“I know Sean’s fond of you too, Rose, because he’s told me so.”
Her eyes honed in on the purse in her lap. “Yes, yes, he is fond of me, I do know that.” She glanced up, and Emma’s heart clenched at the longing in the young woman’s eyes. “But I’m not stupid, Emma, I know he doesn’t love me.” She paused, fingers fondling the beads on her clutch. “Not like he loves you . . .”
Emma jolted up in her seat, heat scorching her cheeks. “Rose, I assure you that Sean and I are nothing more than friends.”
“I know that, Emma, truly I do. And to be honest, if you weren’t married, I’d probably be pretty worried because he talks about you all the time, and I can tell that he . . . well, that he cares about you very much.”
“Sean cares about all of his friends.”
“Yes, he does . . . but you’re the one he listens to.”
Emma nodded, not sure what to say.
“So . . . I thought I would come here tonight to appeal to you, woman to woman.”
“How can I help?” Emma whispered.
“I’ve convinced my father that I intend to marry Sean one way or the other, and he has finally agreed.” A smile flickered on her lips. “Of course, it doesn’t hurt that the sales for the second store have plummeted since Sean left, and my father would do anything to lure him back.” Rose leaned forward in her chair, fingers pinched on Emma’s desk. “Father has offered to not only give Sean his store back, but a substantial raise and—if we get married—full partnership in the stores.”
Emma’s pulse picked up. “That’s . . . a very generous offer, Rose.”
“It is, Emma, and if we got married, Sean would become a very wealthy man doing the thing that he loves the most—running his own store. And I would be”—her eyes glowed at the prospect—“needless to say, a very happy woman.”
Reaching for her pen, Emma absently doodled on Sean’s report, her pen stilling at the memory of his words before he’d left. “You’re pushing me at a woman I don’t want, Emma—a woman who tempts me in all the wrong ways.” She swallowed hard, desperate to do everything in her power to protect both Sean and Rose from temptation. Glancing up at the young woman before her, she knew that if given the chance, Rose would be a good wife. The hopeful glow and youthful vulnerability she saw in her face softened her heart, and she drew in a deep breath. “Rose, would you mind terribly if I gave you some advice regarding Sean?”
Rose’s eyes spanned wide and she clasped the front of Emma’s desk like a little girl. “Oh, Emma, please! I need all the advice I can get if I’m going to convince that man to propose.”
Emma tried to smile, but her attempt faltered as she idly fingered her pen. “Sean is . . . a very old-fashioned man, very moral, very drawn to a godly type of a woman. He and I have had many a conversation about this, and I feel certain when I say that the woman who gets Sean to the altar will be the one who offers him the purity and self-discipline he’s looking for in a wife.” She hesitated, giving Rose a gentle smile. “Do you . . . understand what I mean?”
Dark stains of red bled into Rose’s cheeks until her face was as pink as the coral scarf strewn around her neck. She nodded, gaze dropping to the purse in her hands. “Yes,” she said quietly, “and I appreciate your candor, Emma, really I do. I . . . well, I’ve been feeling a bit guilty anyway, over how close we’ve become . . .” She looked up, her eyes wide. “Oh, nothing drastic, understand, it’s just that when we kiss lately, things tend to get a bit out of hand . . .”
A bit out of hand . . . Emma closed her eyes, each word a knife through the heart.
“Emma?”
“Oh!” She dropped the pen and looked up. “Forgive me, Rose, what did you say?”
“I asked if you would help me convince Sean to take the job at my father’s store.”
Lose Sean? Not only to Rose, but to Kelly’s as well? She swallowed the lump in her throat. “Absolutely, I think that’s just what he needs. After all, neither of us expected his stay at Dennehy’s to be permanent.”
“Oh, Emma!” Rose giggled and bounded to her feet, heels clicking as she circled the desk. Swiping tears of joy from her eyes, she scooped Emma up in a hug, her voice breathless. “You are everything that Sean says you are—kind, generous, and completely selfless. I don’t know how to thank you.”
