500 Miles from You (Scottish Bookshop #3)(38)

“Um, pint of eighty shilling?” said Cormac automatically. He could call his bank and make sure, transfer some money over, probably. Yeah. He’d do that. The crushing thought that these beautiful, groomed creatures might snigger to themselves that he fit the stereotype of Scottish people being miserly was so shaming he wanted to bury himself.

The beautiful model-waitress smiled widely. “I’m so sorry, I don’t know what that is?” she said, her voice going up at the end. “I can ask maybe at the bar?”

“It’s a beer . . .”

“All our beers are imported? We have . . .” And she proceeded to reel off a number of names of beers Cormac had never heard before. Finally Cormac stopped her just to stop things from getting completely out of hand.

“Aye. That one,” he said randomly.

The beautiful person smiled. “Wonderful choice?”

Cormac turned to Larissa, but she was emptying the bottle of champagne into a glass and waving the empty bottle about.

“Keep them coming!”

Cormac swallowed carefully.

“Of course!” said the server, and hurried off with another perfect smile.

By the time he had turned back, Kalitha was telling a story about a red carpet that he couldn’t really follow but involved lots of squealing, then every so often Larissa or Portia, who seemed slightly kinder than the others, would attempt to bring him in to the conversation by asking him something about Scotland, and he would turn pink and mutter something very unfunny and uninspiring, not feeling like himself at all, and the others would look at him for a second and he could hear Larissa’s audible disappointment in him for not being a jolly lad or whatever it was she’d had in mind when she started all this.

It was even worse for the fact that Cormac was a perfectly sociable chap, if a little shy. Not the life and soul, maybe, but he was funny and easygoing and the girls usually liked him, and of course Jake would lead the way. Cormac did think how much Jake would be enjoying himself, telling outrageous stories about people who’d gotten things stuck up their bums, giving cheeky backhanded compliments to Kalitha, and generally being at home everywhere, and he felt completely out of his depth and more and more tongue-tied and awkward than ever. His beer, when it came, was a horrible sweet lager that felt sticky on his teeth, but he drank it determinedly and glanced at his watch so he could work out how soon he could politely leave.





Chapter 34


Jake caught up with Lissa as she left Joan’s surgery, exchanging one bundle of notes for another.

“Hi!” he said, and she stared at him as if she couldn’t remember who he was (this was not at all the case; she was just still getting used to people recognizing her in the street, which never, ever happened in London).

“Oh, hello,” she said, flustered. She held her shopping bag closer to herself in case he wanted to see what kind of groceries she had. She’d never realized how exposing it was, living in a very small village. Mrs. Murray had already remarked more than once on how many Kit Kats she seemed to buy at any one period and she was definitely contemplating getting her Kit Kats online, if she could resist the temptation to buy a box of eighty at a time, which she wasn’t sure she could, and that couldn’t end anywhere good.

“Jake,” said Jake.

“Yeah . . . I know. Ambulance, right?”

He nodded. “Yup.”

“Busy shift?”

“In fact, no,” he said. “Young boy fell out of a boat on Loch Ness, but he was fine by the time they picked him up.”

“Does that happen a lot?”

“More than you’d think. We nearly lost a couple o’ bairns last year.” He shivered to think about it.

“Do they get eaten by the monster?”

“Yes,” he said, totally deadpan. “Monster-related injuries make up about thirty, forty percent of my job most days. It’s okay, we have a venom antidote.”

She smiled for the first time he’d seen, and he saw her lovely teeth.

“So, you know it’s the shows?” he said nervously. He wasn’t asking her out, obviously. He wasn’t asking her out at all. He was just letting her know it was on, which wasn’t the same thing at all, nothing like.

He flashed back to the conversation he’d had the previous night with Cormac.

“You should go see her,” Cormac had said.

Jake was still a little sore about being cold-shouldered the last time. “Mebbe,” he’d said.

“I think she’s a bit lonely,” said Cormac.

“Oh, do you? And how do you know?”

“I don’t. We exchange medical notes.”

“You’re practically having a relationship. I’m surprised your mum hasn’t been over.”

“I’m not,” said Cormac.

“Is she still in a mood with you?”

“She is.”

“Highland women,” said Jake, not for the first time.

“What . . . what does she look like?” asked Cormac tentatively, not even entirely sure why he was asking.

“Oi oi,” said Jake, and Cormac instantly cursed.

“Not like that!” he said quickly. “It’s just a bit weird not to know who’s living in your house.”