Oh, I knew this song and dance. I knew where she was going with it and I wasn’t known to turn down the occasional invitation for a casual ride, so I shrugged. “Sure.”
Emma looked utterly taken aback. “Sure? Just like that?”
“Yep,” I nodded assuredly, “but I gotta tell ya, I don’t do relationships.”
She swallowed and tightened her arms around herself. “I wasn’t implying that you did. I don’t know why you’d get that idea.”
“Well, I’m just puttin’ it out there that, if we have sex—”
Her eyes snapped open. “Don’t say that so loud,” she hissed under her breath. “God, I don’t need people thinking anything like that about me. Come on.” She spun on her heel and plodded her feet against the footpath.
I hurried to meet her pace, towing Padraig along with me, and said, “I was just sayin’, Emma, that women tend to get attached, and ya gotta know ahead of time where I’m comin’ from. I don’t live here, ya understand? Me home is in Ireland, so anything more than casual sex won’t work.”
“Got it,” she grumbled, leading me toward a gray SUV. “Okay, this is me. Pad can sit in the back.”
“He’ll appreciate that.” I opened the door and helped Padraig in. “Do ya drive like a typical woman? Should I fasten his seatbelt?”
“Jesus Christ, Malachy! I’m two seconds away from changing my mind,” she threatened, warning me with her eyes before getting into the driver’s side.
“Wouldn’t want that now, would we,” I mumbled to Pad as I pulled the seatbelt down over his chest. Just in case.
❧
Emma lived in a little cottage about fifteen minutes outside of River Canyon. A beautiful and vibrant garden decorated the lawn, enclosed in a white picketed fence, and a slew of sparkling windchimes tinkled their greetings from the front porch.
I couldn’t help but smile at the place.
“Your house is exactly what I would’ve imagined,” I complimented.
“Oh, please. It was the only thing I could afford after the divorce,” she stated begrudgingly, but the apples of her cheeks had deepened in color.
“How long were ya married?” I asked as she pulled the key from the ignition.
“Too long,” she muttered, and got out of the car.
After climbing out myself, I retrieved Padraig from the back. “Was he a real shite then?” I asked, while walking along the rock pathway to meet her at the door.
“He was a terrible husband and didn’t take any of my ambitions seriously, so yeah, I’d say he was a shit.” Somehow, she managed to find her keys in her bag, among the frilly things and flowers, and she unlocked the door. “Sometimes, I wish we had never gotten married in the first place. We were always better as friends than husband-and-wife.”
I nodded, stepping into the bright and cheery sitting room. The walls were white and yellow. The sofa and chairs were an airy blue trimmed in a stark white and adorned with yellow checkered pillows. White, clean tables sat beside the sofa with vases of happy flowers standing on every surface, and yet, I don’t think I’d ever seen a sadder room in my life.
It appeared staged, as though nobody even lived there. Like a picture from a magazine, and all I could think about, was how exhausting it must’ve been to try to appear to be something you weren’t all the time.
“Should Padraig stay outside?” I offered, turning to her as she carefully hung up her coat and bag on a coatrack painted white.
“What?” she asked, turning around as she smoothed her sweater down over her stomach. “Oh no, it’s fine. I’ll clean up afterward. Just don’t let him on the couch or chairs.”
“Right.” I led him to a large enough space on the floor and commanded for him to lie down. He obliged with a heavy sigh.
“Okay, what would you like to drink? Or um, do you just want to …” She gestured with her hands, waving them between both of our bodies, and I laughed.
“You’ve never done this before,” I declared confidently.
The bobbing of her throat was the only answer I needed, but still she said, “Well, no, but does it really matter?”
I nodded sincerely. “Yeah, it does.”
Emma sighed and walked across the room and through a doorway. I followed behind her, entering a tiny kitchen and another pristine picture on a backdrop of bright, happy colors. She opened a cabinet and pulled down two wine glasses and pointed to a wine bottle positioned perfectly on the kitchen table, with another vase of flowers and a stack of books.
