Seamus went up the steps two at a time. “There,” he told himself. “I’m spry as a young rooster still, when need be.”
At the top of the stairs, he realized that he hadn’t locked the lower door. He’d been so eager to rid himself of his escort and find the safety of solitude. Now he worried and started down the stairs.
As he did, the downstairs door opened. He heard the creaking. He squinted, looking out. The streetlights outside made his visitor no more than a dark image, a silhouette. A man in a hat and a coat. That was all he knew.
“Seamus, Seamus, Seamus. Shame on you, Seamus,” a voice said. Deep, rich, throaty, menacing, with the soft cadence of the Old Country.
He knew instinctively that, indeed, he knew too much. Had said too much.
He turned, his heart thundering. His door was not so far away. And he was spry, spry as a young rooster.
He missed the first step he tried to take. He wavered briefly, then fell.
He hit his head. Hard. Every bone in his old body ached.
“Sorry, me old man. Sorry,” that Irish-inflected voice said. Seamus was vaguely aware of footfalls landing lightly on the stairs, coming toward him. “Indeed, sorry, old man. But I can’t take the chance of you giving me away. Nothing, you see, must stand in my way.”
Seamus wanted to scream. He’d lied. Old Kowalski was deaf as a stone, and he’d never had a wife, much less children. Seamus wanted to scream anyway.
He couldn’t. He felt the powerful grip that seized him. Then he was falling. Flying first, then falling, falling, falling.
When he landed that time, there was an instant of agony.
The sound of something snapping.
Then no pain. No pain at all.
On her way through the house to her bedroom, Moira noticed a small box sitting at the edge of the kitchen table. Inspecting it, she saw that it was a videotape. Frowning to see the title in the dim light, she saw that it had been recorded by someone off TV. Her brother’s handwriting on the cover announced his title for whatever he had taped: The Results of the Troubles in Ireland. She started to put the tape down, then hesitated. They had shared things all their lives, and Patrick had left the tape out where anyone could see it. She took it to her room.
Was she prying? Too bad. She wanted to know what Patrick was up to.
She slid the tape into the VCR in her room and watched for a minute, but the tape seemed to be little more than a travelogue. Yawning, she went into the bathroom, listening as she washed her face and brushed her teeth. She heard music with a voice-over talking about traditional Irish music and dance.
Nothing too evil so far.
Letting it run, she hopped quickly in and out of the shower. Wrapped in a towel, she walked from the bathroom to the bedroom, where she slipped into a T-shirt with a yawning, frazzled cat on the front, saying, “Got coffee?” The Irish music and dance were finished; the narrator had gone on to talk about The Troubles, the thirty years of violence that had gripped Northern Ireland at the end of the twentieth century. Then-President Clinton was on the screen saying, “I don’t think reversal is an option.” She rewound the tape. The narrator spoke about Clinton’s visit, his meetings with Irish Prime Minister Bertie Ahern, Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness of the Sinn Fein. It went on to discuss his journey to Dundalk, a town just south of the Northern Ireland border long known as a recruiting station for the Real IRA, a left-wing faction, that had claimed responsibility for the 1998 car bombing that killed twenty-nine people in the town of Omagh and threatened the fragile Good Friday Agreement, providing for a joint Catholic-Protestant government and approved in April of 1998. Clinton’s face appeared on the screen again as he pointed out how past violence had destroyed the lives not just of those killed, but of those left behind. The important issue of tourism and American business dollars was brought up. Another speaker appeared on the screen, pleading for reason and the value of every human life to both the Unionists, mainly Protestants who worked for continued unification with Great Britain, and the Nationalists, mainly Catholics longing for a united Ireland. The tape went on with shots of Clinton visiting David Trimble, Protestant first minister in the new Northern Ireland government, and Seamus Mallon, the senior Catholic in the government. The tape moved on to interviews with children, orphaned or left with one struggling surviving parent due to the violence. They all talked about the future, about turning Ireland around, making her as prosperous and welcoming as her age-old adage promising hospitality. One attractive teenager, raised by nuns after the deaths of her parents, walked the photographer around the county of Armagh and Tara, the beautiful site made royal by the ancient kings. Northern Ireland, often shunned by tourists because of The Troubles, offered wonderful archeological locations, striking Norman fortifications, haunted castles, magical vistas and more. The girl was charming and sincere, ending her speech with a longing for the kind of education that would allow her generation to offer the world an Ireland at peace. She ended with the words, “There are more Irish in the Unites States now then there are in Ireland. This is still your home. Please help us, and the land that remains in your heart.”
The sound track ended, and a loud buzzing filled the room. Moira quickly hopped up and hit the reverse button, rewinding the tape. As she did so, she thought she heard a strange thumping sound. She stopped the tape, listening. She heard nothing, but remained certain that she had heard a noise coming from the pub below.
“Danny,” she murmured aloud. It had to be Danny. But what was he up to?
She exited her room, closing the door quietly behind her. She didn’t bother with slippers or a robe, just tiptoed along the hall, listening. She thought she heard movement downstairs again. Was he going for a beer? It was nearly half past three in the morning.
