Page 24 of Fixing a Broken Heart at the Highland Repair Shop

The station had been oddly quiet. There’s nothing like howling gales and a whole mountain range shutting down to wipe out petty crime.

Chastened ever since Edwyn’s words of warning and following a few more days’ ‘banter’ from the Mason brothers, during which they called him the name of every TV detective they could think of, Jamie got on with his work.

‘Get the kettle on, Miss Marple. Milk and sugar in mine, cheers,’ Robert had quipped.

‘One more thing, Columbo,’ Andrew said. ‘Printer’s out of paper.’

When Jamie had accepted he definitely wasn’t going to be sent out on anything interesting, at least while the town emerged from the aftermath of the storm, he’d settled down to filling in his application pack for the next intake of full officers in Edinburgh.

The eldest Mason brother had seen him absorbed in typing and quipped, ‘Hey up, Murder, She Wrote , sticking to paperwork, are we, instead of apprehending suspects when under the influence?’

He’d accepted their comments with the good-natured demeanour he hoped they were being said with, trying not to mind them too much. It was all part of the job for him now and it sharpened his resolve to be recruited into the force full time and on full pay.

Sometimes, as he was documenting his experiences as a volunteer on the application form, giving reason after reason why he fit the bill as a member of the Old Bill, he’d found himself distracted by the windows rattling, the rain running down the pane, and it would set off something wistful within him, and in spite of himself, he’d remember Ally leading him through the long grass to the Nithy Brig.

He pictured her red hair against the emerald glow of the aurora night sky.

He’d see her sitting on that ledge over the waterwheel, framed in old stone, staring up at the stars and how he’d got so distracted gazing up at her he’d walked straight into that barbed wire.

If he really let himself slip, he’d replay the way they’d kissed, hearing all over again her breath at his ear and the sounds he’d coaxed from her, delicious gasps and sighs.

Just thinking of them sent shudders bolting down his spine, each time waking him from daydreaming, and the screen would come back into view.

He’d return to completing the form, a little more reluctantly with every involuntary excursion into those deeply imprinted memories of Ally, hitting the keys with a dogged determination to control himself.

This application had to be perfect. He had to get out of here, far away from temptation, and soon.

* * *

Days later, and Jamie’s flat could not have been neater. His clothes were folded. He’d scrubbed the kitchen and the bathroom. His bedsheets were tightly tucked like he was back at cadet camp. He’d grocery shopped, worked out and hydrated. Still, he couldn’t get his mind off her.

He’d stumbled across the repair shop and café’s new TikTok account.

If ‘stumbling across’ means deliberately going in search of any para-social way he might get a glimpse of what Ally was up to – just to check she was happy and not too hurt by the way he’d led her on then dropped her like a stone as soon as his job was at stake.

What he’d found were a series of extremely well edited and distinctly quirky videos about the repair life, made by Willie and Peaches.

Any one of them could be used in a multimedia student portfolio.

In one, he caught the briefest sighting of Ally at her workstation while Peaches showed the shop’s followers how to embroider a kitten face over a hole in a jumper to hide it.

‘Good as new,’ the text onscreen said. Behind it, Ally was hunched and focused on fixing a fault in someone’s robot vacuum, the glimpse too short to gauge her general mood.

It was the uncertainly of it all that was getting to him, that and the simple fact he missed her.

She’d been in earnest when she’d told him she wouldn’t dream of doing anything to endanger his application.

She hadn’t so much as sent him one message.

She was as good as her word and nothing but respectful.

Somehow that made this all the more agonising.

Edwyn hadn’t exactly tapped the side of his nose that day he’d delivered his warning to Jamie.

There’d been no wink, wink, if you catch my drift about his attitude to Special Constables fraternising with local women involved in unsolved cases.

Jamie had left that office knowing Edwyn was leaving it up to him and his sense of discretion whether or not he continued to see Ally.

If it had been more clear-cut, he might know better how to conduct himself.

Maybe then he could meet her for a friendly cup of coffee and he wouldn’t be missing her like this?

Though it troubled him that if he were seen to be being indiscreet or reckless one more time, it could be the thing standing between him and a career in the police.

