bar and the man who stood behind it.
The hum of conversation began once more as people melted away automatically to clear his path.
Severo got straight to the point. ‘My four-wheel drive has been stolen from your car park by a woman—a redhead.’
‘Well, she won’t get far, will she?’
A man who sat nursing a pint piped up with a cheery, ‘As far as the nearest ditch, I would think.’
Severo shook his head to dispel the unbidden slow-motion image complete with sound effects of the redhead hitting his windscreen—had she belted herself in?—and flashed a cold look at the wit sitting at the bar. The man quickly lowered his gaze into his pint glass.
‘Not a lot we can do, I’m afraid,’ the landlord said, still projecting what in the circumstances seemed to Severo a quite inappropriate level of optimistic cheer. ‘Was there anything valuable in the car?’
Severo shook his head in a negative motion even as he listed his possessions still sitting on the passenger seat: passport, credit cards and all that information on the proposed takeover that several rivals would consider, if not priceless, certainly of extreme value.
‘That’s good, then.’
Severo, the strong, sculpted lines of his angular face taut with annoyance, ran a hand across the fresh stubble on his jaw before pressing a finger to the small permanent groove above his aquiline nose. He refused the drink offered by the man behind the bar and rotated his head to alleviate the knots of tension in his neck.
‘You say she’s a redhead?’
Severo nodded, an image of the snow-dappled copper tresses flashing into his head.
‘Someone might know her but, as you can see, we’ve had a lot of people in…’ He banged a tankard on the bar and raised his voice above the loud hum of conversation in the crowded room. ‘Did anyone notice a redhead?’
It was no surprise to Severo that a number of men indicated they had—the car thief had not been the sort of woman to pass unnoticed by men—but no one, it seemed, knew who she was.
The landlord continued to be sympathetic but philosophical. ‘We can’t offer you a bed, but there’s a fire and blankets and a well-stocked larder and bar.’
Severo, who did not share the landlord’s laid-back attitude, shook his head when his host produced a bottle of malt and added, ‘Like Jack here said, she can’t have got far.’
Severo was seeing an image of a still body hunched lifeless over a steering wheel, snow drifting in through a smashed windscreen.
It was not his responsibility if the crazy woman had already written off his car and probably herself. He had not asked her to steal his car!
‘Tomorrow when the roads clear you can—’
That might be too late. ‘We should inform the authorities.’
The landlord watched as Severo fished out his phone, only to grimace at the lack of reception.
‘Before you ask, the landlines are down too, have been all morning, and all the mobile signals have crashed. Have a drink. There’s nothing you can do now,’ he advised comfortably.
Severo accepted a coffee and considered his options. There were always options.
‘Those skis I saw in the porch—who do they belong to?’
The landlord pointed out a group of young men at the far end of the room. ‘Students on their way up to Aviemore,’ he added by way of explanation.
Some bright spark suggested putting together a ski posse. The suggestion was made jokingly but it fed the embryo of an idea in Severo’s head.
Fifteen minutes later, having resisted the well-meaning attempts to dissuade him from his course of action, Severo was strapping on a pair of borrowed skis. The borrowed ski gear was a slightly snugger fit than he would have liked, but more than adequate.
The snow still fell from rapidly darkening skies, but the wind had dropped and he made quite good time down the road, following it in the direction he had seen his car vanish.
He might have missed the abandoned vehicle had he not paused at the top of the incline to scan the horizon; if he had not he would undoubtedly have missed the light.
Changing direction, he followed the eerie beam to its source: the headlights, or at least the one not buried in the snowdrift, of his own off-roader, which was well and truly off road now!
It was the scene lifted direct from his imagination minus, thankfully, the lifeless body slumped over the wheel. The door was open but the thief had already gone, proving that she was as criminally stupid and suicidal as she had appeared; anyone with half an ounce of sense would have stayed with the vehicle and the shelter it afforded.
His belongings were still where he had left them. The sensible thing would be to gather them and make his way back to the inn. An insane woman was not his responsibility. It would serve her right if she did end up a statistic of the freak weather conditions—and he’d end up beating himself up because he could have saved her, or killed himself trying.
After a brief internal struggle he sighed. It would do his reputation no good at all if people suspected he had a conscience.
He permitted himself a grim smile when, after a quick reconnoitre of the immediate area, he discovered the imprint of footsteps that the falling snow was already beginning to cover—his thief was not far ahead.
It was not difficult to follow the footsteps. The thief, who appeared to have stumbled several times, was apparently walking in a series of ever-decreasing circles.
All sounds were muffled in the white landscape except the hoarse rasp of her own laboured respirations as she forced herself onwards. Neve’s reserves of energy were totally depleted; it was sheer desperation now that drove her on. The dread lodged in her chest felt like a stone; total panic was a heavy heartbeat away.
‘I like snow,’ she reminded herself, panting as she added, ‘I love snow.’ Before falling flat on her face for the fifth time—she was counting.
If she ever had grandchildren she was going to bore them silly with this story, though stories that began with the day Granny stole a car might not be setting the best example!
She lay there and closed her eyes; she would just rest for a moment. Then she would get up because if she didn’t there wouldn’t be any grandchildren to set a bad example to.
She would get up because James had trusted her and she couldn’t let him down.
She lay there hearing his voice.
‘I have a favour to ask you, Neve.’
‘Anything,’ she had replied, meaning it.
James Macleod had been at college with her dad and because of that he’d given Charlie a job. Her brother had then proceeded to repay the kindness by embezzling from clients’ accounts to pay for his gambling habit.
Knowing he was about to be
