Page 62 of The Boathouse by the Loch (The Scottish Highlands #4)

She wiped tears from her eyes and looked around the room.

Duncan said, ‘But my shop wasn’t robbed the Christmas just gone – was it, Joe?’

Joe pursed his lips and looked at his hands.

David turned to his brother. ‘What are you not telling us, Joe?’

Joe breathed a heavy sigh. ‘Look, after what happened two years ago, I’d asked one of my colleagues just to pass through Aviemore on Christmas Eve.’

‘Keeping an eye on my store?’

‘Yeah, Dad. It was a stupid thought. Why would the guy who lost his brother that night return to the scene of the crime or attempt another robbery? I knew that the thief, Logan, had been released from prison a month earlier. But why would he return? Of course nothing happened on Christmas Eve, but imagine my shock when I found out he was back, and had been spotted by the police officer as he cruised through town on Christmas Day, running along the road with an illegal firearm and carrying a crowbar. He recognised Logan, pulled over, and arrested him on the spot. And outside Dad’s shop was a car – stolen.

It was obvious what he’d returned to Aviemore to do.

’ Joe turned to David. ‘I had no idea he’d blackmailed you. ’

David looked at him sheepishly.

Joe continued, ‘But after what had happened at your store before, I didn’t want to ruin our family’s Christmas by bringing up the fact that he’d come back to finish the job.’

Nobody spoke for a moment. Then Gayle asked Bonnie, ‘So, after you ran from the car, did you go to the hotel?’

She shook her head. ‘I didn’t know which hotel he’d booked, and even if I had, that would have been the last place I’d have gone.

I couldn’t check into the hotel. He’d be looking for me there.

So, I ran through the town, towards the train station, thinking that would be a refuge from the cold, and maybe there might be a train.

But it was Christmas Day, and there were no lights on.

There were no lights on in any shops – apart from one. ’

‘Wilbur’s Bookstore,’ said Judith, ‘where Robyn was living and working over the Christmas holidays.’

‘I ran up to the bookshop and couldn’t believe it when I saw a young woman sitting at a table in the window.

Although the bookstore said it was closed, I banged on the door.

I was so cold, and getting wet from the snowfall, and I couldn’t carry the bag full of cash for another second.

Oh, the relief when she opened that door.

’ Bonnie remembered the young woman ushering her inside.

‘I told them my car had broken down on the way through Aviemore. I didn’t want to tell her that I’d run away from my rotten boyfriend who was, at that moment, robbing one of the stores.

She appeared genuine and kind, and … and I should have told her to phone the police, but …

’ She looked at her hands. ‘I had all that money. I didn’t know whether it was drugs money, or what it was, but I was sure I’d be arrested too as an accomplice.

I felt so bad for lying, but this was my chance to escape – don’t you see? ’

She barely looked up, too embarrassed to look them all in the eye. ‘I know I did the wrong thing, but all I was thinking about was my baby, and getting away.’

She gathered herself and looked up. ‘Robyn explained that she lived there above the shop. She sent me upstairs to change out of my wet clothes and choose something to wear of hers. Even my shoes were soaked from running along the slushy pavements. She gave me a pair of her Doc Marten boots. They weren’t the sorts of clothes I’d normally wear – the clothes she dressed in weren’t me at all – but I didn’t care.

I was warm. I was dry, and the two women were keen to help me.

’ Bonnie frowned when she remembered that while she was changing, she’d also stuffed a few of Robyn’s clothes into the rucksack to hide the cash.

‘Who was the woman with Robyn?’ Judith asked.

‘She said her name was Eleanor.’

‘Eleanor?’ Jake stared at her, wide-eyed. ‘Are you sure? Are you absolutely sure?’

Bonnie looked over at Jake Campbell-Ross. ‘Yes, she said her name was Eleanor.’

‘So, that’s where she went on Christmas Day. She said she was doing last-minute shopping. It didn’t make sense to me. What shops were open on Christmas Day?’

Bonnie said, ‘There weren’t any shops open. Didn’t she tell you she was meeting a friend?’

‘Robyn was her friend?’

‘Yes. They’d only met the day before, on Christmas Eve, when Eleanor had stepped into Wilbur’s Bookstore.

While Robyn was making me a hot drink, I sat with Eleanor at the table, and she told me that she’d invited Robyn to have Christmas dinner with her family in Aviemore, but that Robyn had refused.

She hadn’t wanted to intrude. So Eleanor had come to see her on Christmas Day instead. ’

Jake stared at her. ‘Thank you, Bonnie, for telling me that. I’ve always wondered where she’d been that afternoon before she arrived at the ski slopes.’

Judith said, ‘Bonnie, do you know what happened to Robyn?’

‘She’d been in the middle of packing her things, said I could help myself to whichever clothes I wanted from her suitcase.

Then she shut her suitcase and put it in her car, ready to leave the next morning.

I guess she was returning to university.

She said I could stay the night, and in the morning she could phone a local garage, see if they could come out and repair the car.

