“I am sorry about your Mam, ya know,” she said, keeping her hand against my back. “I want ya to know that I harbor no ill wishes towards her.”
Glancing at her, I smiled. “If ya did, I wouldn’t hold it against ya.”
She didn’t return the smile, revealing instead a glimmer of sadness within her crystal blue eyes. “Malachy, Collin made no secret of his past when I met him. I knew about her and their fleetin’ relationship, and I’m happy ya came from it.”
The stepping stones were clearly laid in front of me, leading me to the home I desired. It’d only been days, and they were making no secret that they wanted me in their lives, and yet, I couldn’t race toward them. I couldn’t give up my struggle.
“I kinda feel like an accident,” I admitted, laughing, reaching out to ruffle Pad’s ears as his head turned abruptly toward a tree.
“Ah, no, sweet boy,” she said, striking me in the heart with the term of endearment. The backs of my eyes pricked with emotion, my nostrils burned with the threat of tears, and my only distraction was the dog, who was now distracted by a bloody squirrel. “There are no accidents. I do wish we had known about ya sooner, but everythin’ happens when it’s meant to. And I believe we found ya exactly when ya needed us most.”
I shook my head, aiming my gaze toward the sky. “I don’t know—”
“Let go of your doubt,” she said, seemingly knowing what I was feeling and what I was thinking.
And maybe she was right. Maybe it was time I started doing that.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN |
FALLING & HAND-HOLDING
MALACHY
I walked down to Black & Brewed with Patrick and Kinsey, where Ryan, Snow, Sean and Lindsey were waiting with a couple tables pushed together. There were eight chairs, one left open beside me, and my stomach flopped around like a fish out of water.
Look at me. Nervous over a girl. Never thought I’d see the day.
I wiped my palms against my jeans as I sat down next to Sean. He nudged me in the side with an elbow, grinning excitedly to be spending some more quality time together, and he asked if I’d spoken to Emma.
“I, ehm … don’t have her mobile number,” I admitted sheepishly, and was presented with the gawking faces of six people far more experienced than I.
“I thought ya were a Lothario,” Sean said, grimacing.
“A what?”
“A player,” Snow chimed in, taking a sip of her water.
I laughed uncomfortably. “Ah, well, not exactly. I just don’t get attached and I don’t really date.”
Kinsey smiled kindly. “I can’t believe you’re related to any of them.”
“My mam never married,” I blurted out. “She and Da were together, but … loosely.”
Sean nodded, putting the pieces together. “They were, ehm … in an open relationship?”
I shrugged, not sure how to really explain their situation. Mam never wanted to fully commit, which I suspected was something Collin Kinney had experienced with her. It was most likely the reason their relationship hadn’t continued. And it was a good thing it didn’t, for the sake of the three men sitting with me.
“They cared for each other,” I assured them. “But they fought a lot and split up on a frequent basis.”
Lindsey sucked in a harsh breath of air. “That’s so sad.”
I waved it away. “It’s how it was,” I told them, but inside, I couldn’t help but agree with her.
Thankfully, the conversation was laid to rest when Kylie came around with glasses of iced tea, before getting settled into a chair right at the edge of the stage. She beamed with radiant joy for the man stepping up to the platform, and it occurred to me that everybody in that bloody town was madly in love with someone. They were oozing with it, and I couldn’t help the way my own heart felt left out. Until I took a moment to look around the table. I saw three men, with their respective spouses, and I knew that warmth flooding my chest with a foreign familiarity.
I was falling in love. It just wasn’t with a single member of the fairer sex, but with an entire clan.
❧
I’d seen a number of performers in my time, but Devin O’Leary owned that stage with an intoxicating presence. He sang with a voice I could envy, played the guitar with masterful skill and worked the small crowd with the maturity of a seasoned entertainer.
