“How long has it been?” Conor asked, gently.
“As of two days ago, eight months. Melanoma. Fast-moving. Took her in about six weeks. We’d been married thirty years.” The facts came in a staccato burst, a dry delivery of statistics at odds with the emotion he tried to mask by lifting his glass and draining it.
Seeing he needed some space, Conor moved a few steps away to clear the empty bottles and glasses from the bar. He filled an order for two attractive women in their forties, and they lingered after accepting their “Cosmos,” wanting to hear him talk. They thought Irish was the sexiest of all the foreign accents. They’d seen Riverdance. They’d love to go to Ireland and kiss the Blarney Stone—and maybe a few Irishmen. He laughed and played along, filling the role expected of him before politely excusing himself.
Eight months and two days. A trifling amount of time to stack against a span of thirty years. Conor hadn’t even known Kate for much longer than eight months, but if something happened to her—his insides hollowed at the thought of it—he could well imagine marking his loss in the smallest units of measurement. Each hour spent without her, each day, each week. An eternity with every minute, and a lifetime that couldn’t stretch long enough to reach the end of grief. He picked up the Jameson and returned to the end of the bar.
“It’s Jack O’Brian, isn’t it? I checked you in myself earlier.”
The man’s dull eyes widened a bit, impressed. “Good memory.”
“I work at it.” Conor refilled his glass and set the bottle down. “I’ll tell you what I think, Jack. Your friends are the eejits, not you, and there’s a spare room here for you if you don’t mind sleeping down the hall from the innkeepers.”
He waited until the group was seated for dinner and well into the main course before pulling Kate aside to break the news. Anticipating her annoyance at not being consulted before the decision was made, he began with an admission of guilt.
“I should have asked you first, but we’ve got a bit of a situation.”
Alarmed by this opening, Kate visibly relaxed once she understood he was not bringing news of a looming disaster. Her stern expression faltered while he explained why he was on his way to bring Jack O’Brian’s luggage to one of the spare bedrooms in their third-floor apartment. It fell away altogether as he concluded.
“I’m sorry.” Conor’s voice scraped into a whisper. “I pictured myself in his shoes and I guess it got to me.”
“It’s okay.” She gave him a quick kiss on the cheek. “I’ve had a stranger in my spare room before and it turned out all right—and this isn’t a time of year to be telling people the inn is full, is it?”
Kate swung through the kitchen door and dramatically collapsed onto a stool. Her rosy-cheeked chef raised her eyes from the pile of silverware she’d been sorting and pushed a strand of graying chestnut-colored hair from her forehead.
“Please tell me it’s over.”
Ordinarily a voluble presence in the inn’s kitchen, Abigail’s subdued voice gave clear evidence of her exhaustion. She’d had help throughout the evening from her husband Dominic and the inn’s part-time staff, but when it came to cleaning her kitchen, she preferred to work alone. No one could meet her exacting standards.
“It’s officially confirmed.” Kate smiled in sympathy with her plaintive expression. “God, what a night. I thought the last two would never go to bed.”
“Let me guess—the two nitwits who kept swarming around Conor all night.”
“The very same. He finally shut them off, and they still hung around the bar for another hour, drinking diet Coke. I couldn’t take it anymore. I went to my office and when I came out everyone was gone. I wonder if he went upstairs.”
“Nope.” Abigail threw a bundle of forks into the silverware drawer. “He and Dom are out sanding the driveway again. I think he’s hoping everyone will want to get an early start tomorrow.”
“He’s not the only one.” Kate dragged herself off the stool to empty the dishwasher, and a minute later heard the scrape of boots at the kitchen door.
Conor stamped in on a gust of freezing wind, smelling of damp wool and ice. His head was dusted with snow and his nose red with cold. Kate was surprised to see he was bristling with energy, seemingly intoxicated by fresh air.
“It’s gorgeous out there!” He whipped the scarf from around his neck and shook the snow from his hair, leaving it damp and glistening. “The storm stopped a few minutes ago. All the branches are coated in frost, but the sky’s clear and everything’s gone blue in the starlight. It’s brilliant. Literally. Like a bloody Christmas card.”
