“Only if you stop calling me that. My name’s Josefine.” My voice sounded calm and controlled even to me. But inside, I felt weak with sorrow. I forced myself to look at him. “Okay, a truce—at least until the next time you say ‘Mrs. Stone.’”
“Perish the thought! I won’t let myself do that ever again.”
12
Deirdre Bennett was an impressive woman, and not only because she was furious right now. She slammed the pint glass she’d been drying onto the counter. With a tattered dishcloth, she treated the next glass with the same angry care.
“With my poor mother as my witness, this is the last time I’ll do a favour for that ne’er-do-well, kin or not.”
Another glass hit the counter and Li, who had laboriously climbed onto a bar stool, jumped.
“Barking dogs don’t bite,” I whispered into her ear.
My aunt looked uncertainly at the woman whose arms, from the back of her hands to her powerful shoulders, were decorated with Celtic motifs. The Hootanelly bartender not only matched her Edinburgh cousin in stature, but also shared his love of tattoos.
“Gavin’s constantly talking me into giving a chance to one little drifter or another, claiming they’re the next Donovan. And what happens? The snot-nosed brat stumbles in here three hours before his gig and cancels. This whole damn town is making music tonight and the Hootanelly, of all places, has no band. I can’t even get a plastered bagpiper on such short notice.”
“Did she just say what I think she said?” I whispered to Aidan, struggling to follow her heavily accented English.
The regret in his eyes confirmed my fears. I felt queasy—it was starting to become a habit.
“So Ian cancelled.” Aidan’s voice was calm, but he clutched his beer bottle so hard I thought it might shatter.
“That he did. Have to say, though, the boy didn’t look good.” Deirdre bent down and pulled a fresh dishrag from under the bar. “I probably should be grateful he took the trouble to let me know. Most of these types just don’t show up. But I’ll make that cousin of mine pay for the loss in earnings. Maybe that’ll teach him not to be such a fool.”
“Mrs. Bennett—”
“Call me Deirdre, dearie.” She stopped in the middle of drying another glass and looked me up and down. “Can ya sing?”
“You don’t want to hear it, believe me.” I elbowed Aidan for support, but he was fiddling with the label on the beer bottle, seemingly oblivious to Deirdre’s chatter.
“You’ve no idea what types of screeching I’ve had to put up with. It can’t get much worse.” Her ash-blonde spiked buzz cut now swung towards Li and Bri. “How about the two of you? I’m sure you’d make a fine duo.”
Li’s eyes opened wide and Bri almost spilled her coffee.
“You want us to sing?”
“If needs be. Or if you play a flute or a fiddle . . .”
Aidan put down his bottle, its label now striped like a zebra.
“Deirdre, when exactly was my brother here?”
“That sickly little guy’s your brother?” She coughed and spat into the sink. “Well, congratulations! You’re as lucky with your kin as I am. Haven’t brought your guitar, have ya?”
“Sorry.” Aidan’s face was grim.
She shrugged and reached for another glass. “Worth a try. All Scots claim to be musicians, but when push comes to shove, they’re scared shitless.” Her long sigh sounded like a bad note on a bagpipe.
“Was Ian alone?” I asked, my heart pounding. “Or was there, maybe, a girl with him? Mid-twenties, wispy, dark hair?”
Deirdre thought a moment. “Nah, I saw nobody else with him.”
I exhaled. Late again. What now? Had it all been for nothing?
“Maybe Charlie is no longer with this Ian person.” Bri expressed what I secretly was thinking.
“Of course she’s still with him.” Scowling at Bri, Li put her hand on my arm.
“How do you know? Your grandniece goes through lovers like I change underwear. She could very well have ditched him by now,” groused Bri.
“I just know,” Li countered.
“Well, m’dears, I haven’t the foggiest what you’re talking about. Anyway, the lad was here half an hour ago and looked like he needed either a tubful of Glenfiddich or a doctor.” Deirdre sniffed. “I sent him to Harold Finlay at the pharmacy. He’s a strange one, he is, but he knows his way around herbs. His special remedy even helped my mother, and she’s been wanting to join the angels for a year now.” Deirdre stopped short as Aidan laid a pile of twenty-pound notes on the counter.