He’d done the right thing cutting contact with Ally, hadn’t he?

It wasn’t mere selfishness, on his part, right?

He knew for sure that he didn’t want to lead her on and get close with her the way he desired, only to find out he was being sent away in disgrace.

That’d hurt both of them, and it’d break him, for sure.

Ally couldn’t possibly feel as deeply as he felt for her.

That’d be crazy. If he’d been surer of her feelings, if they’d had more time to explore them together, maybe then he’d have been able to tell Edwyn it really wasn’t any of his business and that his intentions for Ally McIntyre were nothing but right and proper, even if they were mixed up with wanting her hard in his arms and soft against his lips as well…

No, he’d done the best thing for everyone concerned.

He’d caught it before it got out of hand.

That didn’t stop his brain cycling back through this conundrum time and again, replaying his cowardly words with Ally, the way he’d tried to let her down gently. He hated himself for it.

It had been enough to have him filling a water bottle, jumping into his running shoes and dashing out into the ten o’clock twilight, dodging the puddles and slowly rolling cars.

He wasn’t much of a runner, but he’d read somewhere that pounding feet on a pavement in a steady rhythm could recalibrate the entire nervous system. It was worth a try.

As his running shoes carried him out of Cairn Dhu and onto the long stretch of pavement that ran alongside the main road, past the shut-up sandwich van in the lay-by and out to where the valley widened, he concentrated on the sensation of pounding the tarmac, the jolting impact, the good hard thump of his rubber soles.

It was good. It was working. His heart pounded too.

Chemicals released all through his musculature, seeping from his brain, letting Ally out from where she’d tormented his thoughts.

He sweated, clammy and hot, in the cool of the July evening.

He’d release her as best he could, leave her out here.

Maybe, if he ran for long enough, he could actually sleep well tonight?

Before he knew it, he had crossed the bridge over the bypass and was entering the new housing estate. His legs weren’t tired. The agitated, restless feelings that were fuelling him showed no signs of wearing off. He’d not turn back; he’d keep running. All night if he had to.

Out along the foothills skirting Ben Macdui the air was clean and damp, heather-scented. The mountain loomed dark to his right, a great monster of immoveable granite and slipping scree.

On he ran, until he found himself entering another little village, not one he knew.

Flats and terraces, gardens and a few closed shops.

Cars lined the residential area as he paced through it, a good looseness in his hips, a lightness in his head.

Maybe he was getting a little tired now?

He drank from his bottle and the coolness brought his temperature right down.

His pace slowed, he halted under a street lamp, bent to rest his hands on his thigh muscles. They were burning in the best way.

Nothing troubled him now. His brain was quiet.

The street was quiet. In fact, the whole village was quiet.

He looked around in the half light. No sign of a pub where he might treat himself to a pint before running back.

Nothing but lights behind closed curtains and pigeons settling down on the roofs.

He turned, thinking a walking pace was enough for now, enjoying the night, and that’s when he came face to face with – no, almost bumped straight into – a woman with a fading yellow bruise under her eye.

‘Sorry,’ she said quietly, dodging out of his way.

‘It’s you?’ he said, still getting his breath back, sweat on his eyelids. He swiped it away.

The woman walked briskly by, her head down, pulling her long coat around her. He turned, noting the rip in the fabric under one arm.

‘Wait, please!’ he called.

It was enough to start her running, barely fast enough to get a few metres before he was by her side, his hand stilling her.

‘Get your hands off!’ she said, still trying to walk away.

‘Please, just talk to me. You’re hurt? Has someone done this to you?’ He pointed to the rip where white lining showed through the beige outer layer of her Afghan coat.

‘Are you a copper or something?’ She still tried to shake him off.

‘Volunteer Special Constable,’ he admitted, knowing if she was going to talk to him, he had to be on the level.

‘Not a copper then,’ she concluded. The heels of her boots clicked loudly as she walked. Jamie stuck by her.

‘We can offer you protection. If you just tell us who gave you the jewellery you took to the repair shop that day.’

This almost stopped her in her tracks. He read her hesitation as his way in.

‘Whoever’s using you for fencing or trafficking, we can put them inside, move you to a new area. Get a fresh start.’