They packed like they were heading out for a picnic and an exorcism: thermos, torch, gloves, pry bar, tea towels, the diary slipped into Heather’s bag and wrapped in her scarf. Flynn clicked Byrdie’s carrier closed.
“She’s coming?” Heather asked.
“Och, no. The queen stays to reign,” he said, releasing Byrdie again. “Claire’ll throttle me if I turn your cat into a site cat. She can mind the cottage.”
Byrdie flicked her tail and threw herself onto the hearth rug as if to say she had always planned to.
The drive to Glenoran was all washed stone and winter grass, the sky a high pewter bowl. Heather kept a palm over the diary in her lap as if something might reach through the glove box to take it. Flynn hummed a tune under his breath, one she recognized from the inn—an old air with a lift to it. It steadied her.
The house looked as though it had spent the night remembering itself. The boards Flynn had nailed over the broken pane sat snug; the front step had shed last night’s gloss of rain for a dull, naked damp. Eleanor’s note sat under the latch in a little ziplock, held down by a stone:
— Popped by at first light. Quiet. Call if you need anythin’. Tea in the tin. — E.
“Saint Eleanor,” Heather murmured.
“Aye,” Flynn agreed. “Guardian angel with bleach and judgment.”
Inside, the light fell long and clean through the eastern windows. They kept their boots on and went straight to the kitchen.
The carved thistles looked almost coy in this light—petals, spines, the occasional entwined hearts that nestled so naturally into the pattern you might miss them even when you knew to look. Heather ran her fingers over the one she’d found at dawn, the two small hearts braided into the bloom; a secret looped through a national emblem.
“Plural,” she murmured. “There might be more than one pair. Or… we need the right one.”
Flynn knelt and laid the pry bar on the flagstone, not to use, just to have. He traced a seam with his fingertip where two stones kissed. “These aren’t mortared as tight as the others.” He looked up. “But if we start pryin’ and Henderson’s got some wee goblin watchin’ the lane, she’ll have our heads before we say boo.”
Heather’s phone vibrated in her pocket: a single email chime that sounded indecently loud. She fished it out.
From: Dr. Flora Henderson
Subject: Checking in on Glenoran’s condition
Her throat clicked. She opened it.
Dear Ms. Campbell,
I was so sorry to hear of the incident at your family property. Please accept my concern and my offer of support. If the museum can be of any assistance in securing Glenoran or assessing any potential damage to historically relevant fixtures or documents, do let me know. If you have uncovered any further personal effectsbelonging to past occupants, we would be glad to help evaluate and conserve them.
With best wishes,
Dr. Flora Henderson
Highland Heritage & Antiquities
Heather’s hands went cold around the phone.
Flynn read over her shoulder and his mouth went thin. “She’s fishin’ with a pearl hook.”
“I hate that she knows my email.” Heather deleted the message, then emptied the trash. “She won’t stop.”
“No.” He slipped the phone from her fingers, set it face down on the table, then covered her hand with his. “But she can be made to wait.”
They worked without tools for a while—just looking, learning the hearth the way you’d learn a loved one’s face. Every groove and scorch mark had a story Flynn already knew. He’d restored these stones himself, lifted and set each one, patched the mortar, sealed the cracks.
“Feels strange,” he murmured, tracing a line of grout with his thumb. “Like I’m meetin’ my own work again for the first time.”
Heather crouched beside him, brushing away a smear of soot. “You rebuilt it to last. Maybe that’s why it kept their secret so well.”
They moved slower after that, methodical. Flynn tapped lightly along the stones, listening for hollows, the way a man might test a wall for hidden echoes. Nothing. Then—something softer.
