Heart Of The Sea goa-3

by Nora Roberts

  He skipped lunch. There were too many calls to make, faxes expected, to take time for an hour in the pub and his afternoon dose of Darcy. He hoped she looked for him, wondered a little. If he understood her as he thought he did, she would expect him to come in, to have to come in. And it would annoy her when he didn't.

  Good, Trevor mused as he let himself into the cottage. He wanted to keep her a little off-balance. That careless confidence of hers was a formidable weapon. Her arrogance played right along with it. And damned if he didn't find them both attractive.

  Amused at himself, he went directly up to his office and spent thirty minutes immersed in business. It was one of his skills, this ability to tune out every other thought and zero in on the deal of the moment. With Riley's memories fresh in his own mind, and Darcy dancing at the edges of it, he needed that skill now more than ever.

  Once current projects were handled, faxes zipped off, E-mail answered and sent, he gave his thoughts to a future project he was formulating.

  Time, he thought, to lay the groundwork. Picking up the phone, he called Gallagher's. He was pleased that Aidan answered. Trevor made it a point to go straight to the head of a company. Or in this case, a family.

  "It's Trev."

  "Well, now, I thought I'd see you sitting at one of my tables by this time of day."

  Aidan raised his voice over the lunchtime clatter, and Trevor imagined him pulling pints one-handed while he talked. In the background he heard Darcy's laugh.

  "I had some business to do. I'd like to have a meeting with you and your family, when it's convenient for you."

  "A meeting? About the theater?"

  "Partly. Do you have an hour to spare, maybe between shifts?"

  "Oh, I imagine we can accommodate you. Today?"

  "Sooner the better."

  "Fine. Come on by the house then. We tend to hold our family meetings 'round the kitchen table."

  "I appreciate it. Would you ask Brenna to come by?"

  "I will, yes." Taking her off the job, Aidan thought, but made no comment. "I'll see you a bit later, then."

  Around the kitchen table. Trevor recalled several of his own family meetings in the same venue. Before his first day of school, when he was going off to baseball camp, about to take his driver's test, and so on. All of his rites of passage, and his sister's, had been discussed there. Serious punishments, serious praise had warranted the kitchen table.

  Odd, he remembered now, when he had broken his engagement, he'd told his parents as they sat in the kitchen. That's where he'd told them of his plans for the Ardmore theater, and his intention of coming to Ireland.

  And, he realized as he calculated the time in New York, that was where his parents most likely were at this moment. He picked up the phone again and called home.

  "Good morning, Magee residence."

  "Hello, Rhonda, it's Trev."

  "Mister Trevor." The Magee housekeeper had never called him anything else, even when she'd threatened to swat him. "How are you enjoying Ireland?"

  "Very much. Did you get my postcard?"

  "I did. You know how much I love to get them. I was telling Cook just yesterday that Mister Trevor never forgets how I like postcards for my album. Is it as green as that, really?"

  "Greener. You should come over, Rhonda."

  "Oh, now you know I'm not getting on an airplane unless somebody holds a gun to my head. Your folks are having breakfast. They're going to be thrilled to hear from you. Just hold on a minute. You take care of yourself, Mister Trevor, and come back soon."

  "I will. Thanks."

  He waited, enjoying the picture of the rail-thin black woman in her ruthlessly starched apron hurrying over the rich white marble floor, past the art, the antiques, the flowers, to the back of the elegant brownstone. She wouldn't use the intercom to announce his call. Such family dealings could only be delivered in person.

  The kitchen would smell of coffee, fresh bread, and the violets his mother was most fond of. His father would have the paper open to the financial section. His mother would be reading the editorials and getting worked up about the state of the world and narrow minds.

  There would be none of that uneasy quiet, that under-the-polish tension that had lived in his grandparents' home. Somehow his father had escaped that, just as his own father had escaped Ardmore. But the younger Dennis had indeed stood and built his own.

  "Trev! Baby, how are you?"

  "I'm good. Nearly as good as you sound. I thought I'd catch you and Dad at breakfast."