Maybe her brother had returned, and he and Danny were talking.
Whatever was going on, she wanted the truth.
She opened the door at the top of the spiral stairway, closing it behind her very quietly. She waited there a moment, listening. Voices. Droning voices. People talking? Or a television or radio left on?
Silently and slowly, she moved down the winding stairway, inwardly damning the fact that a night-light was on in the office, while the bar beyond lay in darkness. Still, she moved downward, step by step, trying to discern just what she was hearing and from where the sound was coming. She came to the ground floor and held very still. She couldn’t make out the words being said. It had to be a radio or television. After a minute, she stepped forward carefully, realizing only then that the floor was very cold, the wooden boards covering concrete, and her feet were freezing. Goose bumps were breaking out on her arms, as well.
She left the office area, creeping behind the bar. The noise, she thought, was coming from the rear of the bar. Probably from Danny’s room. The bar was empty. At least Danny and her brother weren’t sitting around conspiring together.
She started very carefully through the tables in the darkened room toward the guest room door. She wasn’t going to knock or anything like that. She just wanted to assure herself that she was hearing the droning of a television.
Halfway to the rear of the pub, she realized that she was feeling a cold draft. She paused, looking around. It was so dark, both inside and outside, that she couldn’t make out the door. She should have been able to; there were streetlights just outside. But they didn’t seem to be bright enough that night. Finally her eyes grew accustomed to the darkness, and she could see the door. It appeared to be closed, but it might be ajar. It had to be ajar. Cold air was coming in. A deep, bone-chilling cold. How the heck could the door be open? Patrick would never be so careless as to forget to lock up when he came in.
Hugging her arms around herself, she started weaving her way through the tables and around the bar. When she reached the end of the bar, still staring at the front door, she suddenly felt an entirely new sensation, as if a ghost were whispering at the nape of her neck, warning her to stop, to turn back. She did so, coming to a
dead halt and turning.
The door to Danny’s room seemed to be ajar, a faint ray of light spilling from it. That door had not been open before. She was certain. She would have noticed the light. It suddenly seemed imperative that she reach the front door, make sure it was closed and locked.
She turned back. The darkness seemed to thicken before her, as if a cloud had converged on the room. Groping blindly, she slid her feet forward. There was something in her path. She tripped, stumbling. She reached out, trying to find something to break her fall. Cloth…a body? Something…someone…blocking the light.
But there was nothing for her to grip. She flailed helplessly, then went down, her feet entangled in something. She crashed to the floor, hands ahead of her to break her fall.
She hit the ground face forward, her forehead connecting with the green linoleum behind the bar. Pain suddenly shot through her head. Odd, it seemed to come from the back of her skull rather than the front. Sharp…then fading. The room became blacker than ever.
She closed her eyes.
“Moira, now what the hell are you up to?”
She blinked, then realized that she must have passed out, if only for a few minutes. There was a light on behind the bar, and she was being held in a man’s arms. Danny’s. She was still on the floor, but he had lifted her up and was studying her face.
“Danny,” she breathed. She stared at him, not sure whether to fling herself against him or find the strength to leap away in terror.
“Who else were you expecting down here?”
“Were you out?” she asked.
His eyes narrowed. “For a bit. Why? What are you doing down here? Judging by the way you’re dressed, I don’t imagine you trekked down the stairs to seduce me.”
“Danny, damn it, did you just conk me on the head?”
“Are you daft?”
“Who was in your room?”
“No one I know about.” He seemed tense. “Why?”
“There were sounds. Voices.”
“From my room?”
“Yes.”
“The television?”
She hesitated, staring into his eyes. In the murky light, they seemed a pure gold. His features were in shadow, which seemed to emphasize the lean planes and rugged angles of his bone structure. She had been so frightened. Here, in her family business. In a room where she had spent half her life, in a place where she had never been afraid before.
She’d heard voices, seen shadows, touched…something. She’d sensed the danger, felt it at her nape, known it in her bones….
And it might well have been him.
But the fear was ebbing from her, just as the darkness had ebbed from the area around the bar.
“Moira, what’s up? You said you heard voices.”
She sighed, sitting up, rubbing the back of her head. There didn’t seem to be a bump there.
“It might have been a television,” she admitted. “I thought the front door was open…then it seemed your door was open. It was cold, and I thought Patrick had come back and forgotten to lock up properly….” Her voice trailed off.
“You weren’t on your way out to lover boy’s hotel room, eh?” he teased.
“Shoeless and in a T-shirt?” she retorted.
“Ah. You save the bare feet and T-shirts for me. How sweet.”
She frowned. “I really hit my head. I think I blacked out.”
He leaned toward her. “You hit your forehead. Poor baby. Hang on.”
He rose, walking behind the bar, finding a clean towel and filling it with ice. As he came back to her, she tried to rise. “No, no, you might be dizzy, don’t try to stand. Hey, were you drinking tonight?”
“No!” she said indignantly. “Two glasses of wine at dinner. Danny, I could have sworn there was someone in front of me when I fell. Were—were you there all along?”
