So, if you two didn’t bang what did he want?”
“He wants me to go to Loch Ness and disprove the existence of Nessie so that he can build a bunch of hotels there,” Devon said.
“So if you turned him down why did he look so happy?” Danny asked.
“I took him up on his offer,” Devon said reluctantly.
“What?!” Danny shrieked. “But it’s Loch Ness. It’s been done. There’s nothing there that’s exciting or new. At least the Forest of Dean had hot police men and a real mystery!”
“He offered me a lot of money,” Devon said with a sigh. “And I mean A LOT. We could both pay off our student loans with it and still have loads left over.”
“How much is a lot?” Danny said slowly.
Her head was cocked to one side lending her the air of a confused spaniel.
“500 grand,” Devon said.
“Oh. My. God!” Danny cried. She shrieked and leapt to her feet. “Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. When do you leave?”
“In a few hours,” Devon said. “I’m meeting him at the airport and we’re flying up in his helicopter.”
Danny let out a low whistle, her eyebrows once more almost disappearing into her hair.
“Impressive,” she said eventually.
“I know,” Devon said. She paused and shook her head. “There’s something about this though. And him. Something’s not quite right with it all. Can you do me a favour while I go and pack?”
“Sure,” Danny said. “As long as it’s not too much hard work or too boring.”
“You’ll like it, I promise,” Devon said. She got to her feet and began to pull her things together. “I need you to find out everything you can about this guy. Jim McCallum. And I mean everything. What businesses he owns, where he came from, where he went to school. Scandals about his buildings. Anything you can think of.”
“Got it,” Danny said. She squeezed around Devon and took her seat. “Dig up all the dirt I can about the Scottish Hottie. Want it in a discrete folder for when you get a moment alone?”
“That would be best.” Devon said. “I’ll take my laptop but paper copy would be good too. If there’s been objections to his buildings before, I want to know about it. I’ll be back in a few hours to talk to the Department Head and the Dean about taking some time off. I’ll get the folder then.”
“Want me to send one of your minions to the library?” Danny asked. “Get background info about Nessie?”
“This is why you’re my assistant,” Devon said fondly. She leaned over and kissed Danny on the head then turned and headed to the door. “Thinking ahead and knowing what I need.”
“That and I just want to make your minions suffer,” Danny said with an evil grin. She waved her hands in front of herself like a puppet master. “Dance little students, dance!”
“Don’t kill my minions while I’m gone,” Devon said, pausing at the door. “I’ve just got them trained up right.”
“I promise nothing!” Danny called out.
Devon shut the office door with a laugh and then hurried down the corridor.
Three hours later Devon arrived at the airport. She had two heavy bags that contained her clothes and another bag that held her laptop and all of the other equipment she needed to begin her search. The taxi driver very reluctantly helped her to load the bags on to a trolley she brought running over to them. As soon as she’d handed over the money he climbed back into the car and hightailed it out of the car park and on to the motorway. Devon was left standing on the pavement outside of departures and wondering where to go. McCallum hadn’t left her any directions after that point.
“Devon!” A female voice called out. “Devon! Wait up!”
Devon looked around and saw nothing. Then a few cries came from further away and she looked over in their direction. People were shoved to one side, luggage knocked over. The person responsible was a young woman. Devon groaned. It was Danny.
“Thank god I found you,” Danny said when she reached Devon. She leaned her hands on her knees and gasped for breath. “I thought I was gonna miss you.”
“Me too,” Devon said as she looked down at her friend. “What did you find?”
“A lot,” Danny said as she stood up straight. “I got half of your minions looking up about McCallum. It’s all in the files, both paper and hard drive. And then as soon as I told your minions where you were going, they got together and started to look up what they could find about Nessie.”
“I’m guessing that they found a lot,” Devon said.
“Yup,” Danny said.
She straightened and held out the rucksack. Devon took it and opened it. Inside were manila folders and packs of paper. There was a hint of shining black at the bottom of the compartment and a matte black rectangle. Something hard pressed against her hand in one of the pockets. She shifted her grip and opened the pocket to see a few flash drives.
“You’ve got the info about McCallum in there,” Danny said. “It’s in the blue folders. The red ones have the cliff notes version of all the Nessie information we could find; history, images, first hand reports. The flash drives have more information on it and so does the hard drive in the bottom of the bag. We filled up an eReader with all the books we could find about Nessie. There’s a lot of reading there.”
“You are a star,” Devon said, hugging Danny tightly. “I think this should be everything I need. I’ll make sure I get in touch if there’s anything else.”