“Keep the change—for tonight’s loss of earnings,” he said briskly, putting on his leather jacket and stretching out his hand, which I reflexively took.
Bewildered, we looked at our fingers, which had quite naturally intertwined, and let go at the same time. I was immediately overcome by a strange sensation like stepping outside on a winter evening and realising you weren’t wearing gloves.
“Oh my,” Deirdre said. “Quite a spark there.”
“Exactly,” replied Bri, pushing her coffee cup away. Instead of joining Li, who was waiting at the door, she contemplated Deirdre’s spiked hair. “Come up with a proper cup of coffee and a piano for my sister, and I’ll sing for you next time—if you can tolerate Edith Piaf’s ‘La Vie en Rose.’ It would be our pleasure.”
“What are you talking about, Bri? Are you crazy?” Li squawked, waving her hands in embarrassment.
“Why not? You’re hell-bent on adventures of late. Let’s cut loose in a Scottish bar.”
While Bri walked towards the door to confer with her sister, Deirdre dried her hands on the dishrag and motioned me closer.
She bent over the counter and whispered into my ear. “Hold on to this man, mo nighean—my girl.” She patted my arm awkwardly, as if affection was a language she’d forgotten. “It’s not often a chap looks at a woman like he looks at you, and I know what I’m talking about since I had a man who did exactly that until the last breath he took.”
My mouth was ready for a frosty reply, but none came. I nervously looked at Aidan, who was staring out the window and bouncing on his heels. It was obvious he wanted to rush to the pharmacy, but he said not one impatient word—another trait for which any woman would adore him. Any other woman.
I swallowed and, after a polite goodbye, turned away from Deirdre. Her face had resumed its usually grumpy expression. She waved to Aidan with the pile of notes.
“Taing, mo charaid—thank you, my friend. I’ll let Gavin know there are still some decent blokes in his neck of the woods.”
That’s it, I thought. I’m too tired. I don’t care where the little monster was swept by the never-ending rain. I’m quitting this game.
Deirdre Bennett’s remarks were the final straw in this tale of errors, disappointments, and one big missed chance, of which every glance at Aidan, sitting across from me in the driver’s seat, was a reminder. I wanted nothing more than to give up the search for Charlie, admit I’d been beaten, and absolve myself of guilt.
The minutes ticked by on the dashboard clock as this feeling sank in. At exactly 7 p.m., the words tumbled out of my mouth.
“I can’t do this anymore.”
“Stop talking nonsense, Josefine,” Bri said, nudging Li, who was peering at the brightly lit window of Finlay’s Pharmacy. “Do you see the boy in there?”
Li rubbed the windowpane as if she could wipe away the rain. “There are so many people . . .” she whispered, excited by this stake-out. “Is there some kind of epidemic in Inverness?”
“I’m serious,” I said, turning to them. “I quit.”
“But, Josie, what about the ring?”
“I don’t care. I’ll get married without it and Grandmother will have to live with her decision if she really boycotts her own granddaughter’s wedding.”
“What are you talking about?” Bri demanded.
“Oh.” Li waved dismissively. “Charlie stole the bride’s ring.”
/> “She did what?” Laughing, Bri poked a finger into the back of my neck. “So that’s why you’ve been stumbling through the scenery like a shy deer, missing the stag for the trees. And here I thought you cared about your cousin!”
“Spare me your mixed metaphors, Aunt Bri!” I yelled, angry that she seemed neither surprised nor upset by the revelation. “I just want to go home!”
Aidan was straight-faced, but at least I had silenced Bri. I turned back around in my seat and covered my face with both hands.
“What if Ian’s still in there?”
Li’s hand found its way to my shoulder, where it rested heavily. I would have liked to shake her off, but some lingering remnant of manners held me back.
“What if he isn’t?” I spat back, as if it was her fault I’d lost my nerve.
Even if Aidan’s brother still was in the pharmacy, my cousin had probably sent Ian packing a long time ago. With everything that had gone wrong, the chances of actually catching Charlie felt like zero. She was gone and, with her, the bride’s ring. That’s just how it was.