Abigail, who in fairness had seen her share of dazzling winter scenes, appeared unimpressed as she watched him peel off the soggy outer layers of his clothes. “You’re the one coated in frost,” she complained. “You’d better get a hot drink inside you before you take a chill. Where’s Dom?”
“Out warming the car for you,” Conor said. “Get out of here, Abigail. You look solid knackered, and you’ll be back in a few hours cooking up hangover breakfasts for this shower of inebriates.”
“He’s right,” Kate chimed in. “Please go home and get some sleep. You can at least trust us to put the dishes away.”
After a period of token resistance Abigail relented, but continued grumbling complaints and instructions as she pulled on her boots and an enormous quilted puffer coat. When they were finally alone in the kitchen, Conor turned in a slow circle, gazing at the counters loaded with rows of recently washed glasses, flatware and dishes, and looked at Kate.
“Feck it. Let’s do it in the morning. Want to take a little walk?”
She laughed. Although nearly asleep on her feet, the idea appealed to her. “Put some dry clothes on, first.”
They walked down the road and ended up at the shoreline looking out at Lake Rembrandt, its dark water hidden now under a frozen, blue-white crust. Conor lifted his face to the midnight sky, so thickly spread with stars that it looked like an enchanted snowstorm, hanging motionless above them.
The air was cold, but its sharp bite felt good on his cheeks, and with his arms circled around Kate the rest of him stayed warm. They stood without speaking, stifling the sounds of their breathing to better appreciate the utter silence surrounding them. When Kate shifted a little, they both laughed softly at the noise of the snow squeaking beneath her boots.
“There’s another reason I’m glad we were busy this weekend.” She leaned back against him, her head beneath his chin. “We missed my father’s annual holiday party.”
“Really?” Conor was surprised. Kate had explained earlier that she and Peter—the youngest of her brothers and still unmarried—usually spent Christmas with her grandmother, but Sophia Marie had gone to Europe this year. This was the first he’d heard of any other family gathering. “What’s it like?”
“It’s horrible.” Kate response was unemotional—a simple statement of fact. “Every year he rents space in the New York Palace Hotel for his investment firm’s annual party. He kills two birds with one stone by having the family there at the same time. That’s my father in a nutshell—his employees are like family and his family like employees. I hate going to it, and this year I had the perfect excuse.”
“Hmm. Maybe you could come up with a less stressful excuse next year.”
“I’ll do my best.” Kate twisted around to grin at him, but then grew serious. “Conor, I’m sorry. You loved being with your family. I haven’t even considered what the holiday is like for you this year. It must be so hard to be without them.”
“It is,” Conor admitted. “I wasn’t with them last year either, though. My Christmas dinner was lamb vindaloo in a hotel in Mumbai. I like a good curry as much as anyone, but this year is a big improvement.”
“What was your favorite part about Christmas when you were little?” Kate asked, once they were walking back home.
“Besides the gifts and puddings and boxes of chocolates?” Conor smiled. “The candle in the window. Befo
re we went to bed on Christmas Eve, my mother would make a little ceremony out of lighting and blessing it, and then she’d let me carry it to the window. It would stay there all night while we were asleep.”
“You weren’t afraid the house would burn down?”
Conor shrugged. “In soggy old Ireland? Sure it’s hard to get anything to burn, even when you’re trying. Anyway, it was a special candle for the holy family, so I expect we thought God would look after it.”
He grew quiet, caught up in a memory of the waxy scent of the thick white candle that made their living room smell like the inside of a church, and of watching its flickering light cast shadows on the wall while he listened—half asleep—to his mother’s soft voice reciting the prayers in Irish. He could nearly hear it, even now.
“Conor?”
“Sorry, what?” He pulled himself back from the edge of something deeper, and saw they’d arrived at the bottom of the inn’s driveway.
“The candle,” Kate said. “What was it about?”
