Laced

by Carol Higgins Clark

  Now she tells me, Brian thought. “I understand,” he said sincerely. “It’ll be our little secret.”

  “You two walk in ahead of me. Run along,” Margaret instructed. “But don’t forget to leave my keys.”

  Sheila and Brian held hands as they jauntily traversed the little bridge spanning the stream in front of Hennessy Castle. At the hotel’s entrance, eight golf bags were leaning against the wall. Brian’s stomach fell six feet. He held open the door of the castle for Sheila. “After you.”

  What transpired next felt to Brian as if it were happening in slow motion.

  Dermot Finnegan and his entourage, all clad in blue blazers and khaki pants, were checking in at the reception desk. Sheila and Brian knew most of them. Regan and Jack Reilly were across the room, talking to Neil Buckley and a bellman.

  “It’s the O’Sheas,” one of Dermot’s group cried out. “Good to see you!”

  Dermot turned around, his face filled with excitement. “Brian O’Shea, you are the devil! I can’t wait to see the seven paintings I ordered! You’re not going to believe it, but I figured out who the nun is that painted them!”

  Margaret’s voice cried out from behind the O’Sheas: “I’m not a nun!”

  Everyone in the reception area stopped talking and stared.

  Sheila and Brian were frozen in place.

  “You painted the picture with the lace tablecloth?” Dermot asked Margaret, who walked toward him.

  “I did indeed.”

  “And you’re not Sister Mary Rose from the cloistered convent in Galway?”

  “Since when does a nun wear a housekeeper’s uniform? I’m not Sister Mary Rose, I am Margaret Raftery!” she said proudly.

  “And Brian hired you to do the seven paintings?”

  “He and his wife paid me one hundred euros for each painting.”

  Dermot’s mouth dropped. “One hundred euros? I paid him half a million dollars to commission those paintings! He told me that most of the money was going to the convent.”

  “I can explain,” Brian began.

  “No, you can’t!” Margaret cried. “You two are shameful! What you put me through. Thanks to running all over creation with you yesterday, gathering up my paintings, I broke my tooth and ended up with—” she reached into her pocket—“this dreadful cap! I’ve never seen anything like it! It’s hideous! And you were cheating me out of so much money. Why you’d steal the sugar out of my tea!”

  “I’ll pay for any dentist you want…,” Brian offered.

  “Margaret,” Regan interrupted, as she and Jack hurried across the room. “May we see that cap?”

  “Regan, why on earth would you want to see it?”

  “It sounds crazy, but there’s a chance it could lead us to May Reilly’s tablecloth.”

  Margaret handed the cap to her. “Here!”

  As everyone watched, Regan and Jack studied the inside of the cap. “There it is!” Regan cried. “It has a little smiley face in red ink. So did the cap found at Shane’s house!”

  “It’s got what?” Margaret asked.

  “Margaret, who was your dentist?”

  “You don’t want to go to him, Regan, believe me.”

  “Margaret, who is he?”

  “Oh, Regan, I’m sorry. I don’t know. I was bleeding and so upset—”

  “Dr. Sharkey in Galway,” Brian offered quickly. “We brought her there yesterday.”

  Jack turned to Neil and asked, “Can you get us Dr. Sharkey’s number?”

  “Right away!”

  A moment later Jack was on the phone, hurriedly explaining to Mother Sharkey the reason for his call.

  “My son puts caps on lots of people.”

  “May I speak to him?”

  “Hold on.”

  Jack waited. No one in the reception area was moving a muscle. “Yes, Dr. Sharkey,” Jack said and then identified himself. “We’re looking for someone you might have made a cap for…. Yes, we did notice the little smiley face…. Uh-huh…. Great…. Well, we’re trying to find a man who broke into a home last night. He lost his cap before getting away, and it had a little smiley face in it…. Yes, it was the home of the man with the Claddagh rings…. You heard about the break-in on the news…. You make a lot of those caps. Uh-huh. Any recently?…Two so far this week. We’re looking for an American couple. The man has a peculiar laugh…. He was there yesterday?” Jack asked excitedly.

  A collective gasp went around the reception area.

  “But you don’t know his name?” Jack grimaced.

  Regan felt as if she had been punched in the stomach.

