Marion Lennox - Prescription-One Bride

© 1996

TRESPASSERS WILL BE SHOT.

The sign was huge. It almost covered the farm gate and, not surprisingly, it made Jessica pause.

She didn’t pause for long.

Dr Jessie Harvey stared down at the pathetic drag marks leading to the gap beside the gate. Harry must have dragged himself through-and there were traces of blood on the path.

Sign or no sign, there was no choice. Jess had to look.

Niall Mountmarche might have half the island scared silly with his stupid signs but if Harry was suffering somewhere on the other side of the fence…

Sod Niall Mountmarche’s sign!

Jessica Harvey, Barega Island’s only veterinary surgeon, pushed stray wisps of soft brown curls from her angry eyes and pushed open the gate.

She’d been here before and she hadn’t been shot.

Louis Mountmarche, wine-maker extraordinaire, had been the island children’s ogre for years. Rumour said that he’d shot a child in the dim, distant past and his reputation was fearsome.

By the time Jess had arrived to work on the island the old man was hardly ever seen by the locals.

Four months ago the local police had asked Jess to investigate reports of animal cruelty. Neighbours had complained that the old man’s dog had been howling for days.

She’d found the dog.

The neighbours had been right. The animal had been neglected but it hadn’t been the old man’s fault. When Jessie and the police had finally found him, Louis Mountmarche had been dead for weeks-with his dog guarding his body.

Although the fate of the old man and his dog had shocked the locals, the islanders hadn’t blamed themselves. The old man had abused everyone-and now it seemed that his nephew was of the same mould.

Niall Mountmarche, nephew of Louis, had arrived on the island three months ago by private boat and his contact with the locals since then had been restricted to necessary business. The threatening signs had been renewed.

It seemed that there was a family trait of isolation and aggression.

The ogre reputation was building again among the local children and the unknown Niall Mountmarche did nothing to refute it.

So…

So Jessie shouldn’t be here, crawling on all fours between the grapevines trying desperately to follow the broken trail of drag marks and blood.

The ground had been recently furrowed. It was early spring on the island and the vines were just budding. Someone had been here recently, ploughing weeds into the ground and, by the smell of the rich loam, applying fertilizer.

‘Harry,’ Jessie called softly.

Drat the Mountmarches. They had her spooked. She took a deep breath and rose to her feet. The trail ended here but where the vines were still bare she’d surely see an injured dog if it was in the open.

Jessie raised her voice. ‘Harry!’

There was no response.

Or was there? Had she heard something?

Jessie’s face turned in the morning sun toward a bank of trees further down the slope. In the trees there was cover-and an injured dog would head for cover if it possibly could. The sound-if she hadn’t imagined it-had come from there.

She was too close to the Mountmarche house for comfort. For a moment Jessie considered approaching the house to ask permission to search-but only for a moment. The Mountmarche reputation suggested that she’d be marched off the property at the point of a gun-and where would that leave Harry?

‘Harry?’ Jess called again, lowering her voice and heading down the slopes into the cover of the trees. She cast a nervous glance at the house and her voice dropped even further. ‘Harry!’

A pathetic whimper cut across the silence, so low that she would have missed it if her ears hadn’t been straining to hear.

He was here. Somewhere.

Here, where the ground was rough and overgrown and the banks of a creek fell away from the fertile soil, there were hundreds of places that a wounded dog could crawl to die.

She could hear him clearly now. His whimpers increased as she called him.

The branches were thick over her head, barring her path. Swearing softly to herself, Jessie slung her bag over her shoulder and dropped to the ground again.

She’d have to crawl.

Her knees were bare and the twigs and branches littering the ground dug into them-but if she stood up she wouldn’t be able to see. She’d have no hope of finding him.

‘Harry,’ she called again. ‘Harry…’

Jessie pushed her nose through a thicket of undergrowth and stopped dead.

A pair of black boots blocked her path.

And a gun.

Jessie practically yelped in fright. She jumped about a foot and when she finally came down to earth her heart was thumping like a battering ram.

The island children had done their job well. The Ogre of Barega had been built up to such a fearsome figure that it was all Jessie could do not to scramble to her feet and run.

Instead, she forced herself to squat back on her heels and look up.

It was hardly a position of dignity. To be caught crawling on all fours on someone else’s land was scarcely a desirable fate at the best of times-but to be caught by a Mountmarche…

Niall Mountmarche…

Ogre of Barega…

Jessie’s first impression was of size-and of darkness. The man wore black knee-length boots over dark riding jodhpurs, and a black short-sleeved shirt open almost to the waist. The wind-tossed hair around the man’s lean, harsh face was jet black as well and his angry eyes were as dark as night.

The Ogre was in his mid-thirties, Jessie guessed.

The Mountmarche she’d seen-old Louis-had been short and stout but Jess saw no similarity between Louis and his nephew. This man was over six feet tall and hadn’t an ounce of spare flesh on his strongly built body.

Or compassion, Jessie guessed, as she slowly rose to a standing position. Niall Mountmarche’s face was flint hard, repellent with anger.

Even as she found her feet and stood before him, he still made her feel tiny.

And scared stiff.

The man’s hands were gripping his gun as though he’d love to use it. He wasn’t pointing the thing at her-but it didn’t make it one whit less threatening.

‘G-good morning,’ she stammered.

The Ogre of Barega was looking at the girl before him as though she was a repugnant form of insect life. Jessie flushed in mortification. His look was nothing short of contemptuous.

Well, Niall Mountmarche wasn’t to know that Jessie was the island’s vet. She hardly looked professional, she thought grimly. The young vet was wearing shorts and sneakers; her knees were dust-caked from crawling along the furrowed ground and her face was probably the same. Her shoulder-length curls had caught on briars and were tangled and wild.

Niall Mountmarche didn’t know why Jess was on his land. Maybe he was right to look like this-when she was so clearly trespassing.

Jess pushed her tangled curls back with a defiant flourish-and felt more dirt streak down her cheek as Niall Mountmarche finally spoke.

‘What the hell are you doing on my land?’ The man’s voice was deep and resonant with a trace of an accent she couldn’t quite place-and more than a trace of anger.

It was hardly a promising start.

Jessie bit her lip and forced herself to hold out her hand in an attempt at greeting.

‘Hi,’ she said unsteadily. ‘I’m…I’m Jessica Harvey…’

‘I’m not the least bit interested in who you are,’ the man snapped. His dark eyes flashed his displeasure. ‘The sign on my gate is there for a purpose-and it means what it says. This is no place for teenagers to play stupid games-so I suggest you get yourself off my land now.’