“You let that stop you?”
His lips quirked. “Officially, yes. If we were caught, heads would roll. By the way, there’s no BlackBox in Ireland. Enjoy having a piss with ghosts watching.”
Great, I thought, remembering a ghost surprising me in the woods in just such a situation.
I lifted the passport. “If we’re on our own in Ireland, how does a fake identity protect us?”
“Because no one wants to kidnap Jack and Laura MacLean. Or kill them.” Simon cocked an eyebrow and sat back in the throne. “Do you feel more comfortable wearing those rings now?”
My silence was enough of an answer.
He pointed to the envelope. “That contains your legend—your false background. The white papers are copies of your university records and marriage certificate. Keep them with you when you travel. The blue papers form your cover story. Memorize every detail, then destroy the blue sheets. Confer with Zachary to invent stories about how you met and fell in love, et cetera, et cetera. The more detail, the better, but only if you can both remember. And of course, let me know what they are so I can find people to corroborate if necessary.”
“Can you at least tell me who might be trying to kill us?”
He sighed. “If we knew that, we’d go and get them, now, wouldn’t we?”
I didn’t answer, because I honestly didn’t know if MI-X would or not. I had a feeling they were only letting me and Zachary go to Ireland because they thought the real bad guys would follow us. Maybe MI-X was using us as bait.
We could be more valuable dead than alive.
I stared at my bedroom mirror that night, teaching myself who I was.
“My name is Laura MacLean. I’m twenty-one years old. I was born July nineteenth as Laura Reese in Liverpool, England. My parents got divorced when I was six. My mom moved to Baltimore, where I grew up but never became a citizen because I visited my father every summer and wanted to move back to my native country one day. I majored in communications at Johns Hopkins University.”
I jotted a note to study up on Liverpool, as well as the curriculum for Hopkins’s communications majors. On my packing list, I wrote JHU swag for me and Zach.
I turned back to the mirror. “That’s where I met John MacLean from Glasgow. We fell in love, and when I visited the UK last summer”—I checked the latest stamp on my fake passport—“in July, Jack and I got married. I came home to settle my affairs, and now I’m returning to the UK to live with him. We’re honeymooning in Ireland for a few days, then going back to Glasgow for Christmas.”
I went to my bed, where the papers were spread across the comforter, and double-checked my information. My finger traced my college transcript, including my fake 3.97 grade point average.
If only it was the truth. If only I were finished with school and moving to another country to begin an exciting life of adventure with Zachary.
Maybe not married to him. Yet.
My million-and-one memory exercises had paid off. I knew Laura’s personal history as well as I knew my own. Zachary and I just had to flesh out our pasts.
Time to destroy the evidence.
Unfortunately, my smoke detector would go off if I burned the papers. When I’d started going out with Logan, Gina had installed the supersensitive detectors in our house. She knew he’d been kind of a stoner back in middle school.
Instead, I pulled out what must have been the world’s quietest and most expensive shredder from my bottom desk drawer. In less than a minute, Laura MacLean’s cover story was reduced to a handful of blue dust, which I flushed down the toilet.
At eight o’clock, my phone buzzed with a text message from Zachary.
HIYA LAURA, IT’S JACK. READY TO TELL SOME STORIES?;-)
Chapter Twenty-Eight
With the help of an airline seat that folded out into a bed, a pair of shortbread cookies, and the perfect cup of chamomile tea—MI-X had sprung for a first-class plane ticket—I got a decent night’s sleep on my way to Ireland.
The sun rose as we passed over the center of the country. Glimpses of landscape through low clouds showed a patchwork of green fields, set off from one another by crooked rows of fuzzy brown objects I assumed were trees.
The sky cleared when we neared Dublin, and my throat lumped at the thought of my mother making this journey nineteen years ago. Had she wept at the sight of it?
My second thought was of Logan and how much he’d loved it here. As a ghost, he’d probably spent more time in Dublin than in Baltimore. I wondered if any post-Shifters in his adopted city missed him as much as we did.