  “Your Dad what?…He writes down your patients’ license plate numbers because someone once left without paying.”

  Several people in the room covered their mouths, trying not to laugh.

  “Yes, please, ask your dad.”

  Neil put a piece of paper in front of Jack and handed him a pen. After several agonizing minutes Jack started writing down a license plate number.

  “We’ll check this out immediately,” Jack told Dr. Sharkey. “I can’t thank you enough. We’ll let you know what happens.” Jack hung up and caught his breath. “Now I’ll call the garda and ask them to trace the license plate.” He called the number he had programmed on his cell phone.

  A few minutes later Jack repeated what he had just learned. “The car is registered to a couple named Karen and Len Cortsman who live in a small town an hour south of Galway. From the address it appears that their home is in an isolated area.”

  “That’s great, Jack,” Regan said. “But it’ll take us a couple of hours to get there.”

  “No, it won’t!” Dermot cried. “The eight-seat helicopter I hired to take us to the golf course is on the lawn out back! It’s all yours.”

  “I’m coming with you,” Margaret cried. “If those two have May Reilly’s tablecloth, they’re going to answer to me.”

  Dermot looked at Margaret with admiration. There was something about her…“Then I’m coming, too!”

  “Let’s go!” Jack said.

  “Brian and Sheila O’Shea, follow us!” Dermot ordered. “I’m not letting you out of my sight.”

  “I have a stake in this mess!” Neil exclaimed. “Martin, you’re in charge while I’m gone.”

  Jack, Regan, Margaret, Dermot, Neil, and the mortified O’Sheas ran to the back lawn, boarded the luxurious chopper, and lifted into the air.

  As they soared over the grounds of Hennessy Castle, Jack called the garda and alerted them. He then called Keith and said simply, “I think we’re about to nail them.”

  The whole group was silent for the rest of the twenty-minute trip.

  Please, Regan prayed, please let the Cortsmans be there. And let them be the Does.

  As the chopper flew over green fields, the pilot gestured toward an isolated cottage. “That’s the place you’re looking for. We’re going to touch down a little farther up the road, where the garda vehicles are waiting.”

  “Just a minute!” Jack said, looking down. “They’re coming out of the house.”

  A man and woman looked up at the helicopter, hurried to their car, jumped in, and took off.

  That must be them, Regan thought. I can’t believe it.

  “I think you may want to put this chopper down and block our friends’ escape,” Jack said.

  “Gotcha.” The pilot circled the property and touched down at the end of the long narrow driveway.

  The couple jumped out of their car and started to flee. Jack and Regan exited the chopper first and ran after them. Jack caught up with the male and tackled him to the ground on the field in front of the cottage. “Smile for me your pretty smile, Mr. Doe,” Jack said tauntingly.

  Regan tore after Anna who was unbelievably fast. Like a football player, Regan lunged and managed to grab Anna’s leg and pull her down to the ground.

  “Nice play, Regan!” Brian yelled enthusiastically as he caught up to them. “But this is a team effort.”

 
While Anna kicked and screamed, Brian grabbed her arms, Regan sat on her legs, and together they kept her on the ground as the sirens of the approaching garda vehicles grew louder.

  Bobby started to scream. “This is all your fault, Anna. You got us into this mess.”

  “I wish I never met you,” Anna shouted back at him. “I should have stuck to makeup!”

  “It’s here!” Margaret Raftery rejoiced as she came running out of the cottage holding May Reilly’s tablecloth in the air, like a football player who has just scored the winning touchdown. Tears were streaming down her face. “May Reilly’s tablecloth is safe and sound and on its way back to Hennessy Castle where it belongs.”

  Friday, April 15th

  56

  Regan and Jack had spent the last two days finally enjoying their honeymoon at Hennessy Castle—where things were back in full swing. Reservations were pouring in from people intrigued by the tale of the jewel thieves, May Reilly’s tablecloth, and, of course, her ghost. And Shane Magillicuddy had decided that Hennessy Castle was where the auction of the Claddagh rings should take place.

  “It will be a grand celebration of our Irish heritage—” Shane announced at a press conference, Tiger by his side—“to have May Reilly’s exquisite lace tablecloth and Richard Joyce’s original Claddagh rings under the same roof for one night.”

