The town looks like it’s been lifted straight from a postcard. Rows of cheerful houses curve around the harbor, each one painted in soft pastels—sunshine yellow next to seafoam green, coral pink rubbing shoulders with sky blue.
“The hotel!” I gasp at the majestic building up in the mountains overlooking Portree.
Clachmòr House—Gaelic for “big stone,” which feels like underselling it the way calling the Sistine Chapel “a decent ceiling” would. Built in the seventeenth century and acquired by McLaren Hotels a few years ago for major restoration.
It rises from the trees, towers capped with conical roofs like it’s auditioning for a moody Scottish version of Disneyland.
Looking down at this magical place where I’m going to be living and working for the next few weeks, something unexpected flutters in my chest.
Not anxiety.
Excitement. Actual, heart-racing excitement.
“She’s quite something, isn’t she?” Patrick says, pride written across his face. “Still takes my breath away.”
I can’t help smiling. “She?”
“The best things in life are always female. The land, the sea, things that can bring a man to his knees.” His eyes flick to me for the briefest second. “Scotland herself. She’s dangerous that way.”
I make a noise in my throat. That’s… unexpectedly poetic.
“Jake mentioned your grandad was from Skye?” I ask casually. I know Patrick used to spend summers here as a kid. I am, after all, a woman of research.
“That’s right. He would’ve loved seeing it restored like this. It was crumbling in his day. Shame he didn’t live long enough to see it brought back to life.”
“Wow. He would’ve been so proud.”
He shrugs, but I catch the flicker of boyish pride breaking through his billionaire CEO exterior. He loves this hotel. It’s written all over his face.
Minutes later, the nose of the helicopter tips. The rotors change pitch, that deep thrum turning sharper as the helicopter starts to descend. My stomach drops with it. At least going up maintains the illusion of moving away from things that could impale us.
“Golf Charlie Mike, Portree traffic,” Patrick says into the radio, calm as ever, “inbound to private site Clachmòr House, landing to the west.”
I squint through the window and immediately regret having eyes.
All I can see below are murderous-looking trees.
“That clearing’stiny,” I say. “Like, there’s no margin for error. Are we certain this is where we want to land? Have we considered… not?”
The bastard chuckles. “I don’t think anyone’s questioned my flying competence this thoroughly in a single day. I’m reasonably confident I can land this helicopter.”
The whole cabin shakes as we drop. I brace for the bounce off a pine tree.
Then... the softest touchdown. No fiery explosion.
The engine winds down, rotors slowing. My breath comes flooding back. “Oh my God. I’m alive.”
“There was never any doubt,” Patrick says dryly, releasing his harness.
Of course there bloody wasn’t for him. For him, this was the aviation equivalent of parallel parking.
He’s out of his seat and at my door before I’ve even figured out which way the seatbelt clip goes.
The door swings open and Scotland rushes in—pine and rain and air that smells like it contains oxygen instead of exhaust fumes.
He leans across me, and with one hand releases all five points of my harness in a single motion.
I don’t know why that’s so ridiculously sexy. Something about a man being dangerousandcompetent with his hands, I suppose.