I handed it to her, knocking over a book in the process. “I apologize for ruinin’ your display,” I teased.
“Ha-ha,” she drawled, pulling the bottle away from me. “I don’t care what you think of my house, okay? I keep things this way because you never know when you need to take an Instagram-worthy picture. Not to mention I take pictures most days for the blog, so I need to be prepared.”
“Nature of the job,” I said with a quirk of my mouth.
“Thank you for understanding.” She nodded her head once before pouring the wine and handed a glass to me. “Hope you like Pinot Grigio.”
“There’s not much I won’t drink,” I admitted with a smile.
“I’m sure.” She smirked teasingly against the rim before taking a sip.
I watched as she closed her eyes and swallowed. She lowered the glass, licking her lips before her eyes opened, and her cheeks flushed.
“Are you going to drink yours?” With one swift movement, I brought the glass to my lips and knocked it back with one hearty gulp. “Jesus,” she uttered quietly, taken aback.
“I’m not the one that needs to relax,” I told her, placing my glass down on the counter. “Emma, why did ya ask me back here?”
She sipped her drink again, diverting her eyes to the lace curtains on the window over the sink. “You’ll make fun of me.”
Shaking my head, I said, “I promise, I won’t.”
“Fine.” She rested the glass on the counter. “Honestly, I’ve liked you since the plane and haven’t stopped thinking about you since. But of course I never expected to see you again. So, when you were there at the coffee shop, I kind of thought it was a sign or something. I knew you liked me, and—”
“Ah, what?”
“Well, I mean, it was obvious,” she laughed, smoothing her sweater again. “You’ve been flirting with me since you started talking to me on the plane—”
“I wasn’t flirtin’ with ya on the plane,” I insisted. “I honestly thought ya were obnoxious, and then ya laughed at me, and—”
“You don’t have to admit it,” she teased with a roll of her eyes. “I already know.”
My lips curled into a smile. “So, wait, you’ve been thinkin’ about me since then?”
With a blush that rose from her collar to her cheeks, she nodded. “Yeah. I even found you on Facebook. I was going to send you a friend request, but I thought that’d be a little too forward.”
“So, ya thought ya’d ask me back here instead, in case ya didn’t get another chance.” My smile broadened as I took a confident step forward.
She sighed, rolling her eyes. “No. Well, maybe … fine, yes.”
I took another step, putting myself parallel with her body. Her breath tripped in her throat as I crooked a finger underneath her chin and lifted her eyes to mine. “That’s a good reason,” I assured her, my voice lowering with each word, and my palm cupped her cheek. “I probably would’ve done the same thing, if I were you. Hell, I would’ve taken ya on the plane, if I hadn’t been so petrified out of my feckin’ mind.”
Her pulse was on overdrive now, palpitating wildly at the base of her throat. “I told you I knew it.”
“Relax.” I pushed the tips of my fingers into her hair.
“I haven’t been with anybody since my ex-husband,” she blurted the admission.
“That’s fine.” My palm cupped the back of her head. “I’m only gonna kiss ya, okay?”
She nodded, despite the trembling
of her hands. “Okay, I think I can do that.”
“All right,” and I smiled, hardly believing the turn my trip to the States had taken, as I began the descent toward her waiting lips.
Her eyelids fluttered shut, my gaze fixated on her mouth and the inviting sheen left from the wine. The space between us was nearly closed, and I could feel the breath from her nostrils against my upper lip. Cool and fresh. I could smell the wine from her mouth. Sweet, warm, and I couldn’t help my moan as I traced the length of her nose with the tip of mine.
“Tell me if ya want me to—”
“Emma.” The front door opened, Padraig barked, and I was moving backward toward the table. Dividing our bodies with much needed space as I turned my head to see a tall man standing in the center of the living room, flanked by two young girls.
“Mom?” one of the girls asked, startled and confused.
Mom. Feckin’ hell. I turned back to Emma, looking for an explanation and wishing to the Lord that I could Our Father my way out of there.