  "Creatures of habit. But this is an even lovelier way to start the day. Tell me what you see."

  It was an old request, an old habit. Automatically he rose to go to the window. "The cottage has a front garden. An amazing one for such a small place. Whoever designed it knew just what they wanted. It's like a- a witch's garden. One of the good witches who helps maidens break evil spells. The flowers tumble together, color, shape, and scent. Beyond it are hedges of wild fuchsia, deep red on green and taller than I am. The road they line is narrow as a ditch and full of ruts. Your teeth rattle if you go over thirty. Then the hills slope down, impossibly green, toward the village. There are rooftops and white cottages and tidy streets. The church steeple, and well off is a round tower I have to visit. It's all edged by the sea. It's sunny today, so the light flashes off the blue. It's really very beautiful."

  "Yes, it is. You sound happy."

  "Why wouldn't I be?"

  "You haven't been, not really, for too long. Now I'll let you talk to your father, who's rolling his eyes at me, as I imagine you have business to discuss."

  "Mom." There was so much, so much that his morning conversation with an old man and his horde of progeny had set to swirling inside him. He said what he felt the most. "I miss you."

  "Oh. Oh, now look what you've done." She sniffled. "You can just talk to your father while I cry a little."

  "Well, you got her mind off the editorial on handguns." Dennis Magee's voice boomed over the wire. "How's the job going?"

  "On schedule, on budget."

  "Good to hear. Going to keep it there?"

  "Close to there, anyway. You, Mom, Doro, and her family better keep a week next summer open. The Magees should all be here for the first show."

  "Back to Ardmore. I have to say, I never figured on it. From the reports, it hasn't changed much."

  "It's not meant to. I'll send you a written update on the project, but that's not why I called. Dad, did you ever visit Faerie Hill Cottage?"

  There was a pause, a sigh. "Yes. I had some curiosity about the woman who'd been engaged to my uncle. Maybe because my father so rarely spoke of him."

  "What did you find out?"

  "That John Magee died a hero before he ever had the chance to live."

  "And Grandfather resented that."

  "That's a hard way to put it, Trev."

  "He was a hard man."

  "What he felt about his brother, his family, he kept to himself. I never tried to get through. What was the point? I knew I would never get through to him about what he felt about anything, much less what he'd left behind in Ireland."

  "Sorry." He could hear it, that weariness, that vague tone of frustration in his father's voice. "I shouldn't have brought it up."

  "No, that's foolish. It would be on your mind. You're there. I think-looking back, I think he was determined to be an American, to raise me as an American. Here is where he wanted to make his mark. In New York he could be his own man. He was his own man."

  A cold, hard man who paid more attention to his ledgers than his family. But Trevor saw no point in saying so when his father knew that better than anyone.

  "What did you find, for yourself, when you came back here?" he asked instead.

  "Charm, some sentiment, more of a link than I'd expected."

  "Yeah, exactly. That's exactly it."

  "I meant to go back, but something else always seemed to come up. And truth is, I'm a city boy. A week in the country and I'
m itchy. You and your mother never minded roughing it, but the Hamptons is about as rural as I can manage and stay sane. Don't snicker, Carolyn," Dennis said mildly. "It's rude."

  Trevor scanned his view again. "It's a long way from the Hamptons to here."

  "Absolutely. A couple of weeks in that cottage you're renting and I'd be babbling. I don't do quaint for long."

  "But you visited, saw Maude Fitzgerald."

  "Yes. Jesus, must be thirty-five years ago. She didn't seem old to me, but I guess she was well into her seventies. I remember her being graceful, not creaky the way I, being callow, expected an old woman to be. She gave me tea and cake. Showed me an old photograph of my uncle. She kept it in a brown leather frame. I remember that because it reminded me of the song-what is it-'Willie MacBride.' Then she walked with me to his grave. He's buried on the hill by the ruins and the round tower."

  "I haven't been there yet. I'll go by."

