Hot Whispers of an Irishman (2 page)

Had it been just Beth, who was busy enough as a mechanical engineer, he suspected that she would have put up with his absences. But they had their daughter Meghan to consider. Beth had felt that Meghan didn’t need to readjust her life every time her father showed up. She needed constancy, and that was something Liam was incapable of providing.

The irony of it was that he’d just gotten Meghan full time for the next six months, as Beth had taken an assignment in a volatile part of the Middle East. He knew she’d had little choice. It had been take the job or become unemployed. Still, the aggravated part of his soul could only grumble,
“So bloody much for constancy.”

Cullen nudged the edge of Liam’s table, which like everything in Rafferty’s pub wasn’t quite level. Liam watched as the water in his glass sloshed from side to side.

“So are you not the least bit curious to see if it’s Violet?” Cullen asked.

“No,” Liam said, thinking that if she were here and heard her hated full name of Violet being bandied about, blood would be spilled. God knew he had his share of scars from that sin.

Cullen’s cat-shaped blue eyes—a consistent Rafferty trait—grew wider. “I don’t feckin’ believe it. It’s been—what—thirteen years and still you’re battling her memory, aren’t you?” He snorted. “Here I am, five years younger than you and I’m the mature one.”

“It’s been fifteen years and you’d best leave alone what you don’t understand.” Hell, Liam didn’t fully understand it. He tapped the research file in front of him. “Now, if you don’t mind…”

“But—”

“And even if you do. Go to the market and share your gossip with Nora,” he said, referring to their sister closest in age to Vi. “She’ll make you a better audience.”

“I can remember when you used to be fun,” Cullen said before wandering back to his mates by the front door.

“Fun,” Liam muttered. Christ, at this point he’d settle for being passably civil. His business was in one bollocks of a mess, thanks to Alex, his partner. Alex had begun thieving cargoes under the company flag. And in crossing this line from salvor to pirate, he had dragged Liam with him. As business dwindled, Liam was slowly drowning in debt. Knowing that he had only his own ego and ambition to blame for not catching on to Alex sooner did nothing to help his attitude.

And then there was Meghan. Liam was coming to the conclusion that he made a fine absentee da, showering Meghan with trinkets from his travels around the world when he did show up. As an everyday enforcer, he was useless.

Who’d have thought that females became so vicious and moody when not even yet thirteen? Had he missed the easy years? Liam could nearly understand why work in a near war zone seemed an acceptable option to Beth. Twelve-year-old girls were walking strife and conflict.

So here he was, home with Mam, seeking any bit of help she’d give. After all, she’d thus far managed to raise six children to productive adulthood. And even Annie, the last of the brood, who at sixteen was nearly twenty years younger than Liam, seemed to be a normal, presentable teen…once you got past the overdark lipstick and fat slashes of eyeliner.

Liam took a swallow of his water and watched as the next Rafferty approached to sling some grief his way.

“So your old sweetheart’s in town,” said Jamie, Liam’s second-youngest brother and owner of this pub—along with Mam and Da.

Liam hooked a thumb in the direction of the bar. “Don’t you need to go pull a pint?”

“I remember Vi Kilbride,” Jamie said with a broad smile.

“Not much, you don’t. You were eleven the last summer she was here.”

“Ah, but I do. I followed her just the way Mam said she used to follow you. God, but she was the sun in my summertimes.”

Liam snorted. “Publican and half-assed poet. Not a one of us has seen Vi Kilbride in a decade, nor will we.”

“Dabbling in denial?” Jamie asked.

“Feck it.” Liam stood, the legs of his chair squealing in protest against the wooden floor. He bundled his papers back into their folder. “I’m going for a drive.”

Jamie shook his head. “It’ll have to be a walk. I gave Catherine the spare keys to your car this morning. Her Maura had a doctor’s appointment in Kilkenny and Tadgh had their car.”

“Grand of you to mention it to me.”

Jamie shrugged. “I just did.”

Liam pushed on.

“Where are you going?” his mam asked, looking up from the table she’d commandeered to sort some of the fancy yarn—llama and god-knows-what—that his sister Catherine spun and sold.