“Oígidecht. That’s the old Irish word for hospitality. In ancient Ireland, giving a welcome to strangers and travelers was the law. It got so rooted in us that now it’s like a strand of our DNA. On Christmas Eve the travelers are Joseph and Mary, and the baby. They’re out in the night, wandering, looking for a place to welcome them. The candle in the window tells them they’ve found it. There’s a fire and some food, and a bed for them.”
Kate took his hand, pulling him to a stop on the driveway, and turned him around to face her. “It’s a beautiful tradition,” she said, softly.
“Yeah.” Conor cleared a sudden catch in his throat, realizing the subject had raised emotions he hadn’t expected. “I understand it better now, what it’s like to be looking for somewhere to rest, and what it means to find it.”
“I’m glad you gave Jack O’Brian our spare room.”
He smiled. “Me, too.”
Later, as Kate slept on beside him, Conor remained wide awake. He’d stirred up the dusty corners of his soul and found memories that didn’t hurt him. He wasn’t ready to let go of them yet. Careful not to wake her, he slipped out of bed to stand at the bedroom window, looking out over the snow-covered meadow. Ice crystals winked at him in the ghostly light, a sporadic, otherworldly code he couldn’t interpret, but didn’t need to. He was listening to the low, rhythmic voice in his head again, remembering the Christmas carol his mother recited like a prayer.
The poetry of it was especially moving because it wasn’t only about welcoming one wandering family who’d left Bethlehem far behind. Its magic was in what that hospitality represented—a powerful compassion for all travelers and strangers, weary from their journey and hoping for rest.
He thought of their guest down the hall, of the lonely miles he would be adding to those walked already. He wondered if Jack O’Brian was also awake, his mind spooling through thirty years’ worth of Christmas holidays. If so, Conor hoped the memories had brought some comfort, as they had to him.
They were all strangers on the road at one time or another, moving through the night, a long way from Bethlehem. Sometimes all they could do was light candles for each other, but that was no small thing, because it helped so much to know they were out there, burning just for them.
An Ciarri Carul Nolan - The Kerry Christmas Carol
Brush the floor and clean the hearth,
And set the fire to keep,
For they might visit us tonight
When all the world’s asleep.
Don’t blow the tall white candle out
But leave it burning bright,
So that they’ll know they’re welcome here
This holy Christmas night.
Leave out the bread and meat for them,
And sweet milk for the Child,
And they will bless the fire that baked,
And, too, the hands that toiled.
For Joseph will be travel-tired,
And Mary pale and wan,
And they can sleep a little while
Before they journey on.
They will be weary of the roads,
And rest will comfort them,
For it must be a lonely mile
From here to Bethlehem.
Also by Kathryn Guare
The Conor McBride Series
Book 1: Deceptive Cadence
A talented Irish musician reluctantly reinvents himself, disappearing into an undercover identity to search for the man who ruined his career: his own brother.
On a journey from his farm on the west coast of Ireland to the tumultuous city of Mumbai, Conor McBride’s only goal is to redeem the brother who betrayed him. But, he’s becoming a virtuoso of a different kind in a dangerous game where the rules keep changing—and where the allies he trusted to help him may be the people he should fear the most.
Book 2: The Secret Chord
Conor McBride has lost everything, and if he can’t find a way to disappear in a hurry, the next thing he loses could be his life. Running from enemies he’s never met and haunted by his own destructive actions, Conor needs a refuge secure enough to hold his secrets. A farmhouse inn tucked amidst the green mountains of Vermont seems ideal, but when his past catches up with him, Conor discovers the beautiful young innkeeper has secrets of her own, and that hers are more likely to get them both killed.
Book 3: City Of A Thousand Spies
Conor McBride has accepted bargains he may live to regret—assuming he lives through them at all. He’s taken an undercover assignment in exchange for the chance to resume his career as a solo violinist. He’s also agreed to a proposal from the woman he loves, but it isn’t the type he had in mind. When their simple mission turns complicated, Conor and Kate discover everyone is hiding something—secrets as twisted as the fabled lanes of an old world city. Unraveling them will be anything but simple, or safe.
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From Here To Bethlehem Page 2