Surprises on the Scottish Isle (Coorie Castle Crafts #1)

Chapter 1

10 Years Later

Sod Dougie, he could have the lot as far as she was concerned. Tara McTaigh was done. If he wanted to move his mistress into the house that he and Tara had once lived, loved and laughed in, then let him. But he was going to have to pay dearly for the privilege.

Personally, she didn’t care if the damned house burnt to the ground, but she did care that Dougie wanted it. Since he’d informed her that he wanted a divorce, making his life difficult was what had kept her going. These past few months had been hard – seven years of marriage down the drain and very little to show for it: just this house and her memories.

Was she bitter? Yes, absolutely.

But her bitterness had finally run its course, as evidenced by her decision to let him have the house. She was simply too weary to fight any more. Anyway, what was the point? Dougie would get it one way or another, whether he bought her out as part of the divorce settlement or bought it on the open market when it was put up for sale. Dougie had always managed to get what he wanted. He had a knack for it.

Tara made the call. ‘You can have the house. Just give me my half of the proceeds.’

‘I’ve changed my mind.’ Dougie’s tone was mocking.

She didn’t rise to the bait. ‘In that case, I’ll contact the estate agent in the morning.’

Her soon-to-be ex-husband hesitated. ‘What’s the catch?’

‘There isn’t one.’

His incredulous laugh made her wince. ‘I find that hard to believe.’

‘I don’t care. Believe what you like. Let’s get this over with.’

‘It didn’t have to be like this.’ His voice had softened.

Tara recognised the tactic. He was worried she might change her mind, so he wanted to keep her onside. ‘You made certain that it did,’ she retorted, but she sounded weary and resigned, rather than bitter and angry.

She hoped it was a step in the right direction. For her own sake, she had to move on, and it wasn’t as though she still loved him. He’d killed that particular emotion when he’d informed her that the woman he’d been cheating on her with was pregnant. What a bloody cliché! Tara felt like a poorly written character in a badly scripted film.

Cheating husband? Tick.

Younger woman? Tick.

Pregnant mistress? Tick.

Unsuspecting, heartbroken wife? Tick, tick, tick !

But that wasn’t strictly true, she acknowledged, after the call ended and a sum for her share of the property and its contents had been agreed. She’d experienced true heartbreak once, and this wasn’t it. She had loved Dougie, and what he’d done had hurt, but he hadn’t been the love of her life. Which was just as well, really.

For quite some time Tara had suspected he was being unfaithful. And she was pretty certain that The Pregnant One hadn’t been the first. She also suspected The Pregnant One wouldn’t be the last. Leopards, spots, and all that jazz.

However, she had a feeling Dougie might find it more difficult to extricate himself from his newest relationship once children were involved. Yes, children – his mistress was having twins.

Tara thanked God that she and Dougie hadn’t had any kids. It would have made an awful situation completely unbearable.

In some ways, she blamed herself for allowing their marriage to go on for as long as it had. She should have ended it the first time she’d suspected him of cheating. But it had been just a suspicion, no concrete proof. He had slickly and convincingly talked his way out of it, until Tara believed she must have imagined the smell of unfamiliar perfume on his skin, and accepted his flimsy excuses for not being home when he’d told her he would be, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

Bored with going over the same old thing, Tara made her way up to the large attic which she’d converted into her workroom. Now that the decision to move out of the marital home had been made, she urgently needed to start thinking about where she was going to live.

Wherever it was, it had to be big enough for her huge collection of doll’s houses and all the paraphernalia that was used to make them. The upside was that properties in Edinburgh were expensive, so her portion of the divorce settlement would be substantial. The downside was that properties in Edinburgh were expensive, so her portion of the divorce settlement wouldn’t buy her the space she needed.

Maybe it was time to look further afield, for a new home for McTaigh Miniatures?

Tara leaned back in her chair and raised her arms above her head,

clasping her fingers together and arching her spine to ease out the

kinks. She’d been hunched over her laptop for what felt like hours,

searching for the perfect property. Needless to say, she hadn’t found

it.

To be fair, she wasn’t entirely sure what she was looking for. She had no fixed idea in her mind, apart from it needing to be large enough, not too expensive, and available soon. She’d looked at houses, flats, and even commercial properties, all within a twenty-mile radius of Edinburgh.

Nothing.

An expanded search had produced equally dreary results.

None of them were quite right, although there were plenty that would do. But Tara didn’t want to make do . This move was important if she intended to grow her business, and without anything else in her life to focus on, she was going to give it her best shot.

She’d show him.

Dougie used to call her doll’s houses her ‘little hobby’.

The sarcastic, patronising git! Her little hobby brought in enough to pay the bills and then some, a fact he used to conveniently forget because his job was so much more important . As far as Tara could tell, it was also far less fulfilling, although working in fiscal management had provided him ample opportunity to play around, so he’d clearly got his fulfilment in ways other than from his job.

She glanced around the attic, feeling sad. She didn’t mind leaving the house, but she did mind having to vacate her attic. Apart from the structural work, such as putting in a proper staircase and having Velux windows fitted to flood the top floor of their terraced Victorian villa with loads of natural light, Tara had kitted out the attic herself. She’d done everything from cladding the walls and ceiling, to laying the floor and installing the shelves and workbenches. This was her space, her sanctuary. This was where she created miniature models of other people’s houses, and everything to go in them. She would miss this space far more than she would ever miss Dougie.

Getting to her feet, Tara wandered around the room, trailing her fingers along the shelves, stopping every so often to open up one of the houses or to peer through the little windows.

The wall opposite the staircase was lined with the miniatures she’d created, ranging from tiny plates of cakes, to elaborate four-poster beds and planters of tiny flowers for the garden. These were her bread-and-butter items, which didn’t take an age to make and were easily sold online, either from her own website or from sites specialising in unique handmade items.

Thankfully, she didn’t have an actual physical shop to worry about. Her business was fully portable. As long as she had a suitable space in which to work, she could carry on earning a living. The only other requirement was a local post office, a collection service for the bulkier items and decent Wi-Fi.

Returning to her desk, Tara resumed her search, but it was rather desultory and she found herself going down a rabbit hole of looking at properties in places like the Western Isles or the Outer Hebrides, before reining herself in. Ideally, what she wanted was—

She froze. She’d left the popular property search sites behind and had been reading local online newspapers in the hope that something would jump out at her, when something did .

An article featuring Coorie Castle and its associated craft centre caught her eye, and as she read it, excitement bloomed in her chest. It sounded perfect, and from examining the photos accompanying the article, she thought its location on the Isle of Skye was stunning. But what really sent the butterflies in her tummy into a fury of fluttering, was reading that the craft centre had a vacant studio to fill.

With trembling fingers and a stern admonishment to herself to not get too excited because the chances of it leading to anything were slim, Tara typed the words Coorie Castle into the search bar.

Bloody hell! It was perfect. This was exactly what she’d been looking for, even if she hadn’t realised it.

Could she?

Dare she?

Tara could – after all, nothing ventured, nothing gained – and a polite enquiry didn’t commit her to anything, did it?

With great care and the attention to detail that she was gaining a reputation for, Tara typed out an email and attached several photos of her work, along with a link to her own website. The castle looked impressive, the craft centre even more so, and as she pressed send, she crossed her fingers. If, by the remotest chance, she was lucky enough to be able to rent the studio, it would be a fresh start, a new beginning.

Tara didn’t get much sleep that night. She was too busy imagining a whole new life away from Dougie, Edinburgh, and a slew of bad memories.