“Change of scenery,” he said.

“Fine then, but be back before Meghan’s home from school. I’ve plans for tonight and won’t be watching her.”

“Mind the rain,” called his da from behind the bar. Liam didn’t pause to think how bad it must be if a sixty-six-year-old Kilkennyman was issuing the warning.

Once out the pub’s heavy green door, it hit him…a downpour like he’d last experienced in the tropics, yet with none of the warmth. He muttered an obscenity, but didn’t retreat. At the very least, he’d walk home. Behind him, the door opened. Liam turned back, and Cullen flung a bundle his way. He unwadded it and saw that it was a waxed jacket, perhaps some protection against the wet, but not one hell of a lot.

Liam wrenched on the jacket, then rolled the documents he’d been reading into a cylinder and tucked them in the jacket’s inside pocket. By the time he’d walked the four blocks to his house, the rain had seen fit to let up. And thank God it had. For a man who’d spent probably a quarter of his adult life underwater for one reason or another, he hated the stuff when it fell from the sky. A sad state of affairs for an Irishman.

Feeling energized by the lack of rain, Liam decided to walk on. He’d already missed his morning run. Breakfast had been extended by a row with Meghan over why twelve-year-old girls—or even the older girls—did not wear black fishnet stockings to the parish school. He was sure the boys would be sorry to hear that he’d banned the stockings, but she was his daughter and no matter how old she looked for her age, she remained a child. As this morning’s tantrum and tears had proved.

As he walked, he thought of another girl from summers long ago…one who had been overtall and gangly, could run and fight and hungered to be one of the boys. He’d been a vastly superior three years her elder and had scarcely tolerated her tagging behind him and his cousins.

But then Vi had turned sixteen, and then seventeen. There had been no ignoring her as a female.

“Leave it,” Liam muttered to himself, then swiped his hand through his hair, sluicing off what was left of the rain. But he couldn’t lose thoughts of Vi Kilbride with such ease.

Of course he’d always thought of her, but never so much as when he was on Irish soil. The wet green of the countryside, the sight of hedgerows and the smell of newly mown fields, all of it made her seem closer. She lingered with him, taunting him, making him hard late at night, leaving him empty with regret.

Liam walked until the town’s sidewalks gave way to fields with signs touting “new commuter developments” with “finest amenities,” all evidence of the growth slowly coming to the area. He detoured round the deepest of puddles, and waved to passing motorists, mostly out of the hope that if he appeared friendly they might not aim their tire spray at him.

After a distance, even the developers’ signs dwindled.

Liam automatically turned down a narrow track marked by a sole standing stone that had once been painted purple, red, and green, with knots and spirals and beasts consuming their own tails. Nan Kilbride’s work had fallen victim to the wet and the years, but it still shone in Liam’s memory and in a small watercolor she’d bequeathed to him.

He had known that he was coming here, seeking proof with his eyes, though to admit it even to himself seemed a weakness. And one had best not be weak, even when facing the memories of Vi Kilbride.

She’d come to Duncarraig each summer, living with her nan and running through his life like a wild thing. And after each summer had passed, much as he’d loudly claimed otherwise, Liam had counted the days until she’d return again.

A thin sheet of water stood in the farmyard, and the fence that once held Nan’s cow and few sheep stood gap-mawed, its gate no doubt “borrowed” by a neighbor. Liam had covered these lands in measured steps no less than six times in the past three weeks, and nothing had changed from the last time he’d visited.

He walked to the house, seeing no footprints, not that he would with the rain that had fallen. He cut between two overgrown rose bushes that were cowed and beaten from the earlier deluge. Using the side of one hand, he rubbed away enough grime to peer in the front window of the house, and saw only the same clutter he had vaguely noticed the last time.

And seeing this, he felt…empty.

“Fool,” he told himself.

Had he wanted her there?

No, for she’d only complicate his life when finally he’d found a purity of task. What he sought—and he was sure it existed outside family tales told fireside—was likely on Kilbride land, and he’d liked having that land empty.

Truly, had he wanted her there?