We had been sitting outside the pharmacy with the engine running for twenty minutes, watching people come and go. None of us had made any move to climb out of the truck. Even Aidan sat like a statue next to me. Maybe Ian had become for him what Charlie seemed to be for me—an unreachable phantom. I wasn’t sure whether to laugh or cry. We were in so many ways ridiculously similar, except that he wasn’t going to give up.
“All right, then, I’m going in.” Bri reached for the door.
“No,” Li objected. “I’ll go. You’d scare the poor boy off.”
“Really.” Bri let herself fall back into the seat. “And he’ll trust your Old Mother Frost smile? Parents warn their children about witchy old ladies like you.”
“I let the two of them stay in the garden house and made soup for them. He knows me.”
“That might be the problem exactly, sis. It’s possible they don’t want to be found.”
“Maybe Josefine should go,” Aidan said softly.
“Me?” I looked at him in surprise. “I don’t even know if I’d recognise Ian.”
“You will.”
“But I . . . I want to go home.”
“And you will go home, Josefine—just not yet.”
The words hung in the air between us, a truth we hadn’t wanted to admit. I could feel my carefully constructed self-absolution begin to shake. And then Aidan showed why neither a head waiter nor a police officer could resist doing him favours.
“If I go in, Ian will bolt, either before or after I beat him up. In any case, he’ll refuse to talk to me, which means I can’t keep the promise I made my dad.” His eyes locked with mine. “But you can, I think. You could make Ian come back with us. You’re a lawyer—you’re used to handling difficult conversations. Besides, you look . . . nice, trustworthy.” For the first time since I’d met Aidan, he’d stopped in the middle of a sentence. “Do it for me. I beg you.”
A gentle smile, three plaintive words, and I was putty in his hands. He really was a crafty bastard. What kind of person would I be if I said no? He had done so much for me these past few days. I was in his debt—and he knew it.
I unbuckled the seat belt, ignored Bri’s dry “Well, that was easy,” and got out of the car.
Twelve nervous steps later, I stood in front of the wooden door with inlaid stained-glass panels and an etching—“Finlay’s Pharmacy. Established in 1844.” An old brass bell tinkled when I pushed open the door.
I positioned myself behind a cardboard cut-out of a fat baby touting antibiotic ointment and took a moment to adjust to the overpowering scent of herbs and essential oils. Patients must have got better just by breathing the air in here. With its Victorian furnishings, the pharmacy looked like it hadn’t changed since the date on the door.
The bald pharmacist behind the counter wore a white coat and pince-nez glasses. He reminded me a little of Teacher Lämpel in the old kids’ book, Max and Moritz.
In spite of the long queue, Harold Finlay took considerable time with each customer. He had a gentleman with a walker describe his symptoms at length and then turned to the pharmacist’s chest that took up the entire length of the wall. He pondered for a while and then, at great speed, filled a little paper bag with contents from various drawers. To collect the final medication, he climbed a ladder all the way up to the ceiling. I got dizzy just watching.
The customers were mostly elderly, except for one very young mother whose babbling toddler hung on to her coat with one hand and drummed against the glass display case with the other. No Ian. I was about to turn and go when I saw a row of chairs on which more customers waited to be called.
A young man’s dark-blue hoodie was pulled over his forehead, shadowing his face. But there was no question that it was Ian. His feet kept time and his hands played air guitar.
The woman next to him stood up and I took the opportunity to slide into the seat.
“Hi,” I said, mustering the loveliest smile I could, terrified of saying the wrong thing.
He looked up. As soon as I saw his soulful eyes and understood why my cousin had fallen in love with Ian Murray, my phone rang.
“Justus, may I call you back?” I was shocked by my businesslike tone.
“Most certainly not, Josefine. I’ve been trying to reach you nonstop for two days. If this is one of those silly bridesmaid’s pranks your friend Claire dreamt up . . . Well, I don’t find it funny at all.”
“It’s not what you think,” I replied, my pulse racing. “I’ll explain later why—”
“So you really are in Scotland?”