He concluded his song “Edge of a Blue Existence” with a lazy strum against the strings, and smiled against the mic as the crowd burst with applause. “Thank you, guys. This next one is a more recent find I discovered online. You know when you’re on YouTube, and you’re just falling down the internet’s rabbit hole? My travels led me to this one and I just fucking loved it so much, I had to learn it. This is ‘Keep Me Going’ by Jared & the Mill. Hope you like it.”
Kylie laughed from the front of the stage as she turned to face the crowd. “He kept me up all freakin’ night, as he proceeded to listen to this song about twenty times before he was satisfied.”
Patrick chuckled and called to her, “Yeah, he kept ya up with YouTube videos all night. Sure, Kylie. We believe ya.”
A smattering of laughter hovered over the room as Devin shook his head, grinning as his gaze lowered to the guitar.
Then, the room went silent with the plucking of his strings. A folk tune filled the air and Devin’s lids floated shut as he lost himself in the music, singing the beginnings of the lyrics, when the door to the shop opened.
I turned my head to see Emma making her way through the maze of wooden tables, apologizing as she bumped into chairs and stepped on toes, until she finally reached us.
“Sorry I’m late,” she whispered to us, as she dropped that giant bag of hers and sat down next to me.
“It’s fine,” Paddy said, and I could hear the smile in his voice, but I didn’t want to look at him.
Because, well, just being near her was sending my soul flipping through the air, and looking away seemed like a death sentence to that feeling.
She glanced at me and smiled. “Hey, Malachy. I told you I’d be here, don’t look so surprised.”
I leaned toward her, lowering my voice so the others wouldn’t hear. “I’m not surprised by the fact you’re here,” I told her. “What surprises me is how much better I feel when you’re around.”
Her green eyes lit with the beauty of a thousand emeralds. “You better watch it, Malachy.”
“Why’s that?”
Her hand moved to lay on my thigh, her little finger brushing against mine. She leaned closer, allowing our eyes to meet and settle into each other. “Because if you keep talking like that, I’m afraid I won’t be able to let you get on another plane.”
My pinky shifted, sliding over hers until our two fingers curled together underneath the table. “That’s a scary thought.”
She nodded. “Absolutely terrifying.”
That was an understatement, and there was only one way to commemorate the moment.
I slid my mobile off the table and said, “Don’t move,” as I pulled up the camera while tightening my finger around hers. I nudged my elbow against Sean and asked if he could take a picture of us.
“Sure,” he agreed, his lips curling into a smile.
He aimed the camera lens at us, as I told Emma to keep that same expression and to not smile. Sean snapped the picture before handing the mobile back to me.
“Thanks,” I said, placing it back on the table without looking at the photo he took.
Emma looked utterly flabbergasted. “Why wouldn’t you want me to smile? I probably look horrible.”
“Ya look honest. Like you’re embarkin’ on a journey ya never thought ya’d have to take.” And I thought about that, and chuckled. “I guess ya look a lot like me.”
Her bottom lip tucked between her teeth as her brows knitted together, and then, she did smile. She wrenched her finger away from mine, leaving me feeling rejected, until she startled me by flipping my palm over and fitting her hand into mine. Sliding our fi
ngers together and gripping tightly.
“You know, it would be a lot less scary if we weren’t alone,” she whispered, and I returned the smile.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN |
DRINKS & FIRST KISSES
EMMA
I loved watching Malachy with his brothers.
The way they interacted was nothing more than second nature, as if they were always meant to be. You’d never guess they’d only just met five days before, and my fingers itched to reach for my bag and grab my camera. I wanted to capture the moments. The smiles and the laughter.
And I knew there wouldn’t be any props needed. There was no way any doilies or silk flowers could’ve made those moments more perfect.
The night finished with Devin O’Leary’s song, “Daisies & You,” the radio hit that Kinsey swooned over unabashedly, while her husband rolled his eyes at every note. I couldn’t deny that the man on stage was gorgeous, with a head of hair any woman would’ve loved getting her fingers tangled in, but he wasn’t who my eyes were drawn to.
Malachy’s copper hair and blue-green eyes had held me hostage from the moment he sat next to me on the plane, in the way any attractive man might’ve. But the attraction I was feeling now …
Well, that was something deeply unsettling.