Liam kicked at a rock on the edge of the rutted ribbon of road. Yes, he wanted her there, for while his fury at her had banked with time to anger, his hunger for her hadn’t diminished.

And then the rain began again.

“Fool, indeed.”

Liam turned up his collar and aimed for town.

Three things that make for happiness: hedges, shelter, and early rising.

—I
RISH
T
RIAD

M
aeve Kilbride’s house smelled of furniture polish and resentment. That, Vi had concluded sometime late the prior night, was no atmosphere in which to have a good sleep. It was not yet eight and already she was on the road from Kilkenny to Duncarraig. And this from a woman who’d prefer to work late and rise even later.

To Vi’s left, Rog had his nose pressed to the window, growling at sheep in the field as though he’d never before seen them.

“You’re brave enough at this speed, aren’t you?” she teased.

He gave her a look as though to say he’d be braver yet on the ground. Much as she loved a good wander, Vi wasn’t of the mind to oblige him. Today she meant to come up with a plan, to make some sense of the disaster occupying Nan’s house. She longed to have the place perfect, not sterile like Mam’s by any means, but the warm home she recalled from her youth. Of course with Nan gone, and Vi’s frustrating lack of focus as of late, that was asking much. Still, far less mess would be required before she could permit a real estate agent in.

As Vi arrived in Duncarraig, she slowed beneath what the law would require. Yesterday, she’d allowed herself a cool inventory of shops and buildings, but had looked no deeper. And the time before that—ten years ago when she’d been here for Nan’s funeral—her sight had been none too clear. It had been dulled by grief and blinkered by the fear that Liam Rafferty would somehow return from America. He hadn’t, of course. She doubted that it had been out of concern for her feelings. He’d operated more on a grand scale of disregard.

“Prosperous,” she said, taking in all the new brick-fronted buildings built to emulate the older architecture of the town. Rafferty’s Market’s window signs boasted catering, imported specialty foods, and organic produce. Vi smiled. Jenna, her best friend back in Ballymuir, was a chef and would dearly love to have something this sophisticated nearby her restaurant.

Vi tapped the brakes and then came to a halt when she saw the name painted on the door in gold leaf: N
ORA
R
AFFERTY
, P
ROPRIETOR
.

“Ah, Nora. You’ve done well for yourself, girl.”

She and Nora had once been friends. Then again, she’d once felt as though this town were hers to rule. No more, though. She was about to pull away when she saw a lone figure running down the walk. The light was dim yet, with the pale autumn sun taking its time in rising. Still, Vi could see that the person was male and tall, moving with athletic ease.

As he drew closer, her heart sped and her skin grew chill. Were it not for yesterday’s mouse incident, she’d believe that the second sight was on her. This morning she was more inclined to think that indigestion might be setting in.

The man was a block away now. Roger began to growl. The sensation filling Vi grew stronger, and she gave in to the inevitable. She let her eyes slip closed, waiting…waiting…

For nothing.

The feeling passed, and she opened her eyes. She gripped her steering wheel tighter, murmuring a heartfelt curse in the Irish that Nan had taught her.

“Indigestion for certain,” she said to Rog, who was now baring his upper teeth at the approaching jogger. “And have you an excuse?”

He barked, and Vi looked more closely at the stranger.

Her breath left her in a wordless gasp, for toward her ran the ghost of Liam Rafferty.

It could be Cullen, she told herself, or perhaps Jamie or one of the countless dark-haired Rafferty cousins. They’d be running on this fine morning, not a man whom she knew had moved thousands of miles away. Aye, it could be Jamie Rafferty all grown up, but the rapid drumming of Vi’s heart told her otherwise. It was Liam, God help her.

Vi wanted to look, to take in the changes time had brought this man, but didn’t dare. It would simply be too much. She had faced more than one battle in her life head-on, but for this she was woefully unprepared. Sliding low in the car’s seat so that the steering wheel provided some camouflage, she pulled away from the curb and sped from town.

Mere minutes later, as she neared the cluttered sanctuary of Nan’s, Vi began to laugh. Fleeing as though she’d just looted the Bank of Ireland? Insanity, it was, and a rather ugly repetition of her past.