“Well, yes.”
Justus’s dry laugh crackled through the phone.
“I sure hope you can explain. Because I couldn’t make heads or tails of that note you left. What could possibly be so urgent that it couldn’t wait till after the wedding?”
I glanced at Ian. His arms rested on his thighs and his hiking boots were tapping to the beat of some song only he could hear. His slender body radiated such eerie energy that I almost tapped along.
“Josefine? I want you to stop this idiocy right now and come home. Do you understand me?”
Ian fingered his invisible guitar in two-four time. I silently counted along.
“I am coming home. Just not yet.”
Watching Ian’s restless hands, I spoke slowly and clearly to make sure Ian could understand what I said in German. “First, I have to find Charlie, my cousin.”
The tapping stopped abruptly.
“You’re joking, aren’t you?” Justus thundered. “You don’t even like your cousin. How many times have you told me that you wished you didn’t have to have her as a bridesmaid? And now you chase her all the way to Scotland? Are you out of your mind?”
“She’s my cousin, Justus.”
My voice sounded calm, but my insides were in knots. It was true—I really had said that the pretty bridesmaid dress was a bad investment because Charlie would first spill red wine on it and then rip it while running drunk through Grandmother’s rose beds. But if I confessed to Justus about the bride’s ring, he’d have me committed for sure. Belated loyalty to my cousin was less damning. To be honest, I really was beginning to be concerned about her.
Ian was now sitting up very straight, listening intently. There was icy silence on the other end of the line.
“I have to go. I need to clarify an important matter here,” I said, smiling faintly at Ian. “I’ll call you back.”
Aidan’s brother was frowning. He looked briefly at Mr. Finlay and then at the exit. If I didn’t get off the phone fast, he might bolt.
“I don’t understand you, Finchen,” Justus said in a somewhat more conciliatory tone.
At some point I really would have to tell him how much I hated that nickname. “Well, it’s the way it is,” I said, and hung up.
Take a deep breath, close your eyes, find the right words . . . But it was Ian who found them first.
“So you’re Jo,” he said quietly.
Even his voice was musical, despite his heavy accent when speaking German. I nodded, feeling like a fisherman who watches with rapt attention as a fish circles his bait.
“She knew you’d come.”
I was surprised by the relief on his face. He looked like Aidan, only younger, thinner, and more fragile. But there was something in his expressive eyes. He was afraid.
“Where’s Charlie?” I asked with a trembling voice, taking hold of his hand without thinking. It was cold and clammy.
“Mr. Murray? Your fever-reducing remedy is ready,” came the call from the counter.
Fever-reducing? I swallowed.
Ian jumped up and pushed his way through the crowd, mumbling apologies as he went. He took the paper bag from Mr. Finlay, listened carefully to his directions, and paid with a fistful of coins he fished out of the pockets of his torn jeans. Then he came back to me, red in the face, with an unsteady, pleading look in his eyes.
“Come on. I’ll take you to her.”
“First, you need to know . . .” I didn’t know if I should continue. I was worried sick about Charlie, about what would happen if I said the wrong thing and Ian ran. “My great-aunts Li and Bri . . . and Aidan are waiting in a car outside.”
Great, Josefine. Just blurt it out.
Ian’s eyes widened. “My brother?”
My heart beat even faster. Had I ruined everything? I had to know if Charlie was okay . . .
I furtively glanced through the shop window and saw, to my chagrin, that Aidan had climbed out of the car. He was pacing up and down the pavement with the rolling gait of a cowboy, apparently ready to physically prevent his brother from escaping.
Ian followed my look. He shook his head and rubbed the back of his neck in disbelief. It seemed like forever before he sighed deeply, sounding more like a little boy than a grown man.
“Amazing,” he said with a crooked grin. “Just when you think fate has bailed on you, it offers two solutions at the same time.”
Together, we cautiously stepped outside, the bell tinkling in our ears. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a raised thumb sticking out of one of the truck’s windows and Li’s grinning face. I fell back, letting Ian lead the way. He only hesitated for a second before squaring his shoulders and confidently approaching his brother.
Kissed by the Rain Page 17