Page 60 of Merry & Bright

Instantly the weight of the car took it backwards. With a huge effort he managed to stop it slipping back any further but soon realised he couldn’t move it forward at all. After less than a minute of trying, Cam yanked the handbrake back on and extricated himself from the car, breathing heavily.

He regarded the Volvo’s flashing orange distress for one more moment, then, pressing his lips together, he turned around and started walking towards Rob Armstrong’s cottage, his jaw set and determined.

Chapter Six

The sound of the doorbellwas so unexpected that Rob almost spilled his mug of tea. He’d been sitting in his favourite chair in the glass conservatory at the back of the house. With the light off, he could see out into the darkness pretty well. Well enough to make out the shape of his little tumbledown pier on the loch-bank and the bob of his tied-up rowing boat in the black water.

As much as the responsibility of this house weighed heavily on him at times, Rob had always loved looking out at the loch at night. Over these last few years he’d learned a hundred new shades of black, just from sitting here in the dark, looking out. He’d been enjoying the reddish-black of snow-swelled clouds and the oil-black gleam of the water when the doorbell had startled him. Now it rang again, a long insistent summons.

“All right, all right,” Rob grumbled, getting out of his chair. He snapped the light on as he passed, blinking for a moment or two against the brightness before making his way to the front door of the cottage.

Of all the people he could possibly have imagined on the other side of the door, the person he actually found there would not have been one of them.

Cam McMorrow.

Cam McMorrow was standing on the stoop, filling Rob’s doorway with his big, broad-shouldered body.

There were snowflakes in his dark hair.

“Oh,” Rob said. “Um—hello, Cam. Can I help you with something?”

“Sorry to bother you.” Cam didn’t sound sorry—he sounded annoyed, if anything. He was even scowling a little. “I’ve broken down, just up the hill. I wondered if you could maybe help me get the car off the road in case someone comes round the corner too fast and collides with it?”

Rob was reaching for his wellies before Cam had even finished that little speech.

“Sure, no problem.” He grabbed his coat off the peg and quickly pulled it on, lifting his keys off the hook at the door and shoving them into his pocket. Cam stepped back as Rob moved towards him, looking almost comically surprised, as though he hadn’t really expected Rob to so readily agree.

“Uh—thanks,” he stammered. “It doesn’t need moved far but it has to go uphill so it really needs two bodies.”

“No worries,” Rob said cheerfully, pulling his hood up against the steadily falling snow. “Lead the way.”

Cam wasn’t kidding about it not being far. Half a minute after they set off, Rob saw the car’s hazards flashing orange through the blizzard.

“Here it is,” Cam clipped out as they drew closer. “I’ll steer it into the lay-by—you push at the back.”

He went to stride ahead but Rob halted him in his tracks with a dry, “Sure you don’t want me to drop and give you ten first?”