  "I don't remember what we talked about exactly. It was all so long ago. But I do remember this because it seemed odd at the time. We were standing over his grave and she took my hand. She said what came from me would journey back and make a difference. I would be proud. I suppose she was talking about you. People said she had the sight, if you believe in such things."

  "You start to believe in all sorts of things once you're here."

  "Can't argue with that. One night while I was there I took a walk on the beach. I could swear I heard flutes playing and saw a man flying overhead on a white horse. Of course, I'd had a few pints at Gallagher's Pub."

  Even as his father laughed, Trevor felt a chill skate down his spine. "What did he look like?"

  "Gallagher?"

  "No, the man on the horse."

  "A drunken delusion. Well, that set your mother off," Dennis muttered, and through the line Trevor could hear his mother's delighted laugh.

  "I'll let you get back to breakfast."

  "Take some time to enjoy yourself while you're there. Get me the report when you can, Trev, and we'll all keep next summer in mind. Stay in touch."

  "I will."

  He hung up, then continued to stare thoughtfully out the window. Delusions, illusions, reality. There didn't seem to be very much space between them in Ardmore.

  He finished up what business could be done before

  New York opened, then took a walk to John Magee's grave.

  The wind was high and the graves were old. The shifting of ground had tipped and tilted many of the markers so they leaned and slanted toward the bumpy grass to cast their shadows over their dead. John Magee's stood straight, like the soldier he'd been. The stone was simple, weathered by wind and time, but still the carving was deep and clear.

  JOHN DONALD MAGEE

  1898-1916 Too young to die a soldier

  "His mother had that carved in her grief," Carrick said as he stepped up to stand beside Trevor. "In my estimation, one is always too young to die a soldier."

  "How would you know why she had it carved?"

  "Oh, there's little I don't know and less I can't find out. You mortals make your monuments to the dead. I find it an interesting habit. A peculiarly human one. Stones and flowers, symbols, aren't they, of what lasts and what passes away? And why do you come here, Trevor Magee, to visit those you never knew in life?"

  "Blood and bonds, I suppose. I don't know." Frustrated, he turned to face Carrick. "What the hell is this?"

  "By that you're meaning me. You've more of your mother in you than ever your grandfather, so you know by now the answer to that, even if your diluted Yank blood doesn't accept what's in front of your face. You're a traveled man, aren't you? You've been more places and seen more things than most who are your age. Have you never found magic on your journeys till now?"

  He wanted to think he had more of his mother in him, much more than he had of his grandfather. But there was nothing in Carolyn Magee of the easy mark. "I've never had conversations with ghosts and faeries till now."

  "You talked with Gwen?" The amusement died out of Carrick's eyes, turning the bright blue dark and with an edge. He gripped Trevor's arm with a hand that transferred a jolt of heat and energy. "What did she say to you?"

  "I thought you knew or could find out."

  Abruptly, Carrick released him and turned away. He began to pace through the grass, around the stones in quick, almost jerky movements. The air around him sizzled with a visible color and spark. "She's the only thing that matters, and the only thing I can't see clear. Can you know, Magee, what it is to want one person with all your heart, with all that you have in you, and for her to be just out of your reach?"

  "No."

  "I blundered with her. Now that's a deep score to the pride, make no mistake. Not that it was only my fault. She blundered as well. It hardly matters who holds the heaviest weight of the blame at this point."

  He stopped, turned back. The air grew still again. "Will you tell me what she said to you?"

  "She spoke of you and regrets, of passions that flash and burn, and love that lasts. She misses you."

  Emotions swirled in Carrick's eyes. "If she-should you speak with her again, would you tell her I'm waiting, and I've loved no other since last we met?"

  For some reason it no longer seemed odd to be asked to deliver a message to a ghost. "I'll tell her."

  "She's beautiful, isn't she?"

  "Yes, very."

  "A man can forget to look past beauty and into the heart. I did, and it's cost me dear. You won't make that mistake. It's why you're here."

  "I'm here to build a theater, and to acquaint myself with my roots."

