COMING SOON FROM CARINA PRESS AND JOSH LANYON
A vacationing librarian must solve the murder of fellow tourists when someone begins picking off members of a bus tour traveling through the scenic highlands and islands of Scotland.
Read on for a sneak preview of MURDER TAKES THE HIGH ROAD, the new stand-alone mystery by Josh Lanyon.
I said, “I don’t know why not, since I told you I planned on coming on this trip.”
“That you’d be this petty, this vindictive.”
“I paid for the trip. The trip was my idea in the first place. Vance doesn’t know Vanessa Rayburn from Vanessa Redgrave. If anyone is being petty and vindictive, it’s you bringing him on this trip that we planned together.”
“This was supposed to be for my birthday.”
That was true and I felt a twinge of guilt. But I shook it off.
“That was the justification for it, but you know as well as I do that it was for both of us. It was something we’d both talked about doing together for years.”
That was also true. But the reminder didn’t cut any ice with Trevor.
“The fact that you would force your way into our lives—”
“It was my life first!” I interrupted. “And I’m not forcing my way into anything. I paid for my ticket and I’m using it. Why the hell wouldn’t I? Why the hell would I pay that kind of money for a gift to Vance?”
It was Trevor’s turn to talk right over me. “Bad enough you wouldn’t give your ticket to him. But that you had the gall to use it. You don’t even like traveling. You hate traveling.”
At the far end of the hall, the elevator doors dinged and opened. A man in a tan trench coat stepped out, wheeling a suitcase behind him.
I lowered my voice. “I don’t hate traveling. I’ve never had a chance is all.”
Trevor’s face twisted in scorn. “That’s bull-pucky. How many times did I want to go away for the weekend or for vacation? You would never go. All you’ve ever cared about is your garden and your books.”
“I’d have loved to travel. We didn’t have the money!”
“That was always your excuse.”
It wasn’t like vacations abroad had ever been a big point of contention between us, and the unfairness of it stung. I protested, “It wasn’t an excuse. You weren’t working. We didn’t have the money.”
“We all know you’re just doing this to ruin my trip.”
We all? Meaning him and Vance? I said, “Believe it or not, my life doesn’t revolve around you anymore.”
He laughed in disbelief. Granted, it was a stagy laugh—Trevor was active in our local amateur theater and had received a lot of compliments for his Inspector Bullock 2 in Murder Afoot! “Since when? We both know you’re going to spend the entire trip spying on us and trying to make me feel guilty.”
“Spying on you?” I dropped my voice once more as I noticed the man in the trench coat—having disappeared down the hall and around the corner—was now headed back our way, still wheeling his suitcase. “You’re crazy!”
Trevor, as usual, was perfectly comfortable in front of an audience. “Are you going to pretend you weren’t watching us all through dinner?”
“I repeat, you’re crazy,” I said. “I wasn’t watching you. I don’t care what you do. I loved Vanessa way before you ever did.”
“I always loved Vanessa—” Trevor stopped and glared at the guy with the suitcase, who had halted at my door, making himself part of our little tableau.
My heart sank still further as I realized who he must be.
“Can I help you?” Trevor asked in his most forbidding tone.
Jesus, he could be such a prick. How had I not noticed that about him for so long? Or, rather, how had I convinced myself that the fact that he was a prick wasn’t important?
The newcomer—medium height, brown hair, brown eyes—seemed unaware of any tension. “I think this is my room,” he said.
“John Knight?” I said.
“That’s right.”
I offered my hand. “Carter Matheson.”
John had a firm grip. His hands were cold and rain dotted the shoulders of his trench coat. “Nice to meet you, Carter.” His voice was a pleasant baritone.
I nodded toward Trevor, who continued to glower. “This is Trevor Temple. He’s also on the tour.”
“Nice to meet you, Trevor.”
Trevor shook hands with the air of one who always dealt with unpleasant business first—which, by the way, was not, and never had been, his style.
I moved aside so John could wheel his suitcase into the room. “Not so bad,” he said with determined cheerfulness, glancing around the economy-sized cell.
“It’s a little cramped,” I agreed. “But we’re only here for the night. I took the bed nearest the window, but if you—”
“No, that’s fine. I prefer to be by the john.”
Bathroom issues, perhaps?
My uneasy speculation was interrupted by Trevor, who could never stand to be ignored for long. “This isn’t over,” he told me grimly.
