Free Sally's Destiny - A short story of Love and Romance in the Scottish Highlands by A. J. Temple

Chapter 1
    “ It seemed like a good idea at the time !” Sally thought to herself as she peered through the windscreen trying desperately to see her way through the snowstorm.
    By her own estimation she was almost there, perhaps 20 minutes away from the turning that would lead up to her friend’s house just set back from the road a little. The thought caused her to sigh in anticipation of a warm fire and good friends; a million miles away from the trepidation she now felt as she clung on to the steering wheel.
    After collecting the car at Edinburgh airport, she had headed out o f the city and over the Fourth R oad Bridge , on the two and a half hour drive to Aviemore; to spend two glorious weeks in the Scottish highlands. A combination of l og fires and Single Scotch malt whiskey to warm the heart and take away the crippling loneliness, was something she was really looking forward to. That had been the plan anyway, before she had got caught in a snow storm that caused her car to slip and slide on a road that was quickly disappearing in the moonless night and heavy falling snow.
    As she wrestled with the weather, her mind also dwelt on what had brought her to this journey into the Scottish highlands. She had been persuaded to get away for a short break to try and relax from all the stress that the previous months had brought on; and now she was visiting her good friend Elizabeth and her husband Tom in Scotland for the Christmas holidays. It had been 8 months since her father had passed away, and with her mother running off when she was just a child, she was now without both parents – and the thought had left her bereft , and more than a little apprehensive regarding the future .
    S he was pulled out of reverie by a huge dark shape appearing right in front of the car! She caught a fleeting glimpse of a great stag, eyes impossibly wide and bloodshot, as it tried to jump its way clear . Sally automatically pressed hard on the brakes , and the car predictably went into a side-ways slew across the road, speed seeming to increase as it spun around, crunched against something hard and ploughed over the edge of the road ; and all was suddenly chaos and cold as the storm blasted through her shattered windscreen. Her last conscious though was a sharp pain as her head banged against something hard, just before she passed out.
    “Miss, Miss are you ok ?” She slowly regained consciousness, aware in the mists of her mind that someone was speaking to her. She struggled to try and speak, a sharp pain from her head telling her that all was not well.
    “Don’t you worry miss, you’ll be alright now – it seems you’ve had a little accident an d hit your head , by the look of things .”
    As the stranger spoke she automatically raised her hand to her fore-head, and was rewarded by the sight of bloody fingers, which immediately caused a little flutter of fear and alarm.
    “What ..where am I?” She asked, dazed and disorientated.
    “Now don’t you worry at all miss…?”
    “My names Sally.” She said as the memories came flooding back. “Did I hit that poor Stag?”
    “Well I don’t know about any Stag miss, there’s certainly no sign of it. But you did manage to knock my rear light out when you spun into this ditch!”
    Finally she raised her head to look at the source of the tremendously calm and soothing voice, that had been almost subliminally soothing her fears since she had regained consciousness; and her heart gave another flutter as she gazed into the concerned grey eyes of her rescuer. Leaning in through the open door, he had a cheeky grin on his face as he held out his hand with a handkerchief in it.
    “I think maybe you had better hold that to your head for a moment Sally, if you don’t want to mess up your car with more blood!”
    The storm raged on and the snow was falling heavier than ever. It seemed that they were the only ones on a road that was all but impassable.
    “Anyway Sally, my name is Robert and