“Hon-ey-moon?”
The word was drawn out in a heavy croaking sound reminiscent of summer bullfrogs in rural Massachusetts. He felt a little weak in the knees, but decided sitting next to her would be a mistake. Because if he sat next to her, well, could it be true?
Megan turned those green eyes on him, only peeking at him through her thick lashes.
“What’s this about a honeymoon?” he asked again, sure that he’d heard wrong. Hadn’t he?
“Um.” She cleared her throat, and then she cleared it again. “Seems at the abbey, according to Seamus that is, we dedicated ourselves to one another and that’s all that is required.” The last of the sentence came out in a little breathless gasp.
Chapter 29
“Whoa! Are you telling me that in the eyes of the Almighty, we are now husband and wife?” Horror piled on top of horror and the word wife came out of Jim’s mouth with a decided but unwarranted squeak. “Now, who said we were getting married? At the abbey, I mean.”
Something in Megan’s eyes and furrowed brow told him that he’d stepped in it, all the way up to his knees. He actually sounded like he didn’t want to get married, that he was sorry that it had happened. But when he took a breath and slowed down a moment, he wasn’t, he really wasn’t. Then why was he acting like he’d been shocked by a cattle prod?
“Listen, Kennedy, are you ready for this? I mean, is this what you wanted—I mean when you wanted it?”
He knew he was making a mess of it, the explaining, but somehow he couldn’t seem to stop himself. He was like a lamb following the leader off the cliff’s edge. He couldn’t shut his big mouth. He did want to marry her. Hadn’t he been thinking about this for days, with or without Seamus? He’d said too much. Too much. Megan’s face crumbled and a tear coursed down one cheek. Quickly, she dashed the tear away with the back of her hand. Her face changed and glowed with anger. She doubled up her fist and let him have it right in the breadbox.
“You cretin, I thought it was what you wanted. I’ll find my own way back to Dublin.” She strode quickly to the door, jerked it open, and slammed it ferociously. Jim staggered back, fell on the bed, and held his stomach.
Oh brother, had he done it now. He had the distinct impression that there’d be no more honeymoon for him.
Chapter 30
“I’ll give you fifty euros now and another hundred at the end of the week. Will that suit?” he asked, pulling the large, brown raincoat about him. He looked as though he were warding off a chill; or asserting his anonymity.
“Oh aye, ’tis lovely.” The old woman looked at him shyly, her eyes, the color of mud, peered up at him. She looked as though she hadn’t washed in days, and her dress smelled to high heaven. He didn’t really care, as long as he could get the place fixed up in time for Megan.
“Where’s to buy a bit of bread and beer about?”
“Oh, down to the corner, it’s O’Grady’s, though I’ll be telling you to watch the place. Grimy it is, oh, aye. Not as clean a place as I’m thinking ye should have for food and such.”
“Well, hmm, yes, I suppose,” he said, looking again at the woman’s fingernails as she combed her fingers through her clumped, greasy hair.
“I’ll be bringing my wife back here in a few days. You’ll have the place cleaned up by then?”
“Oh yes, sir. She’ll be spick and spangled by then.” The woman gave him a slight curtsy before he turned to leave. The smell of the room was beginning to intrude on the well-being of his stomach. Perhaps he’d better come back the day before and check it out, make sure the place was clean and there were a few bottles of stout in the tiny fridge.
“Cheerio, we’ll be seeing you right enough, then.”
“Oh, aye, sir,” the woman said again with another half curtsy.
He walked outside as quickly as possible, breathing in great gulps of fresh air when he reached the alleyway.
Even standing near the dumpster, he felt cleaner. He’d have to come back and clean it himself. He couldn’t bring Megan to such a place.