I snorted and closed the door in his face.
John, his back to me, was busily unzipping his suitcase. “I was afraid you’d have already gone to bed.”
“No. Trevor and I were just...” I watched him pull out a brown leather kit bag and a brown plaid bathrobe, and asked instead, “How was your flight?”
He threw me a quick look and smiled. “Long.”
John wasn’t exactly handsome, though he had a nice smile and attractive, regular features. He looked to be in his late thirties, around my own age, which was a surprise since everyone else on the trip, with the exception of Trevor and Vance, was at least a decade older than me. I’d discovered Vanessa’s books in my twenties, so it had never occurred to me that her bus tours might lean toward an older demographic.
“Yeah. I’m from LA. I arrived this afternoon. It was a long trip.”
John made no response. I searched for something else to say. “I managed to read all of Wolverine on my flight,” I offered.
John nodded politely. “Okay if I use the john?”
“Sure. I’m all through in there.”
John vanished into the tiny bathroom and closed the door.
I climbed gingerly into my twin bed. I hadn’t slept in a bed this small since my college dormitory—which, come to think of it, was the last time I’d shared a room with someone I wasn’t planning to have sex with.
Setting the alarm on my phone, I wondered what John had made of the snatch of conversation with Trevor he’d undoubtedly overheard. Hopefully he hadn’t caught more than us squabbling over who loved Vanessa more. There would probably be a lot of that on this trip.
I sighed and scrunched the flattened-sponge excuse for a pillow under my head, staring out the rain-streaked window at the lights of the airport.
The bathroom door opened and John stepped out, modestly tying his bathrobe around his waist. “What time do we leave in the morning?”
“Nine. Right after breakfast. We stop in Pitlochry for lunch and shopping. We’re on our own for the noon meal, but I think everyone will head for the roadside café where Vanessa murdered the little ginger-haired waitress in Pressure Cooker.”
John’s expression was blank. I thought I understood the reason.
“It’s one of the stand-alones,” I said. “Maybe you only read the MacKinnons?”
“Maybe.” He sounded cautious.
“It seems like a lot of people on the tour never read past the last MacKinnon book, so don’t feel alone.”
He nodded thoughtfully. “You said you’re from Los Angeles?”
“Right.”
“Do you go on these tours all the time?”
“No. This is my first. My first bus tour. My first any kind of tour.”
“Mine too.” He smiled. “What’s the group like?”
“Well, too soon to tell, really. Tonight was our first official get-together. Everyone seems nice.”
“I guess a few people arrived early. Like yesterday?”
“I think so. To do a little sightseeing and shopping.”
“But not you? You only arrived today?”
“Right. I’ve been here since three o’clock Glasgow time.” Which had been...seven in the morning back in LA and probably accounted for this weird mix of exhaustion and adrenaline. Or maybe that had to do with the argument with Trevor. Were we going to spend the next ten days fighting?
“I see.” Why John was disappointed that I hadn’t arrived early for shopping and sightseeing, I didn’t know. It did seem that way though.
“Is it your first time in Scotland?”
“Yes,” he said. “I guess the tour has a block of rooms on this floor?”
“I think Alison said we were on the third and fourth floors.”
He nodded thoughtfully. Meeting my look of inquiry, he said, “Well.”
“Well?”
He smiled awkwardly. “Just...well.”
“Oh.” I nodded. “Right. Well!”
Oh God. This was going to be ten days of hell.
On the bright side, we probably wouldn’t be spending that much time in our room, so...
But then again, why should it be ten days of hell? I was perfectly good at conversing with people at work. My neighbors thought I was a nice, friendly guy. My friends thought I was a nice, friendly guy. My family thought I was a nice, friendly guy. I was a nice, friendly guy.
Maybe a little reserved in social situations, but not so reserved I couldn’t make this work.
“So,” I said. “What’s your favorite Vanessa book?”
“Blink,” John said immediately.
“Her first stand-alone. That was a great one. I agree.”
“I thought it was a great balance between police procedural and psychological thriller.”
“Yeah. Definitely.”
“A brilliant novel about murder and memory and relationships and cops and modern Scotland.”
Yes, it was. And why was he reciting the book blurb to me? I remembered the quote because only two days ago I’d been glancing through my Vanessa novels trying to decide what to bring to have her sign for me.