  His humor restored, Carrick strolled back to Trevor. "You'll do both, and more. Your ancestor here was a fine young man, a bit of a dreamer, with a heart too soft for soldiering and what war makes men do to men. But he went out of duty and left his love behind."

  "You knew him?"

  "Aye, both of them, though only Maude knew me. She gave him a charm before he marched off, for protection."

  He snapped his fingers and from them dangled a chain with a little silver disk. "I expect she'd want you to have it now."

  Too curious for caution, Trevor reached out and took the object. The silver was warm, as if it had been worn against flesh, and on it the carving was faint.

  "What does it say?"

  "It's in old Irish, and says simply 'Forever Love.' She gave it to him, and he wore it faithful. But war was stronger than the charm in the end, if not stronger than the love. He wanted a simple life, unlike his brother, who went off to America. Your father's father wanted something more, and he worked for it and brought it to be. That's an admirable thing. What do you want, Trevor Magee?"

  "To build."

  "That's an admirable thing as well. What will you call your theater?"

  "I haven't thought of it. Why?"

  "I have an idea you'll choose correctly because you're a man who chooses carefully. That's why you're still living alone."

  Trevor's fingers curled around the disk. "I like living alone."

  "That may be, but it's making mistakes you dislike most of all."

  "True enough. I have to go now. I have a meeting."

  "I'll walk with you a ways. 'Tis a fine summer we have in store. You'll hear the cuckoo call if you listen. It's a good omen of things to come. I'm wishing you luck on your meeting, and with Darcy."

  "Thanks, but I know how to handle both."

  "Oh, well, now, I believe you do, or I wouldn't be in so cheerful a mood. She'll be handling you as well. It helps the last of this waiting, if you don't mind me saying, to be entertained by the pair of you."

  "I'm not part of your plan."

  "It's not a matter of planning. It's a matter of what is, and what will be. You've more say in it than I, and you've little enough."

  Carrick stopped. He could see the cottage now, the creamy walls, the sunny thatched roof, the rainbow spread of flowers. "Once she would have come out to meet me, her heart pounding, her eyes bright. Fear and l
ove so mixed together neither of us could untangle them. And me so sure I could dazzle her with gifts and promises that I never held out to her the single thing that mattered."

  "No second chance?"

  A wry smile twisted Carrick's lips. "There might have been, had I not waited so long to take it. I'll go no farther than this, until the waiting's done. Handle Darcy, Magee, before she handles you."

  "My life," Trevor said briefly. "My business." He strode down the slope toward the house and his car. But he couldn't resist a glance back.

  It barely surprised him that Carrick had vanished. All that was left was the green hill, and sweetly, brightly, the two-tone call of a bird.

  The cuckoo, Trevor supposed. He couldn't think of anything more apt.

  Put it aside, he ordered himself and continued to walk. Tuck away the sentiment over long-dead relatives and their sweethearts, visits with faerie princes, and messages for beautiful ghosts.

  He had business to attend to.

  But he slipped the chain around his neck, and tucked the silver disk under his shirt, where it lay to warm against his heart.

  CHAPTER Eight

  The home team always had the edge. Trevor knew it going in, but didn't see a way around it. Not only was the house Gallagher turf, but the village, the county, the whole damn country was theirs. Unless he found a way to shift the meeting to New York, he would just have to play it as underdog.

  Added to that, they outnumbered him. It couldn't be helped.

  Not that he minded working a deal when the odds were against him. The challenge of it only made the satisfaction of success sweeter.

  He'd already worked out his approach. The questions, the doubts, the general unease of what he supposed would be termed his paranormal experiences would just have to wait until after business hours.

  The minute he knocked on the door of the Gallagher house, he was representing Magee Enterprises. It was a responsibility, and a privilege, that he took very seriously.

  Darcy opened the door, a sassy smile on her face, her head tilted at the perfect angle to display both arrogance and humor.

  Jesus, he'd like to take her in one quick gulp and be done with it. Instead he greeted her with an easy grin. "Afternoon, Miss Gallagher."