Chapter 31
Jim tentatively knocked at the door before he looked at his watch and noticed it was nearly one thirty a.m. He had spent the past hour trying to figure out what had happened. Reliving and recounting every word, he decided that he’d blown it big time. He knew he’d hurt her, he’d spoken too quickly. And as usual, he’d spoken without thinking. That seemed to be his usual modus operandi these days. Speaking without thinking. It seemed that he’d picked up some bad habits since crossing the pond. When was he going to turn his brain on? He couldn’t risk losing her, now that he’d found her, and he knew in his deepest self that if he lost her, he’d lose what was left of himself as well. He could be such an idiot.
She opened the door, holding it open enough to admit him. She looked as though she’d been crying. He didn’t think Megan cried very often, not with her personality; she was not a weepy female. That knowledge made him feel lower than low. He looked about the room, noticing immediately that she’d begun to pack. Was she going to make a fast getaway?
“Listen, Megan, I’m sorry. Please forgive me for speaking so quickly, but you’ve got to admit that the whole thing was so overwhelming. It threw me off guard. I mean, didn’t it throw you as well?” He held his hands out in a gesture of submission, wanting very much for her to fall into his arms, kiss him, and tell him it was all right.
“I’m leaving.”
“Yeah, I noticed.” He glanced around. Her clothes, normally so neat and well-cared for, were rumpled into balls and stuffed willy-nilly into the suitcase. “That’s what I wanted to tell you, I’m sorry. Do you forgive me? You wouldn’t leave a poor defenseless American to fend for himself in a strange land, would you? Please forgive me, Megan. I love you more than I can say. I promise.” He knew he was rambling and sounded like a real idiot, but he had to tell her everything so she wouldn’t leave and never speak to him again. He’d almost lost her once tonight and he wouldn’t risk losing her again, physically or emotionally.
Megan took a deep breath, turned away from him, and paced the small confines of the room. She looked so wonderful in her shabby, fuzzy robe and too-large slippers. She was the most beautiful woman in the world to him.
She stood for a moment, looking out at the black night, watching the rain mist against the window. She shivered and Jim saw the tremor all too clearly play across her shoulders.
“I think it best that we don’t see each other again. I’ll get myself back to Dublin, somehow.”
“Oh, Megan, stop being so silly.” The frustration in his voice was evident, even to him.
“Silly? Silly, is it? I won’t ride in a car with a man who doesn’t want me.” The hurt in her voice came through loud and clear.
“Megan, honey,” said Jim, trying to put his arms around her. “You know I want you. Ah, come on. It was just a shock that’s all. Can you blame me? I mean here comes Seamus like he’s the Almighty himself, and he tells us we’re married? Do you remember saying anything to Father Timothy? Out loud, I mean? Come on.” He was finally able to get his arms all the way around Megan without her pushing him away.
She looked at him and the look spoke volumes. She was ready to spit in his eye. Her red hair had somehow turned even redder, like she was blushing from the tips of the roots. Or was it the way her face flushed so hard that she looked like she might turn purple at any second?
“Megan,” he said, trying his best to sound convincing, because he really did believe that he loved her. He knew it. “Sweetie, please forgive me. I do love you and I do want to get married. But if we’re married now…well, couldn’t we keep on having our honeymoon? Hmmm?” Jim said with every bit of cajoling and oozing of love that he could muster.
Megan stopped struggling and looked at him long and hard. His smile was warm and seductive and it made her shiver. Oh yes. He made her shiver. There was no doubt at all. And shiver in a good way. But this would have to stop right here and now or her heart would not s
urvive. Everything between the two of them was moving at lightning speed, so fast that it was hard to process it all; the abbey, Seamus, the dedication, the sex. She would have to work at untangling all these emotions if it was to make sense enough for her to understand and embrace.
The light caught the sparkle in his eye, making them change to almost an azure. She had to be very careful or she’d be swept away only by his looks.
“Do you mean it, James Francis Xavier O’Flannery? Do you mean it? Do you want to marry me, good and proper this time?”
Jim reached down and kissed her. Her lips, so soft and pliant, melted into his and he felt there was such a rightness about it, such goodness about it. He raised his face from hers and sighed.
