‘Then the quicker you arrange to have it towed south, the better,’ Ava snapped at him. ‘Has Dr MacLeod left yet?’

‘I’m about to take her to Kirkwall to meet the police helicopter.’

Ava tried not to show her disappointment. It seemed that talking to Rhona about the recent developments would have to wait.

Re-entering the kitchen, she found Dougie had been joined by Nadia. Both threw her an accusatory look.

‘You told him about Nadia,’ Dougie said. ‘That’s what brought him here.’

‘I didn’t,’ Ava said. ‘And it wasn’t.’

‘Well, it was nothing to do with the farm. That much I do know.’

Unable to say the words ‘Mark is dead’, Ava went over to her laptop and fired it up.

Her hands shook as she entered Mark’s name, and immediately watched a long string of news clips rolling up the screen. She chose one, clicked on it and turned the screen towards Dougie. ‘That’s why Erling was here.’

Dougie approached the table, Nadia standing hesitantly behind him.

Ava watched his eyes run over the headline, then drop to read the text below, something she was dreading doing herself.

‘Oh no.’ His eyes met hers. ‘I’m sorry, Ava. So sorry.’

Nadia had no idea what was going on, but it was obvious it was bad. She pulled up a chair next to Dougie and turned the laptop screen towards her.

‘This journalist, you know him?’ she said, her voice strangely staccato, revealing her Polish accent clearly for the first time.

Ava nodded. ‘We worked together for years.’ Her voice stumbled a little. ‘Mark and I were both investigating the Go Wild story.’

‘They killed him,’ Nadia said, raising her chin in defiance. ‘I told you what they would do, didn’t I? They’ll kill anyone who might expose them.’

Dougie glanced from Nadia to Ava. ‘That means you’re in danger too now,’ he said, his voice hushed with fear. ‘That’s what Erling was here to tell you, wasn’t it?’

Ava gave a weary nod.

‘What does he want you to do?’ he demanded.

‘He wants to put a guard on the house, an officer from Kirkwall.’

‘But we can’t have a policeman hanging about . . . not with Nadia here.’

‘I told him no,’ Ava said.

Dougie was pacing now. ‘I can take Nadia away. We’ll camp on one of the islands.’

‘No,’ Ava said. ‘Someone will spot you. Locals make a point of finding out who’s on an island. Anyway, no one knows that Nadia exists. That she came ashore. That she’s here.’

It wasn’t true, of course, but she hoped she sounded convincing. ‘No,’ she said again, thinking. ‘You don’t go anywhere. I do.’

Dougie looked perplexed. ‘I don’t understand. Where would you go?’