Dark Island by Daniel Aubrey

Author:Daniel Aubrey [Aubrey, Daniel]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Published: 2024-07-15T00:00:00+00:00

26

FROM FINSTOWN, FREYA DROVE five minutes inland to the car park at Tormiston Mill. Across the busy A-road, a grass mound rose twenty-five feet out of a farmer’s field. Inside was Maeshowe: the five-thousand-year-old chambered tomb that would be brought to life with golden light at sunset. If the conditions didn’t conspire to ruin it.

To the south, the sun was already sinking into the saddleback dip between the two highest peaks on Hoy. As she’d left the coast behind, she had seen the first clouds begin to gather low on the horizon to the north, but the rest of the sky remained clear, a bright cobalt blue. It appeared this once-a-year-at-midwinter event might actually happen, but Freya didn’t know how she was going to give it her full concentration given what she had just heard.

Another car pulled into the car park. Freya checked the clock on her dash and saw it was a little after one. People probably wouldn’t start to gather in earnest for another half an hour yet. She had time to sit and think. She wrapped and unwrapped her hair around her finger as she replayed her conversation with Fergus. Far too often during her stay on the Crime and Courts desk she had reported on cases where women had been raped and murdered, and the killers, possibly in a fit of shame at their disgusting act, had covered or disfigured the bodies in some way after death. Freya thought of the empty eyes and sadistic smile she had seen in that photograph of Jason Miller and wondered if he was capable of such unimaginable things.

If he was, had he acted alone?

Had he left Liam alive to witness what he was doing to Ola or had he killed him first?

That didn’t bear thinking about, so she tried to clear her head and focus on other matters, such as why the two of them were at Skara Brae. And why had Jason really gone to that party in Harray where nobody knew him? It seemed like he had gone there specifically to taunt Ola, but why? Something as simple as a crush? Maybe Jason wanted Ola and the feeling wasn’t mutual.

Thinking of the party reminded Freya of something in Ola’s diary. Three weeks before Ola and Liam had been killed, Ola had written that Liam needed to tell her something he was keeping from her or they were through. They had been at the party together that night so their relationship hadn’t ended, which meant he must have told her. And whatever he had said, Ola had never written it down. In fact, she never wrote in her diary again.

Another vehicle arrived. Freya began to grow anxious she had misjudged this and the place was going to get busy quickly. She decided to walk over to the tomb’s entrance, taking her phone out on the way, and she saw she had several notifications. Top of the list was a text from Tom with a photo attached. Luna was

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