“Jared!” Emma growled, stomping her way past me and into the adjoining room. “What are you doing here? You said you wanted the girls this week. So, what—”
“I should be asking you what you’re doing with some guy in the house my daughters sleep in,” the man apparently named Jared growled, pointing his finger down at her. “Is this what you do over here?”
Emma’s fists balled at her sides. Clenching, unclenching and shaking. “Jared. This is my house and I can bring whoever I want here.”
One of the girls left her father’s side and crouched to the floor to pet the tail-wagging Padraig. “Mommy, you got a dog?”
Exasperated, Emma lifted a hand to her forehead as she turned to face her daughter. “Um … no. No, I didn’t. This is my, uh … my friend’s dog.”
The girl looked into the kitchen, directly at me and asked, “What’s his name?”
“Sarah, please don’t talk to him,” Jared scolded.
But she continued to look at me expectantly, ignoring her father, and I found myself walking over to sit down on the chair next to where she crouched with Pad.
“Ehm, well … his name is Padraig,” I gently told her, scratching him behind the ears.
The other girl, older, came to crouch with her sister. “He’s huge. What kind of dog is he?”
“He’s an Irish Wolfhound,” I explained, smiling and not at all bothered by the way their father was threatening to kill me with his fiery glare.
“Jared,” I heard Emma say quietly, as the girls distracted themselves with Pad. “Why are you here?”
“Hailey needed to pick up a couple of things, and for the record, I don’t need to explain myself to you,” he grumbled. “Not when it comes to our children.”
“You could have called.”
“I shouldn’t have to.”
“Excuse me, but you don’t get to barge into my house and demand to know what I’m doing,” she responded, crossing her arms over her chest and peering up at him with narrowed eyes.
“I didn’t. Hailey used her key,” he sneered.
My concentration on their private conversation was broken when Sarah asked, “What’s your name?”
“My name?” I clarified, surprised she’d want to know, and she nodded eagerly. “Ehm … my name is Malachy.”
Her sister Hailey looked up then, curling her lips with probable distaste. “That’s a weird name.”
“Hailey,” Emma reprimanded.
I laughed, smiling at the embarrassed expression on her mother’s face. “It’s fine.”
“Where are you from?” Sarah the inquisitive asked. “You talk funny.”
From behind them, Jared grunted his disgust. “Enough of this. Hailey, get what you came here for. We’re leaving.”
Hailey’s face immediately fell. “But Daddy—”
“Now.” He pointed a finger in the direction of what I assumed was her room, and she pouted as she stood up and stomped her way down a hallway. “Sarah, stop petting that dog and go wait in the car.”
“Come on, Daddy,” she whined, never taking her eyes from Padraig. “You’re not being fair.”
“What did I tell you about talking back?” he asked in a stern tone, and immediately the girl stood up.
“Bye Padraig,” she sulked with a pout that broke my heart, and she left the house, closing the door quietly behind her.
Jared’s eyes bored straight through me as he stepped forward, pointing a finger directly at my face. “And you. I don’t know who the fuck you think you are, but how dare you assume you can just talk to my daughters?”
“Knock it off, Jared,” Emma groaned, sounding exhausted as she pressed her palm to her forehead.
“Well,” I said, taking the liberty of standing up to put myself on eye-level with the overbearing gobshite, “I apologize for oversteppin’ me bounds, but your daughters were pettin’ me dog and I thought it was the responsible thing to do to make sure he behaved himself. I’m thinkin’ ya should be thankin’ me for havin’ that kinda foresight, unlike yourself, fightin’ in front of them the way ya are.”
“You are some piece of work, you know that?” Jared sneered with a shake of his head. He wanted to punch me, I could see it in his eyes. I’d seen that look plenty of times over the years, and I’d been involved in my share of the pub fights.
I wasn’t going to throw the first punch, but I would certainly throw the last.
Emma heaved a sigh. “Malachy is a friend of mine, Jared. Just stop. Okay? Knock it off.”