His fingers were calloused, his palms rough. A stark contrast to the skin I kept religiously hydrated, attempting to preserve my youth within my thirty-eight-year-old body. The fine lines creasing his forehead and the deeper crinkles around his eyes added to his worldly attraction. He made the leap into middle age look like something to embrace, rather than fear, and I couldn’t help the flirty smile that kept gracing my lips every time I dared to look at him. Just to see if those butterflies were still fluttering in my stomach, drunk on feelings I hadn’t felt in a long time. Maybe too long.
“Thanks for coming out tonight,” Devin concluded, smiling and creasing the lines on either side of his perfect mouth. “I’ll see you guys next week.”
And on that note, he swung his guitar around to his back and jumped off the stage to pull the purple-haired Kylie to her feet and kiss her. He didn’t care who was watching as they skirted the edges of make-out territory, and I felt myself yearning for a kiss like that, not remembering the last time I’d been kissed at all.
It was Jared. I knew that much. He wasn’t the first man I’d kissed, but he’d been my last, and I could still feel how methodical it was. How predictable. How boring. How sterile. Kissing him became a disappointment after those initial flutters of excitement had faded. But watching Devin kiss Kylie, I realized not every man was afraid of showing affection in public, and I found myself drifting into a fantasy of what Malachy’s lips might feel like against mine.
“Well, we should probably get going,” Patrick said, pulling me from my heated reverie. “Gotta relieve Mam of babysitting duties.”
Snow nodded reluctantly. “Yeah, us too.”
“I just really want to sleep,” Sean added with a shrug, and Lindsey rolled her eyes playfully as she said, “God, babe, you’re such an old man.”
“Those mattresses aren’t gonna sell themselves,” he chided, grabbing the end of her long braid and tickling her neck with it before pressing his lips to her cheek.
I glanced at Malachy, not at all surprised to find him already looking back at me. “Do ya gotta get home?” he asked me. “Got any posts ya gotta write?” My heart begged me to say yes and that there were heaps of pictures I needed to add filters to. But I felt my shoulders shrug as my head shook my response, and my lips smiled hopefully.
“There’s a pub around here,” he said in a low, graveled voice. “Ya wanna go?”
My heart was screaming, sobbing even, for me to decline. It begged to let the fantasies be nothing more than sweet little daydreams that might carry over into sleep. But my head was nodding, and my mouth opened so my voice could utter a simple, “Yes.”
And my heart wept.
❧
“So, other than the coffee shop, I know of no other place to go to than this,” he confessed, holding the door open for me to The Ol’ Tavern, the only bar in the River Canyon town center.
“Oh, you would find the one bar in town,” I teased with a laugh as I walked inside. I caught a Help Wanted sign out of the corner of my eye and pointed to it. “And look! You wouldn’t be out of work if you decided to stay.”
Malachy’s chest puffed up at the mention. He glowered at me, but he didn’t say anything as one heated palm pressed between my shoulder blades and guided me through the darkly-lit pub.
It was as busy as you’d expect on a Wednesday night; only a small handful of patrons occupied the space—most of them, sitting on wooden barstools. Malachy brought us to stop at the U-shaped bar in the center of the room, and raised his hand to hail the bartender over.
“What will ya have?” he asked me as we waited for the gruff-looking man to make his way over to us, and I shrugged.
“God, I don’t know,” I said with a sigh. “I think the last time I really drank was in college.”
“Ya don’t drink?”
“I didn’t say I don’t drink,” I retorted. “It’s just not on my list of priorities.”
“Well, I hope ya have somethin’ in that bag of yours to appropriately position in your pictures, because you’re drinkin’ tonight,” he laughed as the bearded, man-bunned bartender came to stand in front of us, and I gulped.
This crazy Irishman is going to get me drunk. “I, uh … guess I’ll go find a table,” I said, turning to find a place for us to sit, and with every step I took, I felt his eyes on me.