But by the time we touched down, my only thought was of Zachary. His flight from Glasgow had been scheduled to arrive three hours before mine. There was a message from him on my MI-X-issued red phone, sent just a few minutes before:
WAITING FOR YOU AT MEETING POINT.
I sent back a quick OK!, then called Gina to let her know I’d landed. She sounded sniffly.
“I promise I’ll check in after I get to the B and B.” Maybe not immediately after. “Before dinner, at least.”
The Dublin Airport’s shiny hallways seemed to stretch for miles. I waited at baggage claim for over half an hour, and started to regret checking a suitcase. But part of me had thought that maybe I wouldn’t be going back home.
Then Immigration, where I calmed my pulse enough to recite my story. I hoped the officer would interpret my jitters as excitement to see “my husband, Jack” for the first time in months.
I got my stamp, and then it was just one more gate to get to Zachary. I glimpsed the MEETING POINT sign in the airport’s bright outer terminal. But only for a moment, as a swell of tall passengers got in my way—Norwegians, based on their accents and blond hair.
Crap. I’d craved this moment for six months, and I couldn’t see through the crowd of Scandinavians. Along the railing, people waved and jumped, some flashing signs with names. A woman held a toddler with a fake holly wreath on its head. A ragged chorus of “Happy Christmas” rang out in the delightful Dublin accent.
But no Zachary. He’d said he was waiting. Had someone taken him in the last half hour?
I stepped out past the gate, into the open area, then turned a slow circle to look behind me. And there he was.
Zachary stood with his back to a cylindrical silver column, still facing the gate. He hadn’t seen me pass.
I lingered a moment, watching him watch for me. He shifted his weight, hands stuffed deep in the pockets of his black leather jacket—apparently he’d replaced the brown one, or the DMP had kept it.
No, only one hand was in a pocket. The other held a bouquet of red and yellow roses.
More people passed, and Zachary’s eyes turned vulnerable. He pressed back against the column as if to keep himself from leaping forward to find me.
I couldn’t wait another second. I pushed against the stream of disembarking passengers, tripping over feet and suitcases and umbrellas to get to Zachary’s side.
My hand brushed his soft leather sleeve. Zachary jerked his arm away instinctively. Then he saw me.
“Au—” was all he got out before our mouths met. I clung to him with everything I had, letting the hunger and joy in his lips consume six months of fear in a single moment. My knees buckled, but he lifted me up and pulled me against him. He was as strong and solid as the Zachary I’d always known.
I felt the floor beneath my feet again, but he didn’t let go. “You’re here,” he whispered, then kissed me. “You’re really.” Another kiss. “Truly.” Another kiss. “Here.”
I couldn’t speak, so I wrapped my arms around his back and pressed my face to his chest. Through his earth-red rugby shirt, he smelled just as I’d remembered.
“Aura, I thought this day would never . . . ach, I’ll just shut up.”
We held each other, still as a mountain in a hurricane, while people rushed by, laughing and chatting.
I finally opened my eyes and saw the roses that had tumbled to the floor. “You dropped
something.”
“Oh!” Without letting go of me, Zachary reached down and snatched the flowers. “You take these, I’ll take your bags. I’ve got the rental car all sorted, we just have to fetch it from the car park.” He took the handle of my suitcase, then stopped. “You’re really here.”
Though our hands were full, we kissed again, testing this new, miraculous reality.
Finally Zachary pulled away a few inches. “The sooner we start walking—”
“Yeah,” I said with the little breath he’d left me.
As we made our way down yet another endless corridor toward the car park, he kept looking at me, as if to confirm I was still there.
I buried my nose in one of the red roses. “These are just like the ones you brought me last year in the hospital.” The morning after we’d first kissed, to be exact.
“These are a wee bit different.”
I examined them. They looked the same—half red, half yellow. Yellow for friendship and red for much more.
Ah, no. Now there were seven red roses and only five yellow. He’d tipped the balance.