“No problem boss lady,” Danny said with a wide grin. “Just remember, if you need me up there I’ll be there straight away. And if you don’t, try to bring me back a hunky Scot.”
“I’ll do my best,” Devon said with a laugh. “They might not like me much though, I am trying to disprove their local legend after all.”
“Oh come on,” Danny said, rubbing Devon’s arm. “You’re not trying to disprove Nessie’s existence, you’re just trying to find out if she’s real or not.”
“Either way, I’m going to face trouble and we both know it,” Devon said. She gave a heavy sigh. “Well, I better get going and find McCallum.”
“No need,” Danny said, nodding towards a spot behind Devon’s right shoulder. “Here he comes now,”
Devon turned and saw McCallum striding through the crowd. They parted before him without a thought, it was like he oozed an aura that told them they should move. He strode over to Devon and smiled broadly. Then he gave her a hug.
“Dr. Childs,” he said as he stepped back. “So glad you could make it.”
Devon smiled and nodded.
“Well, come along, my helicopter is waiting for us,” he said confidently. “No need to wait.”
“I’ll see you later Devon,” Danny said, turning away. “Let me know when you get there.”
She disappeared into the crowd, Devon watched her go. She turned back to McCallum and found him looking her up and down. He smiled again when she caught his eye.
“Well, let’s get going,” he said.
He took hold of her trolley and headed off towards the Departures bay. She put the rucksack Danny had given her over her shoulder, picked up her other bag and followed behind meekly.
***
The flight was uneventful. Devon spent most of it reading about Nessie on the eReader Danny had passed on to her. McCallum had tried to entice her into conversation but she hadn’t been able to hear him properly and it had dwindled into silence. A tap on her thigh after an hour or so brought her attention back to her surroundings.
“We’re approaching Loch Ness now,” McCallum shouted, trying his best to be heard over the roar of the engines. “Thought you might want to get a good look.”
Devon lowered her eReader to her knee and looked out of the window. She gasped as she saw the infamous loch for the first time. It stretched for miles between two rows of mountains. The waters were deep and dark, green and swirling. Roads ran along the edges, small houses and people moved down below, looking like ants. Crowds gathered at the loch’s shore, tour buses waited nearby. The helicopter circled the loch, travelling rapidly around its awkward circumference and giving Devon a good view of it all. It was breathtaking.
Then they started to descend, close to a small town near the loch. A crowd gathered in the square to watch and they quickly fell out of sight as the helicopter disappeared behind a strand of trees to land in a car park that was suspiciously empty of cars. Devon put the eReader back in its bag and waited for the engines to cease their roar.
“I’ve made you a booking at a local Bed and Breakfast,” McCallum said, his voice a little lower now. “It’s not the best there is but the food’s pretty decent and there are a few good reviews for it. I can’t guarantee a warm welcome though.”
“There never is
one,” Devon said, gathering her things together. “You get used to it.”
She climbed out of the helicopter, keeping her head low. A man hurried forwards to help her unload her bags and he put them into a shopping trolley of all things. She smirked at that but followed him as he led her to the road. At the entrance to the car park she heard the helicopter engines fire up again and the wind around them picked up. She turned and watched as the copter rose in to the sky, taking her new employer with it.
“He never sticks around long,” the man beside her said. “Comes in, drops off whichever bunch of experts he’s brought along and then gets going. The locals don’t like him much and I can’t say I blame them.”
“Are you a local?” Devon asked as she followed her new guide along the road. “Have you seen Nessie?”
“I’m as local as they come,” the guy said proudly. “Can’t say I’ve ever seen the monster but I think it’s real enough. And I reckon you’ll soon find out yourself.”
“I get the feeling it won’t be easy,” Devon said.
“Oh no, it won’t,” the man said with a laugh. “But nothing fun ever is.”
Devon laughed and kept following him. He led her to a small building decorated with ivy and flowers in hanging baskets. There was a small, neat sign over the entrance, declaring it a B & B. The man unloaded her bags and headed away.
“The booking’s under your name,” he called over his shoulder as he wheeled his cart away. “Good luck!”
She called her goodbyes after him and started to haul her bags up the steps. A man rushed out and grabbed them from her, carrying them inside. She stepped back, slightly startled and watched as he did it. Then he turned to face her and smiled.
“Welcome to Loch Ness,” he said with a thick Scottish accent. “Glad you decided to stay with us. What’s the name?”
“Childs,” Devon said, following him in. “Doctor Devon Childs.”
He froze for a moment when she said her name and then continued walking. His entire demeanour had changed by the time they reached the reception desk, a little table nestled beneath the stairs. He was tense, wound tight and when he turned to look at her again his smile was gone.
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