Jared opened his mouth, as though ready to say something in reply, only to be interrupted by his daughter.
“Okay, I got my stuff,” Hailey said, coming back into the room with a backpack over her shoulder. “It was nice meeting you, Malachy.”
“You too, Hailey,” I said, waving as she left the house.
Jared shook his head, maintaining his silence as he followed behind his daughter.
The hardened exterior Emma adopted in the presence of her ex-husband crumbled and she bit at her quivering lower lip. Embarrassment pinked her cheeks, shame bowed her head. I knew I should say something, and so I cleared my throat. She turned to look up at me, apology searing the jade in her eyes.
“Malachy, I’m—”
“Ya weren’t kiddin’,” I said. “He’s a real shite.”
She nodded weakly, a tear slipping over her cheek. “Yeah. He can be. I’m sorry. I didn’t know he’d just walk in here like that. He lives a few towns over and he has the girls this week, and—”
“Why didn’t ya tell me ya had kids?” I blurted out, not intending to ask the question.
“I didn’t think it’d matter,” she confessed sadly, hanging her head. “Does it?”
“Well …” And if I’m being honest, it did change things, especially having now met them. They’d ask questions. They’d want to know more about me. They’d want to see Pad again. But, Lord, she looked so broken and defeated, standing there with her head bowed over her heart, and I was only visiting. The chances of me seeing those girls again was improbable, and so I reached forward, crooked my finger under her chin and lifted her eyes to meet mine. “It’s fine,” I assured her, and I almost believed it as I smiled.
CHAPTER ELEVEN |
PERSUASIVE SIBLINGS & STORIES
MALACHY
“So, what’s your story, Emma Bryan?” I asked, as I got myself comfortable in the seat of her SUV.
The trip to her cottage didn’t go as planned. I couldn’t say I wasn’t disappointed, leaving without at least knowing what kissing her lips was like, but spending the ride with her seemed just as good. For someone who didn’t exactly fancy himself a people person, I found that very unsettling.
But also, nice.
“My story?” she asked, glancing at me from behind the wheel.
“Yeah. Y’know, you and Jared. Your daughters. Tell me about it.”
There was that laugh again. The sound of an excited Padraig, with the face of a p
retty woman. “Why do you even want to know?”
I chuckled. “Well, honestly, I couldn’t feckin’ tell ya why, but it feels important to know where ya’ve been and what brought ya here. So, tell me.”
“You have an interesting way of making a girl feel special,” she muttered, but her lips curled with her smile. “Well, I met Jared when I was in college.”
“Ya went to school together?”
She shook her head. “No. He was actually the friend of a friend, and we met at a party. It was nice in the beginning, when we were more friends than anything else; he made me feel good about myself, he made me laugh. He was this older guy with a career, and it felt nice to get the attention of a guy like that. It didn’t take long before I was so wrapped up in wanting to be married, to have kids and to be the doting wife. To have a perfect little life. So, after a year and a half of dating, we got engaged and six months later, we were married.”
A perfect little life. Those words made me lips pucker around a retort I’d regret, and so I just nodded and asked, “How old were ya?”
“I was twenty-three when we got married; he was twenty-nine.”
“Aye,” I replied with a nod. “And the girls?”
“Less than a year later, I had Hailey.” I glanced at her in time to see her throat bob relentlessly, and I wondered what it was about the conversation that made her so uncomfortable.
As luck would have it, I didn’t have to wonder for long. “It was around the time I was pregnant with Sarah, that things started to change between us. He would scold me like I was a little girl, he hated that I wanted to have any semblance of a life outside of him, we fought about the blog all the time, and he just …” She shrugged. “He controlled the hell out of my life. He dictated my friendships, my hobbies, and I listened. Because I wanted the life he could give me. But, while I was so busy trying to create this perfect life, I lost myself in the process.”
“Hm,” I grunted, turning away from her to gaze out the windshield. Was that what I was trying to do by finding my birth father? To give myself a chance at having a life I never thought I could have?
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