CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
My heart was beating fast as I stared at her in horror. She looked just as shocked to be caught in the act as I was feeling.
‘What on earth’s going on, Rhona?’ I blurted out. ‘What are you doing ?’
Her face was stark white against the dark-coloured hood. ‘I... I was looking for something.’
‘ Looking for something? And you had to take a sledgehammer to our fireplace to find it?’
‘It was boarded up. I had to.’
‘How did you get in?’ demanded Jaz. ‘Hang on. Did you climb in through the side window?’
I glanced down. Her feet did look big in the sturdy walking boots she was wearing.
‘Were they your footprints in the soil that we saw?’ I demanded.
She nodded, shamefaced. ‘I got in that way the other night. You saw me at the upstairs window and I was terrified then that you’d know it was me.’
‘So yours was the face I saw?’ I murmured in disbelief. ‘But after we discovered the open window, I made sure it was shut from the inside. So how did you get in here tonight?’
‘A key.’ She shrugged helplessly. ‘I know where you keep the spares – in your office at the café. I’m sorry, Ellie. I’m really sorry. I just had to get inside and this was the only way I could do it once you and Zak bought the house.’
I stared at her in complete bewilderment. ‘So what was it you were looking for? A hoard of treasure? What?’
‘In a way, yes,’ she mumbled. ‘Look, I know I should have told you. But I knew you’d hate me because I’d lied to you, and I couldn’t risk not being able to... to get in here.’
‘And have you found it?’ I demanded. ‘Whatever it was you were smashing up my house to find?’ I was on the verge of tears now because I’d really thought Rhona was my friend... a friend I could trust.
She shook her head in despair.
Milo, seeing how shaken I was, stepped in. ‘I think you need to leave, whoever you are. Unless you’d like us to call the police.’ He looked at me for a steer, but I shook my head sadly.
‘You want to know what I was searching for?’ Rhona blurted out. ‘I was looking for a box of things I left behind.’
I stared at her. ‘ Left behind ? What on earth do you mean?’
She swallowed hard. ‘This used to be my bedroom.’
‘You used to live here? In Bogg House?’ I stared at her in disbelief. ‘Oh, this just gets better and better. So it really was a total lie when you told me you were new to the area.’
She nodded miserably.
‘So... the night I met you, outside in the lane... you gave me this sketchy tale about looking at properties to buy. I thought at the time it was strange you should be hanging around there in the dark. What were you really doing, Rhona? Trying to work out how you could break in?’
‘No!’
‘Funny you never thought to mention to me that you used to live here !’
I turned away in exasperation, my head reeling at the web of lies she’d spun. We hadn’t know each other long, but I’d thought she was my friend. I’d relied on her. And I’d confided in her about things in my life – private things. She’d seemed so kind and caring. I’d trusted her completely.
But all the time, she’d just been scheming to get into the house to steal a box?
It was hard to believe. But from the moment I’d bumped into her in the lane outside Bogg House, everything she’d told me had been a lie...
Another piece of rubble fell to the floor from the fireplace and we all turned to look.
‘I’m so sorry, Ellie,’ Rhona began. ‘You can’t imagine how sorry I am to have lied to you. But I had to do it. I hope one day I can make you understand.’
She moved towards me and I flinched back, not sure what she was going to do. But she brushed past me and bent to pick up something from the floor.
It was the last piece of detritus that had fallen from the fireplace.
At the door, she turned, a look of despair in her eyes. Then before any of us could react, she rushed out and we heard her running down the stairs.
‘Let her go,’ I murmured to Milo, crossing to the window and looking out in a daze.
She was hurrying up the lane now, I presumed towards the lay-by where she must have parked her car.
She’d got what she came for.
It hadn’t been rubble I’d seen her pick up from the floor.
It was a small wooden box . . .