“Yes, Megan Elizabeth Kennedy, at this point there’s no going back. There’s no trying to do what I did yesterday, live like I did yesterday. I want to be with you for the rest of our lives.”
Megan heaved a great sigh, rather melodramatically.
“Oh, neat-o, I quite like that.” She reached up and kissed him, long and hard. The feelings for her pulsated through him and his heart sang with it. Megan was his and he’d show her in every way possible that he meant that he really loved her. He drew her closer, tracing his fingers along the underside of her breast and his hand found its way to stroking her back and hip. She pushed herself away and he stilled. Her eyes were sultry and steamy, and a deep, deep green. His pulse quickened. She straightened her fuzzy robe, folded her hands together with a very proper demeanor, and gave him a little smile.
“I think you should go to your room. Now!” She was completely full of herself. She had him, and she knew it. She’d call it cheeky.
“Go to my room? But I thought we were going to have our honeymoon.” Jim felt like he’d just been run over by a large, fast moving truck, a truck with red hair and green eyes.
“Not now, lover boy,” she said as she patted his cheek and led him by the arm out the door into the hall. “We must get back to Dublin, you know.”
“But, Megan—”
“Ta, ta, get packed so we can leave first thing in the morning.”
The door shut and Jim was left standing on the other side, his arms held out beseechingly. He slumped against the wall, staring at Megan’s door.
What had happened anyway?
Jim was left with such a plethora of confusing thoughts coursing through his mind that he felt he had to call his grandma, and not to say hello. Maybe she could put him straight. And then again, maybe she had some information and had actually found something out about Seamus. There was a guest phone at the end of the hallway, and Jim did a quick calculation of the time difference. He hoped he wouldn’t make her miss her favorite quiz show again. But she loved him, she really wouldn’t care.
“Hi, Grandma, it’s Jim. How are you? Is Mom okay?”
“Jimmy, how are you? Where are you?”
“We’re in a place called Castle Pollard. There’s a Benedictine Abbey near here, and we went to visit the monks today. And by the way, Ireland can feel colder than Boston. I almost froze today touring this old dilapidated church from the seventh century. I took lots of pictures, so we’ll have a great time going over them when I get back. Now, please tell me what you’ve found out about you know what.”
“Ah, well. Deacon O’Boyle did ask his friend in the Bishop’s office. The man said he’d like to speak with you when you returned. He’d like some information, but as it is, they can’t really decide what the thing you’re seeing is. And here’s the strange thing, no one has doubted for a moment that you are conversing with an angel. They can’t understand the leprechaun transformation though. That hasn’t ever been heard of.”
“Well, tonight I was in Megan’s room and Seamus was in there with her, and he looked like those pictures of King Brian of the Leprechauns. I was half baiting him, so I asked him was he really an angel, and Megan said—”
“Oh, Megan can see him?”
“Yes, as of tonight.”
“Well, that’s grand. Two people can’t hallucinate about the same thing at the same time, now can they?”
“Yeah, I told Seamus he could be a demon just as easily as an angel, and he was very put out. He flipped open a piece of parchment that looked like it was made of spun glass. The parchment read like a ‘to whom it may concern’ document, and get this, it was signed Michael, Archangel.”
“Holy Mother—”
“Yeah, no kidding. You can tell the deacon and the man in the Bishop’s office all of this. It should keep the whole lot of them up for a few weeks.” Jim chuckled, thinking of the repercussions his little angel problem might cause for decades to come. “So I was only checking in, thanks for the info. Good night, Grandma, love you.”
“I’ll pass on the information. Night, Jim love. Call me as soon as you get back, love you too.”
Jim rested his head against the receiver, trying to get his brain from spinning out of control. He had work to do.
“Get to work, stupid. The articles won’t write themselves.”
He was able to get a cup of coffee from a coin operated machine in the lobby. The caffeine revived him, and he sat on the bed in his room, drawing a diagram on a piece of paper to pinpoint all the murders.
