PROLOGUE
ELIZA
The ferry to the Isle of Skara leaves from a dock that looks like it was assembled by someone with a grudge against straight lines and a fondness for rotting wood. I stand at the railing, my leather satchel clutched against my chest, watching the Scottish mainland shrink into a gray smudge on the horizon. The September wind whips my auburn hair across my face, and I taste salt on my lips—whether from the sea spray or my own tears, I can't quite say.
Crying over an aunt I met exactly three times in my twenty-nine years seems absurd, yet here I am, red-eyed and clutching a solicitor's letter that has upended my carefully ordered London life with eight words: "Your presence is required to settle the estate."
Required. As if Aunt Maureen had reached from beyond the grave to issue one final summons.
"First time to Skara?" The voice belongs to an elderly man in a wool cap, his face weathered like driftwood. He positions himself at the railing beside me with the confidence of someone who knows he's about to impart important unsolicited wisdom.
"Is it that obvious?" I manage a smile despite my mood.
"Mainlanders always stand at the bow. Islanders know better—that's where you catch the worst of the spray." He gestures to his position near the stern, safe and dry. "What brings you out? Tourism's mostly done for the season."
"Family business." I keep my answer vague, a journalist's reflex. I've spent the better part of a decade asking questions; answering them is another matter entirely.
The man nods as if I've revealed something profound. "Maureen Gordon's niece, then. Thought you might be. You've got the look of her about the eyes."
I startle. I was prepared for the island to be small, but I hadn't expected to be identified before I'd even arrived. "You knew my aunt?"
"Everyone knew Maureen. Lived in that big house overlooking Stormhaven for near on forty years. Kept to herself mostly, especially after..." He trails off, his gaze shifting to the churning water. "Well. The island will tell you its own stories soon enough. I'm Gerry Baxter, by the way. I run the post office and the only taxi service worth the name."
"Eliza Warren." I shake his offered hand, noting the strength in his grip. "I suppose you know why I'm here, then."
"To sort out Maureen's affairs, I'd imagine. Clifftop House has been sitting empty since she passed. Three months now." Gerry's expression turns thoughtful. "Strange business, that. She was healthy as an ox one day, and the next..." He makes a gesture that encompasses the inevitable mystery of death. "Doctor said it was her heart, but then, he says that about most things."
A chill runs down my spine that has nothing to do with the wind. "What do you mean, strange?"
Gerry seems to catch himself. "Nothing for you to worry about, lass. Island folk are superstitious, that's all. Pay no mind to the talk." He pulls his cap lower against the wind. "You'll be wanting a ride up to the house when we dock, I expect?"
"If it's not too much trouble."
"No trouble at all. Consider it a welcome to Skara." His smile doesn't quite reach his eyes. "Though I'll warn you—Clifftop House has been empty long enough that you might find it... unwelcoming. Old houses get that way when nobody tends them."
Before I can respond, a bank of fog rolls across the water like a curtain drawing closed. Within moments, the mainland vanishes entirely, and the ferry pushes forward into a world of gray and mist. The cold creeps through my jacket, and I suppress a shiver.
"There she is," Gerry says, pointing ahead. "The Isle of Skara."
I squint through the fog and make out the dark shape of land emerging from the mist. Steep cliffs rise from the water, their tops hidden in the low-hanging clouds. As the ferry draws closer, I can see the buildings of Stormhaven clustered around a natural harbor—stone cottages with slate roofs, a church with a square tower, and a single main street that climbs up from the waterfront before disappearing into the hills beyond.
It looks like the sort of place where time moves differently, where London and its chaos of traffic and deadlines and pressing assignments exists in another world entirely. I've made my living capturing other people's stories, turning them into neat columns of text for the Sunday supplements. But standing here, watching this ancient island materialize from the fog, I feel like a character in someone else's narrative—and I have no idea what role I'm meant to play.
The ferry bumps against the dock with a groan of old wood and older ropes. A handful of passengers disembark—locals returning from shopping trips to the mainland, judging by their laden bags and the casual way they navigate the swayinggangplank. I follow more carefully, my city boots slipping on the damp wood.
Gerry's taxi turns out to be a battered Land Rover that smells of wet dog and peat smoke. He loads my single suitcase into the back with an efficiency that suggests he's done this countless times, then holds the passenger door open with old-fashioned courtesy.
"It's about a ten-minute drive up to Clifftop House," he says, pulling away from the harbor. "Road gets a bit rough toward the end. Maureen preferred her privacy."
That, at least, matches the little I know about my aunt. The family legend—such as it is—holds that Maureen Gordon scandalized everyone by refusing to marry, leaving London at twenty-five, and exiling herself to this remote island for reasons no one quite understood. My mother spoke of her sister with a mixture of pity and resentment, though she never explained the source of either emotion.
We drive through the village, past a pub called The Drowning Sailor, a small grocery that doubles as a gift shop, and the post office Gerry mentioned. A few locals watch the Land Rover pass with the frank curiosity of people for whom a stranger's arrival counts as news. I wave awkwardly at an elderly woman peering from a cottage window and receive a suspicious glare in return.
"Don't mind Mrs. Burns," Gerry says, catching the exchange. "She's convinced every mainlander is here to buy up property and turn it into holiday lets. Lost her grandson to Edinburgh last year, and she's been bitter about it ever since."
"I'm not here to buy anything. Just to handle the estate."
"Aye, but you're Maureen's heir now. That makes you the owner of Clifftop House whether you want it or not."