I was fanning myself with a piece of sparkly cardstock from my bag by the time I reached a corner booth, away from any other bar-goers. Slumping into the bench seat, I laid my fingers over my forehead, making sure I didn’t have a fever that I was mistaking for a bubbling lust.
Nope, just my out-of-control hormones.
I laughed awkwardly to myself as I adjusted my pencil skirt under the table, feeling my pantyhose for any overlooked runs. I smoothed the lapels of my faux leather blazer before adjusting the frilly collar of my top. Then, for the final look-over, I pulled a compact from my bag, flipping it open to check my makeup.
“Ya look fine,” Malachy growled from above me, and with a startled reaction, I snapped the compact closed as he slid a drink over to me. Something frothy and dessert-like in appearance. “Move over.” The other side of the booth was open and unoccupied, but he was waiting to sit beside me and I hesitated. “Or I guess I could stand, but that’s gonna look feckin’ weird.”
I hummed another awkward giggle, sliding over along the wood-slatted seat, and he sat beside me, his thigh pressing against mine. He held a pint of Guinness and took a sip.
“What’s this?” I asked, pointing at the foamy-looking thing in front of me.
“That, m’darlin’, is a New Market Sour. There’s this nice little place called Sophie’s—”
“In Dublin,” I finished for him. “It’s a glasshouse.”
Malachy nodded, an impressed smile spreading across his face. “So, ya’ve heard of it.”
“I’ve eaten there. You can read about it in my ‘A Day in Dublin’ blogpost,” I said with a cheeky smile before picking up the glass and taking a small sip. It was smooth and slid down my throat easily. “Wow, that’s good. So, you heard about this drink at Sophie’s?”
He shrugged. “I first had it there, yeah. Liked it so much, I found the recipe online.”
“Well, it’s very good,” I complimented, placing the glass back onto the table and smoothing my hands over my skirt again, ensuring it was still laying against my legs just right. In doing so, my finger brushed against his thigh, and I froze in place. “Did, um … did the bartender know how to make it, or—”
“No,” he said bluntly, shaking his head as he raised the pint glass again to his lips. “Had to walk him through it, which was fine, but then he just had to hand me a bottle of Guinness. Who drinks Guinness f
rom a bottle?”
I wasn’t well-versed in my knowledge of alcohol, but one thing I knew was that drinking Guinness from a bottle was a faux pas. I glanced at him, shaking his head, and I said, “See? You need to take over and show them the way. Guess you’ll have to stay now.”
Malachy chuckled through his nose. “Well, if anythin’ could convince me of that, it might just be this place.”
“Would you ever move?” I boldly asked, taking another small sip of my drink. Pacing myself.
“That’s a hard question to answer when I’ve only been here a few days.”
“It’s not that hard,” I replied, turning to face him. “I’ve traveled a lot. I’ve been to all fifty states and twenty-six countries, and I can tell you from experience, that I’ve known within days which ones I could’ve stayed in for an extended period of time.”
“Oh yeah? Why didn’t ya?”
I snorted, shaking my head. “I have family here, Malachy. I can’t just abandon them because I happen to fall in love with a city halfway around the world.”
“So, what you’re sayin’ is, home is where your family is?” He folded his arms on the table and faced me.
Without hesitation, I nodded. “Yes. A beautiful city can only be appreciated for so long before it gets too lonely.”
Turning back to his pint, he released a long-winded sigh and grunted in reply before lifting the glass back to his mouth.
I realized I’d struck a nerve, watching his teeth scrape over his upper lip before he took another . Maybe it was the part about family. Maybe he didn’t yet consider the Kinneys his family, or maybe he worried that he wasn’t considered a part of theirs. But, after spending several hours with them over the course of a few days, I could tell him what I saw.
“I don’t think you need to worry about them,” I spoke gently, sliding my hand from my leg to lay over his thigh.
He turned to face me. “Oh, so ya think I’m worried, do ya?” His brows were lowered, shadowing his blue-green eyes in the already dim bar, and his voice held a bitterness cut with amusement.
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