“I’ll not be judging your bravery again,” she said to Roger, who was looking as superior as a short-legged creature in a fast-moving vehicle could.

When they arrived at Nan’s, Vi remained too unsettled to work. With Rog at her side, she walked to the standing stone that her Nan had painted. It was no relic, just Nan’s twentieth-century nod to the past. Vi traced the remnants of one boldly painted green concentric spiral, the rock cool, damp, and rough beneath her fingertip.

“Well, Nan, what shall I do?”

There was no answer other than the twittering of a linnet in the field nearby. Then again, Vi hadn’t expected one.

Nan had always said that only fools fought the seasons. Much to Vi’s regret, in this instance as in many others, Nan had been right. One could dodge the inevitable for only so long.

Matters had remained incomplete with Liam for nearly half of Vi’s life. Now fate had presented her the opportunity to close a circle. Yet here she was, feeling so bloody graceless and stubborn about the matter, as though just beneath the skin she remained a rash and impassioned seventeen. Perhaps, she admitted to herself, that’s because when it came to Liam Rafferty, she was.

Beside her, Rog fixed his attention on a far sight and stilled. A shiver rippled its way across his coat. Vi knew this sign. He had scented prey.

“Rog, no,” she warned. “Not again.”

Without so much as an apologetic glance her way, the beast bolted down the drive and across the road. A hare briefly broke from the hedgerow, then wriggled back through it. Roger, a terrier’s terrier, followed after.

Vi pursued the hunter and the hunted, but kept to the road. Her fine green cloak wouldn’t meet well with the knot of chill-nipped wild roses, stunted saplings, and greens that made the hedge. Knowing Rog’s determination, she was glad she’d worn her sensible boots, black, round-toed affairs that had held up to Ballymuir’s most mountainous paths.

“Give it up, dog,” she called, but Rog was having none of it, even though he was outmatched. “Ah, well,” she murmured, then broke into a run. At least the weather had turned fair. All in all, it was a fine day for a chase.

Liam had seen Vi. At least he was fairly certain that the woman tucked low in the passing car had been Violet Kilbride. He bolted in the front door of his house, fighting for balance as his running shoes wet with dew slipped on the tile floor.

“Meghan, are you up and about? I have to be leaving.”

“I’m in here.”

After wiping his feet on a fussy flowered mat that one or another of his relatives had left as a welcome gift, Liam strode to the kitchen, where he found his daughter eating breakfast. And drinking his coffee, too. Arguments about the suitability of coffee for a child would have to wait, for he had a redhead to hunt. Liam took the mug from Meghan. He swallowed a gulp, then nearly sent it back up.

“What have you put in here?” he asked once he was sure the vile drink was down for good.

“I tried mixing in some Nutella. Didn’t you like it?” She had a grand talent for widening those toffee-brown eyes to a full innocent look.

“Stay out of my coffee.” He dumped it into the sink, ignoring her howl of protest. “You’re dressed, I see,” he added as he poured himself what dribbles of caffeine she’d left in the bottom of the pot. “And in proper uniform, too. Well done. Would you like a lift to school?”

“I can walk,” she said.

“Grand, then,” he replied, then drank his thimbleful of coffee while double-checking out the kitchen window to be sure his car was where he’d last seen it this morning, parked by the old carriage house. Thankfully, the vehicle hadn’t yet been appropriated. “I’ll be seeing you this afternoon.”

Liam ignored his daughter’s bratty response of “whatever” and made his way out the back door. He pulled the little Nissan out of the courtyard and onto the road out of town before he had time to think too hard about what he was doing. Instinct was the way to go when it came to dealing with Vi Kilbride. Instinct and a fair dose of madness.

Heedless of civilities such as speed limits, on he drove. Within minutes he was nearing Nan’s. As he rounded a bend in the road, an absurd wee dog—part terrier, part possibly warthog—appeared to his right, coming out of a gap in the hedgerow. He was in no danger of hitting it, but out of instinct he checked the rearview mirror once he passed. The dog was gone and standing in its stead was a tall redheaded woman with a flowing green cape of some sort.

Vi!

