“What you can do is tell us the truth,” he said. “And then maybe we’ll let you have a drink of water. If we’re feeling generous.”
“What’s the truth matter to you?” Caskie muttered.
Oliver backhanded him. Lorna jumped at the blow, but Ellie kept her feet planted and dug her fingernails into her arm. Caskie coughed once and spat blood to the floor, a red mark rising on his smooth chin.
“Look, I’m sorry, all right? I didn’t mean to frighten you. I was looking for Mr. MacLeod and . . .” He looked at Lorna. “This wasn’t meant to happen.”
“So why did it then?” Oliver asked.
“Why else? Money. Grand house like this goes to waste most of the time. Could be used year-round if MacLeod would ever finish the renovations, but he keeps putting it off. Keeps finding something new to fix. Should do it all at once and be done with it. Not like he doesn’t, didn’t, have the money. Certainly doesn’t spend it on my salary. Didn’t. Could you loosen these, please?” he asked Lorna. “I’m not going to hurt anyone.”
“Hang on. Salary?” Oliver asked, but before Caskie could answer, Ellie was asking her own questions.
“So who was it?” she asked. “Who paid you to lure us here?”
Caskie blinked a few times as if uncertain how to answer. He looked right at her when he spoke.
“You did.”
The weight of Lorna’s and Oliver’s gaze shifted to her, but before she could deny it, Caskie continued.
“All of you did. You answered the ad I put up on Gumtree. All of your names were on the email. Said you were planning some sort of reunion. And you sent those gifts on ahead. Said it was some sort of inside joke. I thought it was stupid but—”
“You’re saying you don’t know who we are?” Lorna asked.
“Am I supposed to?”
“This is bullshit!” Oliver grabbed Caskie’s shirt collar, smacked him again. “You brought us here on purpose!”
“I didn’t!”
“You thought you could blackmail us into staying!”
“I swear I—”
Oliver punched him. Blood sprayed the floor. “Your plan all along was to kill us one by one!”
“I don’t want to kill anyone!”
“I almost let you off the hook. You should have never shown your face again.” Oliver raised his fist again, but Lorna placed a hand on his arm.
“Wait!” she said. “Please. Ellie, water.”
Ellie went behind the bar as Lorna whispered, “Wait,” to Oliver again. Caskie was crying now, his cheek swollen. Mucus and blood hung from his nose.
“Please,” he begged Lorna. “Please untie me. Make them let me go.” Ellie handed the water glass to Lorna, who crouched in front of Caskie and held it to his lips. He took a sip, wincing at his split lip, and Lorna asked her question.
“I want you to tell us why you came back.” Her voice was calm and firm.
Caskie muttered something through his tears. Lorna placed a hand on his shoulder.
“I know you’re scared. Just take a deep breath. You did leave last night, didn’t you? So why did you come back?”
Caskie took not one but three shuddering breaths and calmed himself enough to speak, but he spoke only to Lorna, wincing whenever Oliver or Ellie moved. He was pleading with her, and it made her want to pull away. “I wasn’t going to come back until Monday morning. You’d paid me . . . I thought you’d paid me . . . to stay away for the weekend. Give you all privacy. I promise that was what I was going to do. I promise. But Mr. MacLeod. He was supposed to be in Glasgow this weekend. He wasn’t. I found out he’d got back early and was headed straight for the house. He was going to find you all here and I didn’t . . . He knew I let the house out again. He’s had his suspicions before, but I always got away with it. This time, I don’t know how, he knew. He found out. Someone told him. Someone must have told him.”
Lorna allowed him another sip of water, and he continued.
“I thought I could make it back here. Head him off and, I don’t know. I figured I’d think of something.”
“So,” Lorna said, “it’s really Mr. MacLeod who owns Wolfheather House. You work for him and let the rooms without him knowing. Pocket the cash. Is that right?”
Caskie nodded.
“Then tell us this, Mister Caskie,” Oliver interrupted. “Why have you been skulking about all day?”
“I haven’t. I just got here. I left Portree as soon as I got wind of MacLeod, but the storm made the sea too choppy. I couldn’t cross safely till late this morning.”
“Did you take the ferry?” Lorna asked.
“I have my own boat. Docked at the quay. Won’t be another ferry until Monday, not with the weather the way it is. Please, I don’t know what’s been going on here or what you think I’ve done. But I’ve told you everything, I swear. Please let me go. Whatever it is you’re after, I’ll help you. I know this house inside and out. Or I can take you to Skye. My boat can hold everyone. Please. I can take you all away from here, and whatever’s happened . . . we can get away. I’ll help you get away.”
“Mr. Caskie. James,” said Lorna. “Look at me. Thank you. But I’m sure you saw him. Out there in the foyer. Mr. MacLeod. There’s no getting away from that.”
Caskie shut his eyes and shook his head. Started crying again.
“James, did you kill Mr. MacLeod?”
Caskie could only cry. Lorna offered him more water, but he turned his head away.
“Look, James. Something’s happening here that we have to see through to the end. If you help us, it won’t matter what you did to . . . It won’t matter what happened to Mr. McLeod. But we can’t leave until we’re done.”
Lorna tried again to coax him into calming down, but he wouldn’t say anything more.
Oliver nodded to the doorway and they followed him into the foyer, leaving Caskie to his tears.
“What do you think?” Oliver asked, his anger waning.
“I don’t know,” said Lorna. “He’s practically a kid. And he’s a mess.
I could see someone bribing him to get us here, but honestly, other than money, what motive would he have? He’s half our age. He couldn’t have been more than an infant when we were at university.”
“Well, of course he didn’t set it all up,” Ellie said. “Maeve did, and she used him to help her.” Now that they’d spoken to Caskie, it was obvious. Maeve had finally got her revenge for that night. For what they did to her at the party. For what happened to Callum. “Women can manipulate soft-headed men like Caskie into anything. Including murder. You might have trouble believing that, Oliver, but I’m sure Lorna understands.”
Caskie was no different than her Gordon, she thought, just a little younger.
But instead of backing her up, Oliver and Lorna exchanged looks. Then Lorna explained that they thought Maeve had been telling the truth about the catfishing. If Maeve was telling the truth about that, she couldn’t possibly be responsible for what was happening, they thought. Ellie could see how they would make that assumption based on the information they had. But they didn’t know what Ellie knew. They didn’t know Ellie had been contacted before coming to Wolfheather House, and that the same was probably true of Maeve. That someone could have told her to pack that lingerie as a cover. She could have told them all of that. Now was her chance. But she knew how angry they would be with her, and it was still possible she could get out of this without either of them ever knowing what she’d done. If she could just speak to Caskie alone.