In the parking garage, Zachary opened the trunk and placed my bags next to his. He shut the lid slowly, letting his hands rest on it. “Did you want to visit Dublin now?”
“As opposed to . . .”
“Going straight to the bed and breakfast. Checking in. To our room.” He adjusted the car’s rear wiper blade, though it wasn’t crooked. “You must be tired.”
I wasn’t, not with him so close after so long. “I would like to see Dublin.” Or rather, I felt like I should like to see Dublin. “Is it on the way?”
“No, Dublin is south. County Meath is north. A half-hour drive, if we don’t get lost.”
“Oh.” I examined the oil-stained concrete at my feet. In less than an hour we could be alone in a room together for the first time in six months.
When I looked up again, our eyes met.
“North,” we said.
On the way out of the parking garage—I mean, “car park”—Zachary handed me the road map. “You’ll have to navigate. I marked the spot, so just tell me when to get off the M1 and everything after that.”
I blinked the blurriness out of my contacts, wishing I’d worn my glasses on the overnight flight. There was a star and a question mark near the village of Slane. “You don’t know where it is?”
“Not precisely, but I’m sure there’ll be a sign. If not, we’ll ring them.”
I looked up from the map as we entered the motorway, which had two lanes in our direction and two in the other—but on our right instead of the left.
“Everything’s backward.” Sitting in the left seat, I put my hands into thin air where the steering wheel should have been.
“Confession: This is only my second day driving on the left side of the road. The first was when I somehow acquired a driving license back home.” He tapped the brakes too hard, jolting us. “The examiner was very forgiving.”
“You don’t drive in Scotland?”
“I’ve no need for a car in the city. I walk or take the bus or subway.” He carefully shifted gears. “I’m a wee bit out of practice.” His arms tensed as we entered heavier traffic. “I have to stop talking now or we’ll die.”
We didn’t die, but we did want to kill whoever built the back roads and made the signs and maps that supposedly went with them.
“It’s like they know,” Zachary muttered, after we made the third wrong turn down a mismarked country road.
“Like who knows what?”
“The Irish, that our marriage is a sham.” The car lurched as he shifted down into second gear instead of up into fourth. “This is their way of keeping us frustrated and pure.”
I focused on the map with renewed determination. The hedgerows blocked the sight of landmarks and gave the road a claustrophobic feel.
Suddenly a gap appeared, with a small brown sign. “Slow down,” I said. “Stop!”
Zachary jammed the brakes. We skidded across the damp road. The car fishtailed, but stopped at the edge of a ditch on the opposite shoulder.
“Sorry,” he said. The engine coughed and stalled.
I pointed out the windshield at the break in the hedgerow. “I think that’s it.”
Zachary started the car, then eased us out of the path of potential oncoming traffic. The tiny brown sign came into view.
BALLYROCK CASTLE B & B.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
The brass key trembled in Zachary’s hand as he inserted it into our door. My heart felt jammed between my tonsils, I was so nervous myself.
Before turning the knob, he lifted a finger to his lips as a silent warning to Shhh.
The moment we were inside with the door shut, Zachary whipped out his phone. Tapping the screen, he activated an innocent-looking icon marked “Files.” The words “Sweep activating” appeared.
He was looking for bugs. I wasn’t sure if this made me more or less jumpy.
The suite’s walls were gray castle-stone, and the floors a warm, dark wood covered in thick earth-toned rugs. Near the door where I stood, a love seat and coffee table sat facing a fireplace, flanked by armchairs. Straight ahead, double doors opened onto the balcony, where I could see the dim afternoon light through translucent white curtains.
But I barely registered all this, because of the bed. Tucked back into the right side of the room, it dominated the space with its king-size hugeness and what looked like the world’s fluffiest quilt. The carved dark wood frame reached four posts up toward the low ceiling.
I needed air.
I went to the balcony doors, leaving Zachary sweeping the phone in slow arcs at arm’s length, watching the screen carefully. He nodded to me when I put my hand on the latch, so I opened the doors and went outside.