Emma hugged her back, fighting the moisture in her own eyes, which was anything but tears of joy. “Well, I do, Rose,” she said quietly. She drew in a deep breath and patted the young woman’s arm, brow angled to indicate a demand rather than a request. “Just make him happy.”
“Here are the menus, Mr. Dennehy—three selections from each of the ten restaurants you asked me to call, all typed up for Mrs. Hennessey. Do you need anything else before I go?”
Mitch glanced up from the sea of papers scattered across his desk—donor lists, donation inventory, pledges, and patron ads ad nauseam—and reached to take the sheets from his secretary’s hand. He gave her a grateful smile. “Thanks, Dorothy, you’re a lifesaver. Just my luck that Mrs. Hennessey had a falling out with the caterer who’s been booked since July. She’s been clamoring for these for weeks now, but I’ve been too busy to tackle it.”
Dorothy gave him a sympathetic smile. “I honestly don’t know how you’re doing everything on the auction and your job too. I wish there was more you’d let me do.”
He shuffled papers into neat, little piles before tucking them into his briefcase. “Yeah, well, I wish there was more you could do too, but Mrs. Hennessey is bent on my handling every detail myself.” His lips twisted. “I suspect it’s her way of keeping me under her thumb.”
She smiled and headed for the door. “Well, it will all be over soon. Good night, Mr. Dennehy. See you tomorrow.”
“Good night, Dorothy.” He slipped the menus into the briefcase and exhaled, glancing at his watch to check the time. Not that it mattered—Marjorie was usually late, another one of her ways of keeping him in line, he supposed.
Women. There were days when he wished he could do without them—at least the blond variety. He scrubbed his face with his hands and yawned, leaning back in his chair to close his eyes in a rare moment of rest. He could use a little peace and quiet, especially after the horrendous day they’d all had. The market had taken another nosedive today—just another blow in its steady slide since April. Two years had passed since Black Thursday, the day that sent Wall Street reeling when panicked sellers unloaded nearly 13 million shares on the New York Stock Exchange. It had been unprecedented—trading three times the normal volume, culminating in losses over five billion dollars for investors around the world. Anxiety tightened his throat. Investors like Patrick, who’d sunk his savings into the market. Mitch’s sigh was laden with worry, thinking how hard Patrick and Marcy had been hit and still struggled today, pinching pennies in these tremulous times. Patrick had encouraged him to invest as well, but he’d put it off, never being much of a gambler with his money. Only with love, he thought with a press of his lips, reminded once again that loving Charity, apparently, was the biggest gamble of all.
Exhausted, he drew in a deep breath to clear his mind of his worries, determined to take advantage of Marjorie being late and indulge in a quick nap. He couldn’t remember when he’d been this tired. Sleep had been almost nonexistent lately, at least since two weeks ago. His jaw hardened. Two weeks ago that his wife had not only made a fool out of herself, but out of him. Never had he been so furious with Charity, not even in the two years prior to their marriage when such harebrained stunts had been as natural to her as breathing . . . and lying. But this time she’d gone too far, humiliating him in his place of business, not only in front of his co-workers—for whom it was front-page news—but in front of a superior as well. A superior who, obviously as mortified as him, hadn’t shown up for their meeting last week. He grunted. Superior. Yeah, right. The only thing Marjorie Hennessey was superior at was getting under his skin.
A trait she obviously shares with my wife.
In a fit of jealous rage, she’d lost his respect overnight, something he hadn’t believed possible, at least not for a woman who possessed his soul. And although she’d rebounded with calm humility and even tender love in the face of his anger, the humiliation and fury of that night still scalded the back of his neck. Fury that she had invaded his work life, exposed him to ridicule, and then thwarted his authority in front of God and man. He ground his jaw. Fury that she had the audacity to accuse him of infidelity with any woman, much less Marjorie Hennessey. Nothing churned the anger in his gut more than that, lipstick on his collar or no. Not when he had fought Marjorie tooth and nail for months now.