  Tickets were sold out.

  Regan, wearing the black silk dress she had worn to her rehearsal dinner exactly one week before, glanced out the bedroom window at the enormous white tent covering Hennessy Castle’s back lawn. It was a beautiful spring night.

  “This is going to be some party,” she said as she gave herself a final spritz of perfume.

  “You look beautiful, Regan Reilly Reilly,” Jack said as he pulled on the jacket of his dark suit. “So rested and refreshed.”

  “I must be on my honeymoon.”

  Jack rolled his eyes and smiled. “Our honeymoon has taken a turn for the better these last couple of days. I bet Jane and John Doe wished they hadn’t tried to interfere. They won’t be living the life of Reilly for the next fifteen or twenty years.” He extended his arm. “May I escort you, madame?”

  “Why, of course.”

  They descended the stairs to the main floor and walked out to the festively decorated tent where guests were already mingling. Tables were covered with lace tablecloths and bouquets of flowers. Onstage a harpist was playing. May Reilly’s tablecloth was on display in the center of the room in a new glass case.

  Regan and Jack accepted glasses of champagne from a passing waiter and looked around the room. They said hello to the Sharkey family who were glowing with excitement.

  Seamus Sharkey was thrilled to have been an integral part in an international police investigation. He had been on television and radio, and was written up in the newspapers. “All my work finally amounted to something,” he said. “I’m ready to die now.”

  “Stop that talk!” his wife admonished. “We have a lot of living to do.”

  Seated in the corner, Linda and Brad Thompson were still behaving like newlyweds. She rested her head on her husband’s shoulder, nibbled his ear, and stroked his back.

  “How come you don’t do that to me in public?” Jack asked Regan with a wry smile.

  Regan laughed. “Somehow I don’t think you’d want me to.”

  Dermot and Margaret appeared in the doorway, holding hands. Margaret looked elegant in a new silk pantsuit. She’d had her hair and makeup done at the spa in the castle courtesy of Neil Buckley and had obviously found a new dentist. Her smile was brilliant.

  “I knew that whoever created that painting had to be special,” a smitten Dermot had told her. “I feel as if I’ve known you all my life.”

  A still contrite Sheila and Brian were in their wake. Lucky for them that Dermot and Margaret had hit it off. It was the only reason they were somewhat forgiven. But Dermot wasn’t going to let them off the hook completely. He had vehemently suggested that when they got back to Arizona, the O’Sheas spend at least ten hours every week for the next six months on community service projects.

  “You were taking advantage of this wonderful talented lady,” Dermot had chastised them.

  “From now on, I want the respect you gave your aunt Eileen,” Margaret added with a twinkle in her eyes.

  Felicity, Neil Buckley’s wife, floated by and said hello to Regan and Jack. She obviously had had a couple of glasses of champagne. “You haven’t seen any ghosts around here, have you?” she asked them with a wink.

  “What do you mean?” Regan asked.

  “Let’s just say I help Neil keep this place intriguing,” she said as she floated off again.

  Is she the woman I saw on the lawn? Regan wondered.

  “Regan! Jack!”

  They turned at the sound of Gerard’s voice. He and Louise were standing at the entrance to the tent. “We have a little surprise for you,” he said, then turned and called out, “Come on in. It’s all right.”

  Looking sheepish, Luke and Nora appeared from around the corner.

  “Mom! Dad!” Regan said when she saw them. She and Jack hurried over.

  “We didn’t want to interrupt your honeymoon,” Nora explained, “but Dad thought it would be nice to bid on one of the Claddagh rings.”

  “I thought it would be nice?” Luke asked with amusement.

  Nora ignored him. “We’re staying with Gerard and promise we won’t call or bother you. We just thought it would be fun to be at the auction…and then they moved it to where you’re staying and—”

  “Don’t worry about it, Nora,” Jack said. “We’ve been sharing our honeymoon with a lot worse!”

  They all laughed.

  Several hours later, after a delicious dinner, Irish music, and much merriment, the auctioneer cried out, “Let the bidding begin.”

  The Reillys—Regan, Jack, Luke, Nora, Gerard, and Louise, were all sitting together. And there was another Reilly in attendance as well…at least in spirit.