That seemed like a good idea, unless Logan had decided to sleep in the car.

But I couldn’t see that in sub-zero temperatures.

I imagined he would check into that hotel and return to his car in the morning.

Either way, I knew I had to abandon the idea of leaving town in his car.

I couldn’t explain that to Robyn, but she came to my rescue and said she doubted they’d be any car mechanics working on Boxing Day, so if I wanted, she’d take me where I wanted to go the next day.

’ She sighed. ‘I didn’t know where I was going, and I didn’t care.

All I knew was that I needed to get out of Aviemore, away from him. ’

Judith said, ‘But I don’t understand … you were driving out of Aviemore in Robyn’s car, alone, when you had the accident.’

‘Yes.’ Bonnie halted. She knew she had to tell them.

She felt her resolve slipping. Bonnie took a deep breath and forced herself to continue.

‘Robyn asked me if I’d do her one small favour in return.

Her friend, Eleanor, wanted to go skiing, but she had some things she still wanted to do in the shop before she left the next day.

Would I drive Eleanor to the ski slopes?

Of course, I said yes. It was such a small favour to ask.

It was the least I could do. They both went upstairs, Eleanor to change into her ski stuff, and Robyn to tidy up the flat. ’

‘So you drove Eleanor in Robyn’s car?’

Bonnie looked at her hands. ‘Yes. She looked like some sort of professional skier in her lovely ski wear. I had no idea you needed so much kit. She had dark reflective glasses on, a large cosy bandana type sleeve wrapped around her head and ears, and a silk scarf that she’d pulled up to her nose.’

She stole a glance at Jake. ‘I’m so sorry about what happened on the ski slopes. I wish … I wish I’d never driven her there.’

Jake shook his head. ‘Don’t say that. It wasn’t your fault. She’d have got there one way or the other. Obviously Robyn was going to drive her there before you appeared.’

Bonnie looked at him. It didn’t make her feel any better – not after what had happened after she’d dropped Eleanor off.

Judith said, ‘But you didn’t return to the shop, did you?’

Bonnie shook her head, avoiding Judith’s gaze.

‘We drove through Aviemore, on the way to the ski slopes, and we passed Logan, standing by his car, scratching his head with the butt of his gun, not even bothering to conceal it. I couldn’t see a broken window, but he had a crowbar in his hand, and the boot of the car open.

I guessed he’d returned to his car for the crowbar to prise open the shop door, when he realised I was gone, along with the money. ’

Bonnie had left her mobile phone in the car, so he’d had no way of contacting her, or tracing her whereabouts through his phone. She’d also had the presence of mind, in the split second that she’d fled, to take his keys so that he couldn’t get the car started .

‘He spotted me, in her car, and quickly jumped in his own car, but there was no key. So I saw him in the rear-view mirror, running along the pavement with the gun in one hand and the crowbar in another. That was when I realised I couldn’t return to Wilbur’s Bookstore.

He was still in town. He’d find me. I needed to get out of Aviemore immediately. ’

‘So you stole my stepdaughter’s car?’

‘Yes, it’s true. I … I’d made up my mind before we even arrived at the ski slopes that I wouldn’t return to the shop.

But I wasn’t going to keep her car, not at all.

I’m not like Logan. I don’t steal stuff.

I was desperate, and I just needed to borrow it to get out of town.

There wasn’t time to explain. But as soon as I got someplace else, I was going to phone Wilbur’s Bookstore, let her know where her car was, pay to have it returned to her. ’

‘And that’s why you were speeding out of Aviemore,’ said David, ‘on Christmas Day.’

‘And you had the accident in Robyn’s car,’ Judith added.

‘But you never made it past the town limits,’ said Gayle.

Bonnie looked at each one of them in turn and nodded.

Judith said, ‘So, where is Robyn?’

‘I … I don’t know.’

Melissa’s boyfriend, Brodie, who’d taken over running his grandfather’s bookshop said, ‘Last Christmas, when my grandfather, Wilbur, returned from his Christmas break, expecting the young lady he’d employed to still be there minding the shop, he found the keys to the shop posted through the letter box, and her things gone.

I never thought to ask her name, but then he didn’t seem all that bothered, to be honest. He just said she was a student at university, and had probably changed her mind about the holiday job, and returned to campus early.

He’d decided to retire anyway. I think he’d lost interest in the shop, and was just biding his time until I took over the place. ’

Bonnie looked over at Brodie. ‘Robyn said she was leaving. I don’t know where she was going, but her things were packed up in the car, ready to go.’

‘The car you … borrowed,’ said Gayle.

‘Yes.’

‘So, the question is,’ said Joe, ‘What happened to Robyn Parker when you didn’t return to the shop with her car? She obviously left the shop, just like she’d planned. But where did she go?’

It was a rhetorical question. Nobody in the room knew. The only thing that was obvious was that she’d locked up the shop, put the keys through the letterbox, and disappeared.