And for what? So that the woman he actually lusted for—his own wife—could accuse him of dallying with another woman. The unfairness of it stung his pride something fierce, and he found his anger stoked white-hot once again. If ever there’d been a time he’d needed Charity’s understanding, her love, it had been the last four months, when another woman seemed hell-bent on giving him hers.
Hell-bent. An apt description for Marjorie Hennessey, and yet Mitch couldn’t deny the pull she provoked. Less frequency of making love to his wife had a dangerous effect, he soon discovered, making him more vulnerable to Marjorie than he liked. Drawing his glance to the swell of her breasts, warming his body with a slow cross of her legs. He licked his lips as his mouth went dry, remembering the trigger of his pulse whenever her body eased against his.
Purely physical. And purely wrong.
And yet, you can have her.
The thought sucked the air from his lungs as his heart rate accelerated. He jolted up in the chair. “God, help me,” he whispered and dropped his head in his hands.
“Go home to your wife, Mitch, Marjorie isn’t coming.”
For the second time in mere seconds, all air abandoned him as he startled, paralyzed at the sight of Patrick in his door. He blinked, still in a daze. “What?”
“I said, go home to your wife, Marjorie isn’t coming.”
His prior thoughts and Patrick’s untimely words suddenly merged, forcing a blast of fire into his face.
Patrick studied him for a moment, then slowly walked in and shut the door, his gaze never leaving Mitch’s as he moved into the office. Without a word, he sat down at the front of Mitch’s desk, his body looking tired and worn and battered from the day. He rested his hands on the arms of the chair with fingers limp over the edge. Releasing a weary sigh, he peered up with a cloudy look that registered concern. “You want to tell me what’s going on?”
Mitch ignored the roar of heat in his cheeks and steeled his jaw, leaning forward with palms on his desk. He ground his words out. “Maybe you need to tell me, Patrick, since Marjorie has obviously chosen to inform you rather than her cochair. Why isn’t she coming?”
Patrick stared for several seconds, then propped his elbows on the arms of the chair and steepled his hands. “You’re off the auction, Mitch.”
He blinked, eyebrows raised and jaw going slack. “What?”
“You’re to turn all your notes over to O’Reilly, first thing in the morning.”
“You’re joking . . .”
Patrick idly tapped two tented fingers against his lips, his steady gaze fused to that of his son-in-law. “No, I’m not.”
“But, why?”
Patrick drew in a quiet breath. “It would seem my daughter has put the fear of God into Marjorie Hennessey, which,” he said with the trace of a smile, “is not necessarily a bad thing.”
Mitch gaped. “She told you that?”
“No, not in so many words, but I’m not deaf, Mitch, and I’m not blind, either.”
Mitch blinked, his sagging jaw apparently a permanent condition tonight. “You knew? Knew how Marjorie has been after me, and yet you did nothing?”
“No, I didn’t know at first, of course, other than knowing her reputation with men. But frankly, there was nothing I could do. Arthur specifically requested you, and to be honest, I trust you and respect you more than I can say.”
Mitch looked away, shame adding to the heat crawling up the back of his neck.
Patrick paused, his tone measured. “Mitch, being tempted by a woman and giving in are two entirely different things.”
Mitch swallowed hard and closed his eyes.
“Besides,” Patrick said with a hint of levity in his tone, “I know my daughter and had every confidence that Marjorie had met her match.”
Mitch’s eyes popped back open, his anger rekindled. “Your daughter humiliated me, Patrick, made laughingstocks of both of us—you and me, not to mention herself.”
“Yes . . . yes she did, no question about that. But you know, Mitch, in her own misguided way, she also proved just how much she loves you. She took a stand with Marjorie to make sure that woman wouldn’t get too close. A she-cat with her mate, if you will. And,” he said with a slant of his lips, “she managed to accomplish something neither you nor I could do—cut you loose from a project you disdain . . . and deliver you out of the clutches of Marjorie Hennessey.” He smiled. “If I were you, I’d go home and thank her.”
Mitch didn’t share his sentiments. His lips flattened. “No, thanks, Patrick, I think I’ll nurse this grudge awhile longer. At least long enough for my pride to heal and Charity to learn that she can’t go off half-cocked whenever she gets a whim.”