“And what an ending,” I said, watching him closely.
John didn’t bat an eye. “It blew me away.”
“The fact that she even went there.”
“It stayed with me for days.”
Hmm. Had he actually read the book? But why say it was his favorite if he hadn’t? Why not pick one of the MacKinnons?
I ventured, “She wouldn’t have risked trying to pull off such an ambiguous ending in one of the MacKinnon novels.”
John looked regretful. “I’m not really up on the MacKinnons.”
Okay. That was unusual. But possible. Not everyone loved series books. It was possible some readers only knew Vanessa through her stand-alones. I’d never met one yet, but they had to be out there.
And, after all, why would John admit to not reading the MacKinnons, but fudge about his favorite stand-alone? That wasn’t logical.
John gave a sudden huge yawn. “I’m beat,” he said, meeting my eyes with the guileless direct stare you get from patrons who are going to try to argue their way out of paying their overdue fines. “I’m going to turn in now. But if you want to read or watch TV, go ahead.”
“It’s going to be a long day tomorrow. I should probably sleep too.” I sat up and snapped off the lamp on the table between our beds.
John flicked off the wall switch. His pale outline crossed the floor and climbed into his own narrow bunk.
“Good night,” I said.
“Night.” The bed frame squeaked as he rolled onto his side, offering a view of his broad pajama-clad back.
I studied the outline of him in the gloom, thinking. Was it possible John hadn’t actually read any of Vanessa’s work?
No.
The whole tour was tailored to fans of Vanessa’s work. It was too expensive and too idiosyncratic for the ordinary Celtophile. He had to be a fan. Well, not just a fan. A superfan. A fanatic. An ordinary fan did not pay gobs of money and travel the ocean to meet any old author. The shelling out of airfare was the gesture of the truly devoted.
After a few puzzled moments I lost interest in John and his reading habits and returned to worrying over the problem of Trevor.
I’d been foolish not to anticipate how unpleasant this trip might be, given the current situation between us. The problem was, I’d never really thought much about the tour. My focus had been on thwarting Trevor by using my ticket. I had looked forward to how irritated he’d be by my presence. And he was! He was every bit as pissed off as I’d imagined. Mission accomplished.
And now I had ten days of Trevor being pissed off to look forward to. Which...
I sighed.
“Did you say something?” John asked politely.
“Me? No.”
Silence.
I considered the wide-awake and listening stillness of a guy I did not know from Adam, and decided it was the darkness and the fact that we were in bed that made it uncomfortable. Again, I was reminded of college dorm life.
Once you reached a certain age—No, it wasn’t an age thing. It was the fact that I had been, to all intent and purposes, married for years. When I woke up in the night, I still expected to find Trevor there. Except that wasn’t correct either. Trevor was the default, but nowadays I didn’t expect to find anyone there.
And wouldn’t for the foreseeable future.
Even as I told myself this, I felt my heart deflate. The foreseeable future was a long time, and the fact of the matter was, I had liked being one half of a couple.
I liked sharing my life with someone. I liked the comfort and joy of a steady relationship. I liked having someone to celebrate the good times with—and someone to turn to when the times weren’t so good. I liked security. I liked having regular sex with someone I trusted. Ha. More fool me. But partnership was more than sex and security. It was companionship too. I liked having someone with whom to share my favorite books and films. I liked cooking meals together and spending Sunday mornings having breakfast in bed. As much as I liked my book clubs and my film club and my cooking classes, as much as I enjoyed Sunday brunch with friends...it just wasn’t the same.
Not that it had been perfect with Trevor. When I was feeling lonely—and there was nothing like trying to fall asleep next to a complete stranger to make you feel lonely—I tended to view those years in a warm nostalgic glow, as if lit by the candlelight of a romantic dinner. The truth was, Trevor had driven me crazy a lot of the time. I’d used to wish he had a little more sense of humor, that he’d occasionally bother to hide the fact that my friends and family bored him, that he’d take on some of the responsibility of cohabitation—or just pay a utility bill on time for once.
Anyway. It was dead and gone—and I’d already conducted the postmortem and filed my report.
Which didn’t change the fact that the next ten days were going to be awkward. Trevor was not what anyone would call a good sport. He was going to do his best to make sure I regretted thwarting his wishes. The fact that I already regretted it wouldn’t make any difference.
