CHAPTER 1
FINN
Welcome to Glenfield
(Or How to Get Blacklisted in Three Simple Lessons)
The little stone cottage seems to glare at me with the same suspicion as the villagers while I stand in front of Moira MacTavish’s gate, medical bag in hand. The shutters are a faded green that probably looked cheerful twenty years ago. Now they hang slightly crooked, like they’ve given up trying to make a good impression.
Exactly like me.
Scottish rain has this particularly unpleasant habit of never fully falling. It hovers. Creeps into everything. Slips through the smallest gap between my jacket collar and the back of my neck just to remind me I have no business being here.
I push open the gate, which groans in protest at my presence, and head up the dirt path. My shoes make a strange sucking sound in the wet ground.
I’ve only been in Glenfield a few weeks, but I already feel like an actor who forgot his lines halfway through a play no one ever handed him the script for.
I knock on the door. Two firm, professional knocks. The kind that say, I’m a doctor. I’m here to help. Please open the door. Or at least, that’s what I imagine they say.
Shuffling footsteps echo inside, followed by the sound of a chain being removed. The door cracks open a few inches, revealing a faded blue eye studying me with all the warmth usually reserved for vacuum salesmen.
“Mrs. MacTavish? I’m Dr. McLeod. We had an appointment for your blood pressure check.”
The door opens a little wider. Gray hair pulled into a severe bun, beige cardigan buttoned all the way to her throat, tartan slippers on her feet, the old woman stares at me with sharp suspicion. Moira MacTavish can’t be more than five feet tall, but she has the kind of look that’s probably terrified generations of children in this village.
“I know who you are,” she replies in a voice about as welcoming as a January blizzard. “You’re late.”
I glance at my watch.
“It’s exactly two o’clock. Our appointment was scheduled for two.”
“Dr. McKinnon always arrived ten minutes early,” she shoots back, folding her arms. “Said it gave me time to finish my tea.”
Of course he did.
“I apologize for the... inconvenience,” I say carefully, forcing my tone to stay neutral. “May I come in?”
She steps aside reluctantly, and I walk into a living room that smells faintly of beeswax mixed with something else I can’t quite place. Everything is immaculate. Lace doilies cover every flat surface. An antique clock ticks steadily somewhere in the room,and for one brief moment, I think I’d rather face Vecna than deal with this woman.
Unfortunately for me, no Netflix monster is going to save me from doing my job.
I turn my attention back to Mrs. MacTavish.
“Have a seat,” she orders, pointing at an armchair covered in floral fabric that probably survived two world wars.
I sit down and open my medical bag. I pull out the blood pressure cuff with precise, practiced movements.
This is what I know how to do. What I’m good at.
Or at least... what I used to be good at.
I shove the thought away and focus on my patient.
“How have you been feeling since our last appointment?”
“You mean the appointment where you barely looked me in the eye while typing on your little computer?”
My head snaps up. She’s staring at me, lips pinched tight.
