Chapter One
Keeping my eyes on the slick rocky path edged into the cliff side, I hurried down to the beach.
Just as I had reached my rental car moments before, I’d received a call from the University of Glasgow telling me that the silver dagger excavated from Dun Eistean had been stolen, and they wanted to talk to Dylan. He wasn’t answering his phone. Was he on the beach, and could I find him?
I’d abandoned my plans to return to my room with my host family, the MacMillans, and I had run back across the steel bridge separating the tidal stack stronghold of the Morrison Clan from the mainland to find Dylan.
I remembered that I had just asked him about the dagger, but I couldn’t say what had prompted the question. Was I psychic? Had I known it was missing before the university called?
I’d never really had a chance to examine the dagger before one of the resident archaeologists wrapped it up and sent it down to the university. But from what I had seen over his shoulder, the tarnished dagger must have been a thing of beauty in its time. I looked forward to seeing it polished and on display when the university completed their metallurgical studies. The archaeologist who had uncovered it, Gerry, had already stated he thought it was French in origin, perhaps fifteenth century, which suggested the Morrisons hadn’t always been isolated on their tabletop retreat.
I lifted my eyes for a moment to glance down at Dylan and the mysterious Cynthia sitting on the rocky beach. Dylan held something up as if showing it to Cynthia. Sunlight glinted off it, whatever it was. I couldn’t tell from that distance.
I paused for a moment, my hand braced against the cliff face wall. As I watched, Cynthia vanished. She simply vanished. One moment she had been sitting next to Dylan, and the next she wasn’t. Dylan stared at the empty space beside him.
My knees buckled. I searched the beach, but there was no mistaking what I had seen. Cynthia hadn’t simply gotten up and walked away. She had vanished.
On trembling legs, I resumed my journey down the treacherous path, and by the time I reached the beach, Dylan was standing, collecting his backpack. I ran toward him, the loose pebbles making my shaky journey even harder.
“Dylan!” I called out.
He turned around and looked at me. He had glanced toward me at the top of the cliff, so I knew he wasn’t surprised to see me. He waited as I hustled to his side. Despite what I had seen, I kept surveying the beach, somehow expecting Cynthia to reappear.
“Where is she? Did I see what I just saw? What happened?”
Dylan looked over my head, his eyes dull and unseeing. The characteristic white flecks interspersed in his azure-blue irises vanished...like Cynthia.
“Dylan?” I prompted. I reached for his upper arm and gave him a slight shake. “Dylan?”
“Aye?” he asked, dropping his eyes to my face.
“Where is Cynthia? What’s going on?”
He drew in a deep breath as if to speak, but only shrugged his shoulders helplessly.
“Dylan!” I pressured.
With a shake of his head, he finally managed to say something. “I’m sorry. I just can’t talk about it right now.”
I scanned the beach once again before raising my eyes toward the cliff top as if, somehow, Cynthia had scooted past me up the impossibly narrow path. Of course, she hadn’t.
I dropped my hand, sensing a continuation of the rejection Dylan had been showing me lately. He hadn’t broken up with me...yet, but something had gone wrong between us, and I didn’t know what it was.
“Is she gone again?”
I wasn’t sure what I was asking, but I suspected Dylan understood my question.
He did look at me then, as if trying to focus.
“Aye, she’s gone. I doubt if she’ll be back.”
I resisted the urge to scan the beach yet one more time.
“Well, I didn’t see you push her into the sea, so whatever explaining you have to do, I guess you can count on me to verify that you didn’t murder her.” My words came out a little more bitter than I had expected and more cryptic than I intended. I didn’t even know what I was talking about, but I knew Cynthia had shown up out of the blue after disappearing for a few days and had disappeared again.
Dylan dug into his bag and produced a folded sheet of yellow paper, which he handed to me. I opened it up.
Dylan
Thank you for everything. I have discovered that I just can’t finish the dig with my back the way it is. I’m heading back to the States today. Thank you again and please let the university know.
Cynthia Dunnon
I refolded it and handed it back.
“I must have missed Cynthia passing me on the path back up to the tabletop.” I regretted the sarcasm in my voice. Dylan was far too sweet to speak to in that way, but I couldn’t help myself. I had been smarting from his obvious attraction to Cynthia, that he wouldn’t tell me any kind of truth about her, and that he continued to lie to me.
Dylan said nothing, only shook his head.
I looked up at him, trying to recall the memory of warm nights and a gentle Scottish burr whispering in my ear.
“You don’t have to tell me anything, Dylan. I’ll support you, no matter what. But if we ever had anything, it’s gone...just like Cynthia. Trust means everything to me. If I can’t trust you, I can’t be with you...I can’t love you.”
Tears rolled down my face, and I dashed at them. I could see the pain in Dylan’s eyes, but I wasn’t sure who had hurt him—Cynthia or me. Or maybe the angst on his face was sympathy for me and my own pain.
“I’m so sorry, Debra. I don’t mean to hurt you.”
“No, I know you don’t. I think I know you pretty well, Dylan. You’re a good man, just apparently not my man.”
I turned and walked away, letting the tears flow until I needed to see clearly to climb back up the path. About halfway up, I remembered that I’d forgotten to tell Dylan the university had called about the stolen dagger. The vision of sun glinting on steel nagged at me.
Torq, Cynthia had cried out when I’d first found her lying on the ground several weeks before. I didn’t get to say goodbye! Where is the dagger?
I had always wondered what she meant by Torq. I had thought it was some sort of curse that I hadn’t heard before. But her mention of the dagger had been unmistakable. She hadn’t said knife—she had said dagger.
I knew now that she had been talking about the medieval French dagger they had found at Dun Eistean, the one now missing from the university, the one I now believed Dylan had stolen.
I looked over my shoulder. Dylan followed, although slowly. I crested the top of the cliff and turned around to wait for him. The sun shone down on the empty beach below. Whitecaps floated on the beautiful sea separating the Isle of Lewis from mainland Scotland. Seagulls soared on a wonderfully salt-tinged breeze. I hugged myself and stared out across the sea until Dylan reached the tabletop.
“I forgot to tell you that the university called,” I said. “They couldn’t get through to you, so they tried me. The dagger is missing, and they want to talk to you.”
Dylan nodded, seemingly unsurprised.
“I saw it, Dylan. You should return it.”
“I do not have it.”
Still he lied to me. I hated that he didn’t trust me. We had been together for about six months while I studied at the University of Glasgow. While Dylan was a professor in the archaeology department, I hadn’t taken any classes under him...except for the dig at Dun Eistean. He was the field team leader, and there would be some problems if people knew we had been seeing each other.
“Well then, I guess you’ve got some explaining to do. Again, I will cover for you if you need, Dylan, because I care about you. I just wish you could trust me with the truth.”
Dylan reached out as if to touch my face, but I took a wounded step back.
“I wish I could tell you. I just can’t talk about it right now, but I will someday.”
I shook my head.
“I’m not sure I’ll be here someday, Dylan.”
I turned and headed back to the dig site, hardening my heart and stiffening my spine. I only had one more year to go before I graduated. If I had ever imagined that Dylan and I might be more permanent, he had destroyed that idea. I would leave Scotland at the end of the following school year and go home.