Page 20 of The Scottish Island Wedding

‘Ah, Joan was always a tiger,’ Chrissie laughed. ‘I’m more of a pampered housecat. But we both have claws when we need to.’ She took Heather’s hand. ‘Listen to me. If Matty’s not home by tomorrow, then you have to go and find him and ask him, face to face, what the hell he’s up to. He can’t leave you in the lurch, so soon before your wedding. It’s cruel. If needs be, I’ll go and find him myself.’

‘Auntie, don’t be daft.’

‘Oh, I will. But you need to be strong in all of this. Women need to be strong.’ Aunt Chrissie paused for a moment, collecting her thoughts. ‘All my life, people have told me that I was soft and pretty and pliable. And perhaps I am those things. Or I was. But I was, and I am, resilient. Heather, you have to know that you have the backbone to cope with whatever these Campbells throw your way. And what I used to do, when I was modelling and at all different times in my life, was that I’d imagine myself as a vast angel with wings and a cape. And sometimes I had a flaming sword, like St Michael, if I was really cross and wanted revenge, or I wanted to protect myself. And I’d imagine being much taller and bigger than the person who was being mean to me, and glowing with a righteous light, and that would help me feel strong. Maybe you should do something like that.’

‘Pretend I’m an angel?’

‘You are an angel. Like, a superhero, in your modern parlance, I suppose.’ Aunt Chrissie pulled the covers around her. ‘Glorious and powerful, anyway.’

‘Well, it’s a thought. I’ll give it a try.’ Heather kissed her aunt on the cheek. ‘Get some rest now, Auntie. And thanks for the chat. It helped.’

‘I’m not daft, and neither are you, Heather Balhennie.’ Aunt Chrissie wagged her finger at her great-niece. ‘Remember that.’

As if I could forget my heritage of strong women, Heather thought. It was a good thing: a thing to be proud of, but sometimes, when all you wanted to do was lie down, pull the covers over your head and weep, the expectation of being a Balhennie felt like a measure she could never live up to.

Heather vastly preferred not being fierce: she didn’t want to have to go and chase Matty down and make him explain himself. She didn’t want to make him come back and marry her. She didn’t want to have to imagine herself as a righteous angel or a superhero to be able to get through life.

She wanted Matty to be beside himself with joy that he was going to spend the rest of his life with her, and do everything in his power to make that happen.

Heather left her aunt to rest and softly closed the door behind her. Though it had helped to talk to Aunt Chrissie, she still didn’t know where Matty was, and whether her wedding was going to happen at all. Her stomach clenched in fear: a terrible spectre of failure and loss seemed to hang around her. Why was this happening? Why was Matty torturing her like this? Was it, in some way, her fault?

TEN

TUESDAY 14 DECEMBER

‘Well, of course, I’m delighted that there’s another opportunity for the Campbell jewels to be worn,’ Elizabeth Campbell said loftily as she held court in the drawing room of Balhennie Castle the next morning.

The room had been arranged – presumably by one of Elizabeth’s ever-present security team – in such a way that Elizabeth and Heather sat at the front in two of the grand upholstered chairs with a small cherry wood table between them. In front of them were two rows of chairs, where various journalists and photographers sat, along with Catriona, Blossom, Primrose and Bluebell, and Clara and Estella. The security team sat at the back, still dressed in black suits and, incongruously, black wraparound sunglasses.

Heather surreptitiously looked at her phone, but reading the string of unanswered texts she’d sent Matty was too painful to bear. She’d begun by being polite and loving, but as the silence continued, her texts had – understandably, she thought – got more frantic.

Hey xx I love you. What’s going on?

Matty, everyone’s asking where you are. How much longer do you think your work will take?

Matty. Please call me.

The wedding is in eleven days. If you’ve changed your mind, please just say.

She put her phone down and patted the diamonds around her neck self-consciously. She didn’t like being the focus of attention like this, and she certainly didn’t like the fact that Elizabeth had arranged a press conference without asking her or anyone else. The first anyone knew that morning that it was happening was one of the journalists pulling up on the drive to the castle. Uncle James had politely let them in, but Heather had seen his look of unease growing as more and more of them arrived. Heather and Catriona had been summoned by card again from the Inn; their sisters had rooms at the castle for the wedding.

In fact, Heather wondered if the man Elizabeth had met in the car the other day was a journalist. Now that they were all filing in, she could see that Elizabeth clearly had her favourites, and people that Heather guessed she might have known for a long time. But nobody arriving looked as though he could have been the man in the car, although Heather couldn’t be sure – he had been wearing a baseball cap and dark glasses, after all. However, most of the journalists were women, and of the male journalists that were in attendance, two were quite elderly and one looked much too young.

‘And will the wedding be here?’ one of the journalists asked. Heather had her phone on silent, but she could see notifications from the sisters’ group chat had started pinging furiously.

‘Yes. We’ve been very busy for months, planning everything,’ Elizabeth went on. Heather caught her mother’s eye at this outright lie; Catriona blinked and shot Heather a look of semi-comedic outrage, her mouth opening in a deliberately large O.

You have not planned anything, Heather argued with Elizabeth in her own head. You’ve just arrived and started throwing your weight around. Mum, Evelinda and I have done everything.

Somehow, the act of catching Elizabeth in such an obvious lie gave Heather a feeling of conviction and strength. She’d spent the last couple of days second-guessing herself; wondering if she’d misjudged things, judging herself for being possibly unreasonable. But there was no misjudging what was happening now.

Elizabeth was talking absolute rubbish.

‘How many people are coming?’ another journalist asked.

‘About two hundred. Quite a small affair.’ Elizabeth sniffed. ‘Still, Balhennie isn’t as spacious as Glenorchy. But we know that it’s tradition for the bride to host the wedding at her family home. We look forward to a festive Christmas wedding. I thought that would be rather charming.’

‘Bloody cheek!’ Primrose muttered from the rows of seating. Catriona’s eyebrows shot up so far that they were almost in her hairline; Heather rolled her eyes. Elizabeth was making it sound like the Christmas wedding was her idea. In fact, it had been Catriona’s.