Patrick sighed and slowly rose to his feet. “I’m sorry to hear that. It seems I remember being in a similar situation when Sam O’Rourke came to call a number of years back. I wasn’t ready to forgive Marcy then, either, and I believe it was you who told me not to take too long to forgive. That my time for healing might be Marcy’s demise . . . and mine.”
Patrick walked to the door, then turned halfway with his hand on the knob. “I wish I had listened then, Mitch . . . just like I wish you would listen now.” He sighed. “But I can’t make you, any more than you could make me. But I can pray . . . pray that you will put that hurt pride of yours aside long enough to realize that life is too short and love is too precious to waste even a single moment. Go home to your wife. Forgive her and tell her you love her.” His lips skewed into a bittersweet smile. “Trust me, I have painful experience.”
Without another word, he opened the door and left, leaving Mitch to stare after him with the sour taste of pride in his mouth. The thought came to him to pray, but he put it aside for the moment, knowing full well that the time would come when he would.
He would pray. And he would forgive. And he would even love his wife once again.
But . . . not until he was ready.
“For mercy’s sake, Sean . . . it’s a basketball game, not a duel to the death.” Father Mac gasped, hands on his knees and scarlet face lined with sweat despite heaving breaths that billowed like smoke into the chilly November night. “At this pace, I’ll need Last Rites.”
Sean grinned, swiping the sweat from his own face with the sleeve of his gray rolled-up sweatshirt, his breathing not near as raspy as that of the fifty-four-year-old priest, but definitely strained. “Come on, Mac, given your age, you’re in better shape on the court than Collin, Mitch, and probably Brady too, even though all of them work out at the gym religiously.”
“Yes, well, I work out religiously too, but one does not get a lot of exercise in a three-by-three confessional.” He straightened with a groan and stretched brawny arms in the air, a glimmer of a smile twitching at the corner of his mouth. “Although I confess I’ve been sorely tempted to hide a set of dumbbells when Miss Ramona rambles on about her latest dance recital.” He fished a handkerchief from his cassock pocket and mopped his face with a wry smile. “Probably should anyway, to beef up for moments like this when certain members of the flock have a mind to clip
me on the court.”
“Sorry, Mac,” Sean said with a smile. “Had some frustrations I needed to vent.” He draped a loose arm over the winded priest’s shoulder on their way to the rectory kitchen.
Father Mac held the door while Sean ambled through, then headed straight for the icebox. “Figured as much. Haven’t experienced that much humiliation on the court since Brady’s struggle over Lizzie before they got married.” He waggled a milk bottle in the air, brown eyes pinched in a squint. “Milk, coffee, or tea? My nose tells me that Mrs. Clary just baked a fresh batch of snickerdoodles, so make your decision accordingly.”
“Milk sounds great, thanks.” Sean placed the basketball on the counter and scrubbed his hands at the sink, his mouth watering from the smell of cinnamon still hovering in the air. His stomach rumbled while he dried his hands on the towel, suddenly nervous about the real reason he was here tonight, other than to vent his frustrations on the court. He sucked in a bolstering breath and straddled a chair, watching Father Mac as he poured two tumblers of milk. He cocked his head, eyes trained on his friend. “You ever get tired of it, Mac? People venting?”
Father Mac turned at the counter where he was raiding Mrs. Clary’s pink pig cookie jar. He dumped a mountain of cookies on a plate and smiled, replacing the lid before returning to the table. “Never. I thrive on it, Sean. Just like you thrive on helping others, whether it’s coaching the baseball team, building risers for Sister Bernice”—his mouth inched into a grin—“or raising funds for Sister Cecilia’s pagan babies.” He dropped into a chair with a grunt and nudged a glass of milk forward, along with the plate of cookies. He took a healthy glug while eyeing Sean over the rim, then wiped his mouth with his sleeve. “Or helping Emma out at the store for less pay when we both know you’ve been offered a job making far more.”
A Heart Revealed Page 40