Page 29 of Star Witch
‘I’m wearing my pyjamas because I’m going back to bed. Winter, even you can’t think this is a good idea.’
His expression was blank. ‘There’s no other time. You’ll be busy working during the day. In fact, now there’s been a bloody pentagram, I will be too. If we want to check out the murder site, this is the only time we can do it.’
Except I didn’t want to check out the murder site, I wanted to go back to bed. ‘The police will have been all over it with a fine toothcomb. There won’t be anything to see. Not any more.’
Winter arched an eyebrow. ‘No witches have been permitted access, Ivy. Do you really think that the police, regardless of how competent they are, will be able to recognise spell traces? Do you think they’d notice if there were some stray herb sprinkles amongst the grass? Would they…’
Bloody hell. ‘Enough,’ I said. ‘Give me five minutes and I’ll change my clothes.’ This was an argument I wasn’t going to win.
***
Just about the only positive to this venture was that Winter had somehow managed to procure a motorbike. He muttered something about borrowing it from the proprietor of his B&B. When he initially refused to let me drive it, I pointed out that driving was what I did for a living and that I hadn’t told him where we were going yet. What I didn’t mention was that I’d never driven a motorbike before. There was a first time for everything.
‘I’d have thought,’ Winter shouted in my ear as I revved the engine, ‘that you’d take the opportunity to sit back and not do anything. If I drove, you’d be able to relax.’
True. But if he drove, we’d go at snail’s pace and he’d probably want to stop to examine random trees or pick rare herbs just in case they would come in useful in the future. With me in charge, we’d get there and back much more quickly. After all, I had to get some sleep at some point.
It was also rather nice having Winter hold my waist. When he almost fell off the back and took me with him, however, I decided I was less enamoured of the situation.
‘Slow down!’ he yelled in my ear as we careened away from the hotel.
‘I can’t hear you!’ I shouted back and sped up. This was fun. It helped that the roads were empty. Maybe I should get out and about in the Highlands of Scotland in the dead of night more often.
Nah.
From what Gareth had told me, I had an idea about how to get to Dead Man’s Hill. There were enough signposts for the cemetery and, when we reached it, I spotted a small dirt track leading up the slope behind it. That had to be what we were looking for. It looked less like a hill and more like a damn mountain that would give Everest a run for its money.
Yet again I pretended not to hear Winter when he shouted that we could walk from here and nudged the bike upwards. I was going to use horsepower to get as close as we possibly could. I kept going upwards, stopping only when I was forced to.
‘What the hell?’ Winter ground out when I turned off the engine and he slipped off the back.
‘There’s too much mud. The wheels are spinning.’
He peered at me through the darkness. ‘That was not what I meant and you know it. You drive like a demon, Ivy.’
‘Thank you.’
Winter growled, ‘You should have left the bike at the bottom of the hill.’
I blinked. ‘But then we’d have had to walk all the way.’
‘Now the bike is all dirty.’
‘So wash it when we get back.’ Preferably while wearing a white T-shirt, which would quickly get soaked, and when I was watching from a comfortable vantage point. I patted him on the arm. ‘Come on. I think it’s this way.’
‘Then let’s get going.’ With his usual gait, Winter took off at a tremendous speed, scaling the hill as if it were nothing more than a gentle incline. I followed after him, my determination to get this over and done dissipating in the face of the immediate ache in my calves.
‘Slow down,’ I called to Winter.
His response was immediate. ‘I can’t hear you!’
Ha. Ha. Ha. I gritted my teeth and ploughed upwards. Who the hell murdered someone up a mountain? It would have been far more convenient to use the cemetery – at least then it would have been a one-stop shop.
Huffing and puffing, I glanced back down. With the gravestones just visible in the moonlight, it looked more picturesque than creepy. ‘It can’t,’ I heaved, ‘be a coincidence,’ I paused again for breath, ‘that the murder took,’ I gasped, ‘here.’
Winter finally stopped and turned. ‘What on earth is wrong with you?’
I doubled over and tried to bring more air into my lungs.