There had been three in Dublin. The first one had made the New York Post because the victim had been from Manhattan. The next two victims had been from the Boston area. The third, murdered in Sligo, was a displaced New Yorker; a man that had recently moved to Atlanta.
All the victims were male, loud-mouthed, pushy, Irish Americans, and approximately five feet eleven to six one in height. Jim imagined that the Irish forensics team had made the killer to be about six feet two inches. It had been easy enough for him to do it. And he had that confirmed by his friend who worked in the forensics department in Boston.
There were never any fibers found on the victims, no fingerprints anywhere around the murdered man, or any clear footprints that could lead them to the killer. It was as though the killer wore a slick garment that would keep fibers from rubbing off, a slick garment. Maybe a waterproof coat, like a raincoat?
The hair on the back of Jim’s neck stood up when he remembered the man in the bar in Sligo. The man wore a huge brown raincoat, and the coat had covered him almost to his ankles. The man’s hat had a wide brim that he judiciously kept pulled down so that Jim, or anyone else who was looking, wouldn’t easily recognize him. It was the man that the barkeep downstairs had described to a T.
Could it be Richard? No, it couldn’t possibly be. Logically maybe, intellectually maybe, but Jim couldn’t emotionally believe that someone Megan had been close to could be a serial killer. Richard had a screw loose—there was no question. But—a serial killer? No, Jim would have to look elsewhere.
Chapter 32
The next day, the silence inside the car was ominous. Megan nodded to him as he’d placed her suitcase into the trunk. Megan had neatly avoided him and had her breakfast before he could make it downstairs. Her persona as the very correct and very capable Miss Megan Kennedy had arrived and taken up residence loud and clear. No more the hurt little girl of last night’s thwarted honeymoon.
Drat. He was so glad she felt better, but he craved their unfinished honeymoon.
Jim looked at her from the corner of his eye. Cool as a cucumber this one. Not one hint of self-consciousness or embarrassment. He felt embarrassed enough for both of them. What a situation. Seamus had been conspicuous by his absence as well this morning. That little, creepy, redheaded so and so. Angel Second Class. Second class, for sure, but angel? Angel, my ass. Am I being uncharitable? Of course I am, but he’s earned every bit of un-charity there is.
He’d have to get Megan to warm up to him again, and then maybe they could get on with their honeymoon.
“May I come see your apartment when we get back?”
“Huh? Oh, uh, sure.”
“Where do your parents live? I need to go meet them, right?” If they were married, then he’d
have to get busy with all the usual polite modes of social acceptance; like meeting the parents, finding out about siblings, and all that kind of stuff. And then they’d have to go talk to a priest and get all of those modes of accepted, when you were a Catholic, behavior accomplished.
Megan quirked a look at him from under her brow.
“They live in Limerick.”
“Could we go see them on the weekend? How far away is that from Dublin? I mean I can’t very well Shanghai you to Boston without meeting them first. Right?”
“Yes, I suppose so,” she said absently and then turned quickly, her brows pulled down in question. “And who said anything about going to Boston?”
“Ah, come on, Kennedy, I thought we were as good as married.”
“Oh, indeed, and why is it you’re still calling me Kennedy?”
“Force of habit. Journalist to journalist, okay?”
At least he didn’t think she was just another pretty face after all. Of course, she knew that all along, intellectually if not emotionally.
Oh, Megan, you know he’s always been the best, the most considerate, the nicest, oh crumbs, cut it out, she thought to herself. Most of the morning, between coffee and eggs and packing the car, she’d almost forgotten the whole weirdness of the dedication and Seamus, and her outburst at Jim. But she would never, never forget her “honeymoon.”
“Thanks,” Megan finally said.
“For what?”
“For putting me on the same footing as you.”
“What on earth should I do? Consider you some kind of hack stringer?”
A bubble of laughter caught Jim off-guard. Her laughter reminded him of silvery bells and he loved the sound of it. He thought he’d like hearing it every day from now on. Yes, every day.
The Wild Mountain Thyme Page 18