“Whoa.” I stepped out into the mist and rested my elbows on the stone railing. Below, the hills and trees sloped down toward the stately River Boyne, whose northern shore I could just glimpse through the fog. I wondered how many ghosts I would see peppering the distant fields and streets if I hadn’t been so recently—and so thoroughly—kissed.
A few minutes later, the balcony door creaked open behind me. “We’re alone,” Zachary said softly.
“Great.” I cleared my throat and repeated the word, but kept my eyes on the river, wishing I could borrow its silent, silver serenity. “Did MI-X give you the bug sweeper?”
“My dad did, as long as I promised not to tell Mum. She doesn’t want me following in his footsteps.” He gripped the railing. “But I’ll do whatever it takes to protect you.”
I began to tremble, from his proximity and the strength in his voice.
Desire and fear were playing tug-of-war with my thoughts.
“I bet when it’s clear,” I said quickly, “you can see the whole valley.” Am I really talking about the weather to hide how nervous I am about sex? Seriously?
“I hope it’s clear for sunrise tomorrow at Newgrange.”
And now he’s doing it, too. “It will be, I just know it.”
“Aye, this weather’s no match for that beautiful Yank optimism.”
“No way.” My voice was a bare whisper now.
Our hands lay inches apart on the balcony’s stone railing, but the distance might have been miles. That’s how much courage it would take to join them, because once we touched, here in our room alone . . .
I spread my fingers, and he did the same, until the tip of my right pinkie and the tip of his left pinkie almost brushed. Almost.
The thick Irish mist seemed to fill my lungs, drowning me in fear and anticipation. I wasn’t sure what would kill me faster—touching Zachary or not touching him.
“Are y’hungry?” he finally asked in a low voice.
“No,” I whispered, not looking up.
“Thirsty?”
“Uh, yeah. No. I don’t know.” I risked a glance at him. “What’s there to drink?”
“Water from the tap?” He uttered a short, hoarse laugh.
“I dunno why I’m acting like a waiter. I suppose, now that you’re in my part of the world, it feels like you’re my guest, and I want to make you, em . . .”
“Comfortable?”
“Happy.”
I summoned every scrap of courage and turned to face him straight on. “You do.”
“Aura.” Zachary drew his top lip between his teeth, then spoke to the stone surface just beyond my feet. “I tried tae think of the perfect things to say and do right now.” With each quickening blink, his eyes shifted, never leaving the ground. “But then, I thought maybe this would never happen, that I’d never even see you again. And then every time I turned my mind to this moment, it went blank.” His lashes lifted to let his gaze meet mine. “I couldn’t imagine a future that would be so kind.”
My eyes burned with tears—of anger as much as sorrow or love. Whatever those bastards had done to him, the one thing I’d never forgive was the haunted look they’d put in his eyes.
“So I’m sorry,” he continued, “if I’m no’ quite the most, em, smooth person when it comes to these things. I never did sort out what to say and do, how to get from here”—he pointed to the space between our feet—“to there.” He gestured behind him, toward the door. Toward the bed.
I took a shaky step forward, so that we almost touched. “You’re not the only one who can sort stuff out.” I twined my fingers with his, feeling his hands tremble as hard as mine. “Let’s go inside.”
Sitting on the edge of the love seat, I watched Zachary start the fire. His face set in concentration as he reached up the chimney to open the flue, which settled into position with a heavy iron thunk. “There.” Then he pulled a long match from a green cardboard canister on the hearth. Our hosts had arranged the wood for us ahead of time, with kindling and paper underneath.
“Wait.” I went to kneel beside him. “Let me do it.”
With a faint smile, he handed me the red-tipped match, then held out the rough bottom edge of the canister for me to strike.
I hadn’t realized how dark the room had grown until the flame burst white-yellow from the match head, searing my vision. Zachary pulled back the fireplace’s webbed-steel curtain so I could touch the match to the paper beneath the kindling.
Shine Page 20