After Yardley parked the car, Lachlan stepped out into the cool, clear night. Gwen and Imogene waited in the courtyard.
“Cilla went to the lighthouse without us.” Imogene harrumphed. “She isn’t supposed to go anywhere without a guard.”
“I’ll talk to her.” Yardley opened the lighthouse door and stopped short.
Lachlan eased around him.
On the floor lay Cilla’s fabric seascape, adorned with pebbles and feathers.
Lachlan squatted in front of it. Sometime since he’d last seen it, she’d added a selkie on the beach, with a sealskin of downy gray feathers and long, flowing hair made from dozens of tiny dried flowers.
It was ... stunning.
“Is that a letter?” Yardley asked.
A folded sheet of paper rested on the fabric cliff, and Lachlan opened it to see Cilla’s bonny handwriting with its large, loose loops. He read it out loud.
What a fun year this has been! But all fun must come to an end. In Dutch, van der Zee means “from the sea.” From the sea I came, and to the sea this selkie must now return.
By the time you read this, I will have donned my sealskin. Lachlan, I thank you for giving it to me.
Don’t try to stop me. The coordinates I gave you for tonight’s rendezvous are incorrect.
With highest regards, I wish you all farewell.
Lachlan’s mind buzzed. None of it made sense.
Yardley cursed. “She’s a triple agent.”
Gwen and Imogene released cries of outrage.
Hunched over the seascape, Lachlan clutched the letter and slammed his eyes shut. It couldn’t be true. Had he been betrayed again? Lured by mercy, by trust, by ... love?
“She turned on us.” Gwen’s voice trembled. “I—I liked her.”
“I never trusted her,” Imogene said.
Lachlan did. Despite all evidence, he still trusted her, and his eyes opened.
“Mackenzie,” Yardley said. “What does she mean about the sealskin?”
A long breath drained Lachlan’s lungs. He drew in more air and glanced up at Yardley. “I taught her to operate my family’s motorboat.” And tonight, she’d taken it to sea.
Yardley’s upper lip curled. “Why would you do such a thing?”
“After the fishing boat sank. After—aye, after sheprovedshe was loyal. She proved it.” Lachlan slapped the letter. “I dinnae believe this.”
“Don’t be a fool, Mackenzie. This is the only truth she’s told us this past year.”
Lachlan stared at the letter. She hadn’t said she was returning to Germany. Hadn’t said she’d betrayed them. Only said she was going to sea.
Cilla’s seascape drew him, the selkie gazing to the shore, aselkie with flowers for hair—a selkie of the land, not the sea.“What if she doesn’t see herself as trapped?”Cilla had asked him with her blue-green eyes turned to shore.“What if she prefers the land? This land?”
Memories jostled in his mind, all she’d said the last few weeks, the options she’d bemoaned. The recent, sudden, unwarranted cheer.
“Every word of this letter is true,” Lachlan said with nauseating, heartbreaking conviction. “But she hasnae betrayed us. She’s protecting us.”
“Don’t be a fool, Mackenzie.”