“No, I wasn’t, and the front door was locked when I came in.” He hunkered down by her, pressing the ice to her temple. She shivered.
“That floor is probably cold. Grab the ice.”
She did so automatically. She was cold, and the ice, though it felt good against her head, sent rivers of frost racing through her.
She realized he had given her the command so he could scoop her up. “Danny,” she murmured, still holding the ice but slipping her free arm around his neck so she wouldn’t fall.
“You’re like an ice cube yourself,” he said huskily. He strode with her in his arms toward the back, making his way through the tables much more fluidly than she had. Of course, he had light to guide him.
He juggled her weight so he could open the door to his room, which was also closed, though not locked.
“Hey!” she protested.
“I’m not going to attack you or anything. Just warm you up,” he assured her.
He paused in the doorway with her in his arms. He smelled good. The underlying scent of the aftershave she had always known and loved so much.
She realized that he was studying his room—his guest suite, as her father called it. Not really a suite. Her father had always imagined that in the old days, the room might have been a secret little harbor where the American Founding Fathers had met to ponder the question of separation from the mother country. Sam Adams might have written some of his stirring rhetoric here. Now it held a queen-size bed, two dressers, a mahogany entertainment center and a modern bath.
The doors to the entertainment center were open. The television was on. CNN. Headlines on the hour.
“Nothing seems out of place,” he murmured.
“I guess I heard the television,” she replied.
He remained still, looking around. He didn’t seem to notice her weight. She had forgotten that although Danny appeared slim, he was built like rock. A lean machine, pure, supple muscle. He turned, still not seeming to notice that he was carrying her.
“Danny, you can put me down.”
“Yeah. Let’s get you under a blanket.”
Still holding her with seemingly little effort in one arm, he stripped the throw and comforter from the bed, then placed her against the pillows and immediately covered her up.
“Danny—”
“Are you any warmer?”
“A little. I’ve got to go upstairs. I must have been imagining things.”
“Let me take a look around out there. Keep that ice on your forehead.”
He left her in the bed. She stared at the television. The volume was low, but she could hear every word clearly. She wondered why the sound had been so strange and garbled before. Because she had been listening through a closed door?
Danny seemed to be gone awhile. She turned from the television to see that he had returned and was standing in the doorway to the bedroom with something in his hands. Her black knit purse.
“My purse.” She rose from the pillows. “Where was it?”
“By the end of the bar. It’s what you must have tripped over.”
She frowned as he brought it to her. “Danny, I know damn well I didn’t set it there. And if it was there, why didn’t you and Colleen see it when you were cleaning up?”
He shrugged. “Maybe it was wedged beneath the bar.”
He slipped out of his coat, hanging it on the hook by the door, then pulled his sweater over his head and took a seat by her on the bed. “Check it out,” he told her. “See if anything seems to be missing.”
“You think someone stole my purse and put it back?” she queried.
He shook his head, eyes on the purse, his slow, rueful smile slipping into place. “I think someone moved it from the well, meant to give it to you, walked around with it, set it down by the bar and forgot it. But since it seems to have mysteriously moved of its own volition, perhaps you should check it out. Besides, I want to see if you’ve got a bump on your forehead.” He reached out, taking the ice-laden towel from her hand and her head, studying her seriously.
“No bump. Not even a bruise.”
“Good,” she murmured.
“Headache?”
“Not really.”
“Want an aspirin?”
“For my imagined injury?”
“I never suggested you had an imagined injury.” He rose, disappearing into the bathroom, returning with two aspirin and a paper cup of water.
She took the pills from him. “I really don’t feel bad,” she murmured. “I should. I’m sure I blacked out.”
He wasn’t listening to her. He was watching the television. The reporter was explaining the route the parade would follow on Saint Patrick’s Day.
Then suddenly he was looking at her. He reached out, smoothing a tangle from her hair.
He was close. Warm. His fingertips were like magic. “You know, you’re really beautiful.”
“You’re not supposed to be attacking me,” she murmured.
“I’m not attacking you. I’m trying to smooth out your hair.”
“How romantic.”
“I’m not supposed to be romantic, since I’m not allowed to attack you, remember? Of course, the devastating negligee is a real turn-on. Are you sure you didn’t come down here with the express thought of attacking me?”
“Attacking you?”
“Seducing me?”
“Danny…”
“You know, the lovely heroine in distress, fallen on the floor. The strong, silent hero sweeping her up and all that?”
“When the hell were you ever the silent type?”
“You have a point there.”
His fingers were still moving through her hair. And somewhere along the way he’d stretched out beside her. When she closed her eyes, she breathed him. She seemed overwhelmed by a sea of physical memory. Sight, touch, the sound of his voice, the huskiness, the slight touch of a brogue. She could even remember the taste of his lips on hers, his flesh beneath the pressure of her whisper soft kisses, and more. How long had it been? How in God’s name could she feel so natural, lying here with him, wanting to reach out and touch and taste and breathe and more again?
“You know, even dressed that way, you’re absolutely beautiful,” he said softly.
“That’s a stock line.”
Night of the Blackbird Page 18