Moon Cursed (5 page)

“But Nessie would have to be a herd of plesiosaurs. Just because dey might not be extinct don’t mean dey be immortal.”

“Right,” Kris agreed. “The shape and size of what people have seen is about right for a plesiosaur, or so this guy said.”

“Sir Peter Scott,” Jamaica said. “British naturalist. Plenty famous. But a plesiosaur was a reptile and so cold-blooded. Which means it wouldn’t survive in de freezing cold of de loch.”

“There goes that theory,” Kris muttered. “So how cold
is
the water?”

“Average temperature around six degrees Celsius.”

“English, please.”

“Dat
is
English.” Jamaica shook her head. “Six Celsius is … oh,” she pursed her lips, “about forty-two degrees American. You know, besides de cold, you can only see five feet down, which means you’re swimming above a great black maw of nothing.”

“Not only cold then, but creepy.”

Jamaica lifted her nearly empty water bottle in a toast. “No one swims in de loch unless dey had ten too many local lagers. Maybe dat was de case with your mystery friend?”

Kris shook her head. “He didn’t taste like Guinness.”

The sudden silence made Kris glance up, then curse. She’d actually said that out loud.

“You kissed him?” Jamaica asked.

“He kissed me. It was—”

Fabulous,
she thought.

“Weird,” she said.

Jamaica remained silent, in her eyes an expression Kris couldn’t read. She seemed both concerned and annoyed, with a bit of afraid thrown in. But none of that made any sense. Unless—

“You know who he is now?” Kris asked.

“Why would now be any different dan before?” Jamaica returned.

Two customers burst in the door, and Jamaica hurried off with a “Nice talking to you” that held the distinct undertone of
Get lost.

Since Kris had just met the woman, she couldn’t say for sure what she’d seen in Jamaica’s eyes or heard in her voice. But Kris had done enough interviews to realize that answering a question with a question was almost always an attempt to hide a lie. Although why Jamaica would lie about something so minor as knowing the identity of the man who’d kissed Kris in Urquhart Castle was anyone’s guess.

Sufficiently caffeinated, Kris went in search of lunch. Along the way, she became enchanted by the wonder of Drumnadrochit.

Lola owned a large collection of old Hollywood musicals, and
Brigadoon
was one of her favorites. Kris had probably watched the movie a dozen times, and parts of Drumnadrochit had her humming “Almost like Being in Love.” She half-expected to turn a corner and find Cyd Charisse twirling and jumping along the sidewalk.

Other parts resembled every small tourist town in America—shops, museums, tours, hotels with catchy names like The Highlander, and restaurants that advertised a “Nessie-sized breakfast.” One place in particular caught her eye.

“The Myth Motel,” Kris read. “Museum, gift shop, rooms, and eatery. Specialty—Nessie Nuggets.” How could she pass that up? Especially since she was by now hungry enough to eat Nessie.

Kris paused with her hand on the door, wondering if Nessie Nuggets were shaped like Nessie, something to feed
to
Nessie, or made
of
Nessie.

She snorted. There
was
no Nessie. Sheesh. If she wasn’t careful she’d be sharing the delusion of everyone in Drumnadrochit. Where would
Hoax Hunters
be then? Where would
she
be?

“Out on my ass with no place to go,” Kris muttered, and yanked open the door.

A tall, slim man in a kilt stood just inside. His close-cropped dark hair and goatee proved a stunning contrast to his light gray eyes. “Welcome to The Myth Motel.”

“You’re American?” Kris blurted, both startled by the lack of an accent and thrilled by it. She hadn’t heard English without an accent since she got off the plane. Sure, it had only been a day, but she missed it.

“Technically, no.”

Kris tilted her head and waited.

“Raised there, born here,” he explained. “I’m Dougal Scott.”

Kris offered her hand. “Kris Daniels.”

They shook. He had nice hands, a good handshake. Not too soft, not too hard, and he looked directly into her face with a smile. “The writer woman?”

Kris rolled her eyes, and he laughed, the sound deeper than she would have expected and very engaging.

“You’ll soon learn that everyone knows everything in Drumnadrochit.”

Kris certainly hoped not. She might find herself tossed into the loch if they did. She was, after all, planning to expose their livelihood as one of the biggest tourist traps of all time.

“I’ve never met anyone named Dougal,” she said, eager to change the subject before he started posing more questions that would require more lies.

“I went by ‘Doug’ in the states, but I’m back to ‘Dougal’ now.” He indicated the kilt. “Anything to appease the tourists.”

“Yet you don’t add a brogue?”

His lips curved. “I come off sounding more like Foghorn Leghorn than William Wallace.”

“How long were you in the states?”

“Most of my life. I inherited the motel from my
granaidh.
My grandfather. I added both the restaurant and museum. If I do say so myself, my museum’s the best in the area. A combination of scientific facts, cryptozoological theory, and the most comprehensive list of sightings available in this country or any other.”

Kris felt a prickle of excitement. She’d never been able to find information on all of the sightings compiled in one place, so it was impossible to compare and discover if some were repeats of others.

Meeting this guy was a golden opportunity. And she’d walked in for the Nessie Nuggets.

“You sound like a true believer.” Though Kris wanted the information, she was kind of disappointed to encounter yet another sheep in the “I love Nessie” flock. Was no one in Scotland a skeptic, like her?

“Don’t tell, but…” Dougal made a show of looking around, then stepped closer and lowered his voice: “I’m here to cash in. People want Nessie…” He swept a showman’s hand toward the museum’s entrance. “I’ll give them Nessie.”

Kris smiled. At last. Someone with a clue.

“I’d love to hear more,” she began, and the door opened, spilling tourists into the foyer.