Either way, the trip was paid for. No refund was possible. There were two options: I could spend the next ten days coping with life on the road waiting for whatever revenge Trevor might come up with, or I could cut my losses, fly home and spend my vacation enjoying my books and garden, which was how I usually spent my vacations.
The airport was just across the road, literally a few yards away from where I lay. If I was going to pull out of the tour, sooner would be better than later. Later was going to be a huge hassle for everyone. Later was going to look like—and feel like—Trevor had driven me off. Whereas I could get up, pack my bag, quietly leave tonight and... Trevor would still have driven me off, but it wouldn’t feel so much like the failure it would five days from now.
Strangely enough, though, I wasn’t so sure now that I wanted to bail.
Yes, I had been bored and out of sorts at dinner, and yes, being around Trevor made me miserable, but I was here in Bonnie Auld Scotland. At long last I’d stopped talking about traveling and actually started traveling.
And I was going to meet my favorite author in the world—spend four nights in a castle on an island in Scotland, which, even if the castle hadn’t been owned by Vanessa, would have been a really cool thing.
Plus there was my new roomie, John, who had definitely aroused my interest. Not that interest—although he was vaguely attractive, I guess—but more like curiosity.
I listened to the rain, which was coming down pretty hard; a restless tick-tick against the window.
It would be a cold, wet walk to the airport. Whereas this bed, though narrow and suffering a pillow shortage, was warm and reasonably comfortable.
I continued to weigh the options while my eyelids grew heavier and heavier...
* * *
I woke to the sound of someone moving furtively in my bedroom.
I opened my mouth to yell, then remembered that you weren’t supposed to yell if the burglars were already in your space. You were supposed to be very quiet until you could slip away to safety. While I was reasoning this through—and realizing that there was no quiet way to disappear right out from under someone’s nose—I remembered I was in a hotel room in Scotland and that my roommate was apparently sneaking his clothes on in the middle of the night.
No. He probably wasn’t sneaking. He was probably trying to be considerate.
I said, “I’m awake, if you want to turn on the light.”
John’s silhouette jumped about a foot and swore. He said with a hint of accusation, “I thought you were asleep.”
“I was. I’m a light sleeper.”
I could tell from his silence that he didn’t like that. And I didn’t like that he didn’t like that, because why would he be worried about me sleeping through whatever he was getting up to?
Not for the first time it occurred to me that there was something a little odd about John.
“I can’t sleep,” he said brusquely. “I’m going for a walk.”
“Okay.” I peered at the clock on the low table between our beds. One o’clock in the morning. I’d have been a little uneasy about walking around a strange city in the middle of the night, but clearly John was a more adventurous soul.
I closed my eyes—only to jerk awake at the sound of commotion in the hall outside.
The room was still dark. In fact, it felt like only a minute or two had passed, but a quick glance at the clock indicated it was now five thirty in the morning.
I was trying to analyze the memory of the sound that had woken me—it had sounded a lot like a cow kicking a glass milk can over—when I heard the door lock turn.
I raised my head as the door inched open. A pale form hovered for a moment and then cautiously stuck his head in as though to make sure the coast was clear.
I reached up and snapped on the light. Both John and I winced in its glare.
“What the hell?” I asked. Politely, I thought, given the circumstances.
“Oh, you’re awake,” John said. Ever so casually.
“Again.” I continued to squint at him from beneath the hand shielding my eyes.
“Er...yeah. Sorry about that. The maids left their cleaning cart in the hallway.”
“And you thought you’d take it for a spin?”
“Ha! No. I didn’t see it in time.” He held his phone up as though in explanation.
“Are you in for the night? Or still doing laps?”
He pushed the door wide open and stepped inside. “In for the night. What’s left of it.”
“Thank God.” I turned the light off, flopped over onto my pillow and went back to sleep.
Copyright © 2017 by Josh Lanyon
Also available from Josh Lanyon:
THE MERMAID MURDERS, an Art of Murder novel
Special Agent Jason West is seconded from the FBI Art Crime Team to temporarily partner with disgraced legendary “manhunter” Sam Kennedy when it appears that Kennedy’s most famous case, the capture and conviction of a serial killer known as The Huntsman, may actually have been a disastrous failure.
The Huntsman is still out there...and the killing has begun again.
To purchase and read this and other books by Josh Lanyon, please visit Josh’s website at .