The bend had ended, but with his attention fixed elsewhere, Liam was curving on. His car bounced and shuddered as it skidded into the shallow ditch that marked the border between road and hedge. The vehicle spun in a quarter-circle, ground against something really quite solid, then stalled out.

Liam smacked the steering wheel with open palms. “Holy slice of shite on burnt toast!”

He wrenched open his door, stepped out and landed ankle deep in cold, wet mud. It soaked through his running shoe and formerly white athletic sock before he could even react. When he did, the shoe made a squelching sound as he pulled his foot from the mud. For Liam, swearing was an art form, not worth doing unless done with flair. As the mud seemed to have leached all flair from him, he kept silent.

First, he looked for the objects that had distracted him. Neither woman nor dog was visible, probably still back around the bend. Next, he picked his way through the mud, circling his car to see what he had hit. An initial look showed nothing, but then he found a stray boulder beneath the vehicle.

Liam squatted down and ran his hand along the trim below the car’s front grille. He’d been as lucky as one could be under the circumstances. A lower portion of the Nissan’s bumper appeared to have taken the worst of the blow. And he’d live with it cracked before he’d pay the rates his cousin Seán charged for auto repairs.

“Hello? You’re all right, then?” called a woman’s voice. One he hadn’t heard in fifteen years. At least, not while awake. Liam slowly stood. He took a perverse sort of satisfaction that Vi was shocked to see just who had run off the road.

“Liam,” she said, the perpetual note of good cheer in her voice muted near to silence.

“Vi,” he offered in return, walking from the shallow ditch to join her on the side of the road. As he did, he marveled that instantaneous hunger and sharp bitterness could coexist in the simple male mind she’d once accused him of having.

Vi was as beautiful as ever. Tall—perhaps too formidably so for some men, but never for him. Strong-boned—she was no anorectic model. And angry, likely still over his past bad acts—perceived and real—since he’d hardly had time to add anything new. That he knew would change in a matter of days unless she had grown less perceptive. And while he was a lucky man, he wasn’t that lucky.

“It’s been a long time,” he said, yet just now it felt as if the years had compressed to nothing at all. Aye, he was twenty, hungry, and at a loss for what to do with the woman in front of him.

Vi drew a deep breath, seeking inner calm. God, she could remember that last moment when she’d walked from him. She could feel the knife-slice of pain as though it were
now,
here again to eat her soul. She had loved this man beyond time, beyond reason. And that never-to-be-repeated love had almost killed her.

“It could have been longer,” she replied. And if fate weren’t set on running headlong at her, it would have been.

“You look the same,” he said, then tipped his head to assess her more carefully. “Taller, maybe.”

She wondered if that was meant as a dig. When she was seventeen, she’d hated her height. But now she was working her way to twice-seventeen and had come to terms with who she was.

“All the better to look you in the eye,” she said.

“And tell me what?”

She gave him a smile, hoping it would distract. “Why, hello again, of course.” She offered her hand in greeting.

Liam hesitated. “That simple, is it?”

“It’s as simple as we make it,” she replied, knowing that the words were far easier to speak than to live. When he took her hand, she made sure the contact was fast and impersonal. Anything more would be dangerous, just now. He was still watching her too carefully for her comfort.

“Will your car start?” she asked, drawing his attention elsewhere.

He glanced back at it and frowned. “I don’t know. Let me give it a check.”

Liam folded his tall frame into the vehicle, and Vi moved just enough to keep him in her view. The lines creasing his forehead eased away when the car’s engine caught and purred. He switched it off and stepped out, stretching his long legs to avoid mud at his door.

“That’s half the trouble,” he said. “Now for the rock she’s hung up on.”

“Bad bit of luck,” she said aloud. Another thought she kept to herself, that this was exactly the anchoring in spot that he deserved.

Liam’s preoccupation gave her a chance to watch him unobserved. He’d aged well, but she would have expected no less. At twenty, he’d had a tall, raw-boned strength. In the intervening years he had filled out, not in a running-to-fat sort of way, but with bulk and muscle that made her think his days weren’t spent behind a desk. He remained as potently attractive to her as he’d been all those years ago. More so, perhaps, she thought as he came toward her.