Dougal appeared torn. He obviously sensed in her a kindred spirit and he wanted to talk longer, but he needed to deal with all those wonderful customers.

“Are you busy tonight?” he asked.

Kris blinked. Was he asking her out?

Kris hadn’t had a date in six months, with good reason. The last had been of the blind variety. Lola had set it up with a friend of a friend of a ticket taker at the ballet.

“He’s a nice guy,” Lola had insisted.

Apparently his wife thought so, too.

Lying creep.

Such was the way with dates. They looked good on paper. Even seemed to go all right on the phone. But by the third meeting, if not before, the lies started to tumble out.

Dougal patted Kris on the shoulder, already moving toward his unexpected mother lode. “Don’t look so deer-in-the-headlights. I was just going to suggest you walk through the museum and if you’re still interested in talking, there’s a pub where the locals go. MacLeod’s. The oldest of its kind in the village.”

“How old?”

“Maybe eight hundred years,” Dougal answered. “They say Andrew Moray’s troops drank there. And there are the usual tales of the Bonnie Prince, Robert the Bruce, and William Wallace all lifting a tankard on their way to the next kill fest. But I think, sometimes, those tales are very much like the American claims that ‘George Washington slept here.’ If the man slept everywhere they say he did, he wouldn’t have had any time left to win the war.”

“Where is it?”

“Next street over.” Dougal jerked a thumb past his right ear. “I usually get there around sunset.” He turned and greeted his guests.

Kris ducked into the eatery ahead of the crowd. Nessie Nuggets turned out to be deep-fried chicken strips shaped like a herd of bumpy-backed dinosaurs.

“Chicken McNessies,” Kris commented when they were placed before her.

From the waitress’s expression, she’d heard that one before and hadn’t found it funny then, either. Kris had done her share of waiting tables in college and understood the sentiment. Everyone was a comedian. Or at least thought they were.

The Nessies came with chips and veggies, she assumed the latter to help clean out the arteries being clogged by the deep-fried former.

She ate everything, washing it down with what had been billed on the menu as “Scotland’s other national drink” or Irn-Bru—which tasted like a combination of orange pop and 7UP.

Kris exited the restaurant ahead of a large group of Belgian tourists, then paid the nominal fee for the museum to a young, dimple-cheeked woman who
did
have a brogue and slipped inside.

If the museum were comprised of a few out-of-focus photos of fish fins and some inflatable purple plesiosaurs, Kris wouldn’t feel bad about skipping the rendezvous at MacLeod’s, although from the description of the place she would need to stop there at some point. An ancient, authentic Scottish pub should not be missed.

However, Kris was impressed by Dougal’s museum. He’d done a fantastic job with the displays. He obviously had artistic training or perhaps had hired someone who did. Everything was well lit, colorful, easy to read, and there was a lot here Kris hadn’t seen before. She wished she’d brought her notebook so she could write down the questions she wanted to pursue later.

Dougal Scott just might be her new best friend.

CHAPTER 4

After an afternoon wrestling with the Internet, followed by a nice, long nap, Kris retraced her steps to The Myth Motel. As the sun fell toward the horizon, she took the next street to the north, walked a block, and bingo.

Tucked into a stream of newer buildings, MacLeod’s stood out like a great-grandfather at a four-year-old’s birthday party.

The gray-stone exterior appeared to be original. The structure listed slightly to the right. However, the roof was no longer thatch and the windows, which had no doubt begun as mere holes in the walls, now sported sparkling glass and red shutters.

Inside the floor was polished wood, as was the bar. The ceilings were lower than Kris was used to—a testament to how much shorter men were back when the pub had been built. Through timbered archways several smaller rooms were visible, which made her think that once upon a time MacLeod’s had hosted both a public drinking area for the unwashed masses and private areas for the privileged few.

The place was three-quarters full—both men and women of all ages sat in booths, at tables and the bar. Their attire was testament to their occupations—cook, waitress, parking valet, farmer—very few had bothered to change clothes after work. In the corner sat Rob and Effy Cameron, a pint in front of them both.

They were arguing, or at least Effy was. Her mouth moved; her hands waved; she slopped ale over the edge of her glass and onto the table in an effort to make her point. Rob just sat there and drank.

The conversation dimmed when Kris walked in. She almost walked back out. MacLeod’s was for the locals, and she wasn’t.

Dougal stood, waving her to the bar. As she crossed the room, whispers followed. It wasn’t until she took one of the several empty stools surrounding him that the voices started up again.

“I wasn’t sure you’d come.”

She hadn’t been, either, but even after the whispers and the strange looks she was glad that she had. She was in Scotland. She should see Scottish stuff as much as she could before she ran out of money and had to go home.

“You look like you could use a drink.” Dougal’s concerned expression made Kris realize she’d been frowning at the thought of her rapidly dwindling bank account.

She made herself smile. “Yes. Thanks.”

Dougal lifted his hand and the bartender, an extremely large man in every way—height, breadth, belly, chin; make that chins—grimaced. Strange behavior for a business owner, but it was quite busy. Eventually, after waiting on every customer down the line first, he made his way to them.

“Johnnie, this is Kris Daniels, the writer woman staying at Effy’s place.”

Kris’s offered hand disappeared in Johnnie’s when they shook. His smile for her was warm, and his voice when he asked what she’d like friendly. She must have been mistaken about his annoyance.

Kris didn’t think white wine was on the menu or, if it was, that she’d want to drink it, so she indicated Dougal’s glass with a finger and said, “Whatever he’s having.”

Johnnie moved off with a surprisingly light step for his bulk and pulled a bottle from the top shelf.

“Did I just order the equivalent of Scottish lighter fluid?” Kris asked.

“You’ll see.”

Johnnie brought her drink, about an inch of liquid the shade of burnished sienna; then he waited while she tried it.