Page 56 of The Boathouse by the Loch (The Scottish Highlands #4)

Robyn sat in the police station, at a desk opposite Joe’s colleague, Sean, and nervously kneaded her hands, wondering what he’d find in their database.

She was thinking of all that cash in the bottom of the rucksack.

Oh, god! I’m a criminal on the run . It all made sense now.

She’d burgled David’s house, and then by a bizarre twist of fate, they had collided on the road as she was speeding out of Aviemore.

And very soon all her new friends, whom she’d unintentionally deceived, would find out.

She looked at the police officer and thought that it would have been good if Joe had accompanied her in the police car.

He was David’s brother, and her friend. Or David himself could have run out of the house to go with her.

She didn’t know whether they would have been allowed, but as she sat there, feeling so very alone, she realised that it was a moot point.

Not one of them had made a move to accompany her for moral support – not one.

She looked at Sean, searching through his database, her mind focusing on that rucksack full of money and the burglary at David’s house on Christmas Day.

She thought she knew exactly what had happened, and why she’d been on that snowy road, all alone, the previous Christmas.

But that didn’t explain how she had come to be in Robyn Parker’s car with her suitcase.

If she wasn’t Robyn Parker – which clearly she was not – then who the hell was she, and why did she have Robyn’s belongings, and her car?

‘Hmm.’

Robyn looked at Sean wide-eyed as he turned away from his PC screen and looked at her.

She thought she was going to be sick. ‘What is it?’

‘Nothing – is what it is.’

‘Pardon me?’ Robyn stared at his computer. ‘So, I’m not in your database?’

Sean sat back in his chair. ‘No.’

Robyn looked at her hands. She could still see smudges of black on her fingertips where they’d taken her fingerprints. She hadn’t wanted her mugshot taken either. It made her feel like a criminal. But they’d needed both to run checks on her identity and see if she came up in the police database.

She’d kept saying to him on the way in the police car that it wasn’t what it looked like.

She hadn’t been impersonating Robyn Parker on purpose.

It had been just as much of a shock to her that she wasn’t who she thought she was as it had been for Judith – and everyone else in the room.

She’d lost her memory in the accident. Dr Jamieson could vouch for that.

The problem was that although she’d had a bump on the head, and a mild concussion, Dr Jamieson had told her there was really nothing physically wrong with her. But how could she prove that she wasn’t faking it?

‘So, who am I?’ She really hoped that he wasn’t going to reply, You tell me.

Instead, he said, ‘I’ve looked at the report of the car accident you were involved in on Christmas Day. You have no idea how you came to be in possession of Robyn’s car?’

‘I told you. I don’t remember anything.’ Robyn dropped her eyes from his gaze.

She did remember two things: sitting in Wilbur’s Bookstore with a young woman, and sitting in a car in the dark outside David’s boathouse – neither of which she had any intention of sharing.

She was not going to share the latter because of the money she’d found in the rucksack and the burglary at David’s.

The last thing she wanted to do was implicate herself in a crime.

She was in enough trouble as it was. She was not going to share the former because she really couldn’t see how it was relevant – sitting in Wilbur’s Bookstore with a woman.

She suddenly sucked in a breath. Was that Robyn she had been sitting with in Wilbur’s Bookstore?

The real Robyn? She remembered the sketch in Robyn’s diary of two women sitting in the window.

It was her and me , she thought. But if Robyn had let her borrow the car, why would she have left her suitcase in the car?

Robyn stared at Sean. There was only one logical explanation. She’d taken Robyn’s car – stolen it. Oh, god … so I am a criminal!

‘Are you all right?’ Sean asked. ‘You’ve gone awfully pale.’

‘Have I?’ she asked, feeling a little lightheaded.

‘Let me get you some water.’ He stood up and walked over to the water cooler. He’d just turned his back to her, about to pour her a glass, when he swiftly did an about-turn. ‘I don’t need to lock the door, do I?’

Her shoulders sagged. They were in a small interview room. She’d waived her right to free legal advice before being questioned. She didn’t want to sit in a prison cell waiting for a lawyer to arrive. She just wanted to get on with finding out who the hell she was.

She glanced at the door. ‘Where would I go?’ She thought of Judith going back to Lark Lodge. Gayle had been quick to disown the fake Robyn, as, no doubt, had everyone else. She had absolutely nowhere to go. Until she found out who she was, she had nobody.

She looked at Sean. If it turned out she had broken the law, then she’d just have to face the consequences. All she wanted at that moment was to know her own name. ‘Will you help me, Sean?’ she pleaded as he handed her a paper cup of water.

‘Yes. But you’ve got to help me.’

She frowned. ‘I don’t understand.’

‘Where is Robyn Parker?’

‘I … I don’t know. I told you, I can’t remember what I was doing on that road on Christmas Day. I woke up in hospital and didn’t even know my name. The police did a DVLA search on the vehicle and assumed I was the owner of the car. And I believed them. I had no reason not to.’

Sean nodded. ‘Yes, I know. As I said, I read the report.’

Robyn realised something just then. She wasn’t in handcuffs, but she wasn’t free to leave.

Sean leaned forward in his chair. ‘We want to know your identity.’

‘As do I!’ And she knew just the person who might be able to find out.

It didn’t appear that the police were going to be much help.

She just needed to contact the person she had in mind.

‘I still get a phone call – don’t I?’ They’d already offered her a phone call, but she’d declined because she hadn’t known who to call until that moment.

‘Yes, you can make one phone call. May I suggest you consider who you choose to contact wisely.’

She looked at his earnest expression. ‘What do you mean?’

‘I would suggest contacting a lawyer. ’

She smiled. ‘That’s exactly what I intend to do.’ She wished she’d thought of it when they’d first asked her.

She sighed in relief when she got straight through to Melissa.

She was nervous about making the call, thinking that Melissa wouldn’t be the slightest bit interested as she would be thinking she’d been deceived.

But on the contrary, Melissa was very worried about her and relieved she’d phoned her.

Melissa was going to get straight on her case.

When she got off the phone, Sean was looking at her thoughtfully. He leaned forward in his chair. ‘I do have an idea about how you might get your memories back – if you’re up for it.’