Finn smiled, gratitude to God for answering his prayers warming him more than a hot brick at the bottom of his bed. “You talking to me again is payment enough, Aiden.”
“Yes, well, I aim to do a whole lot more than just talk.” A fresh rush of blood mottled Aiden’s cheeks as he gave an abrupt nod toward the hall. “Close the door, son, if you will.”
Rising, Finn did as he asked, although he knew Aiden was the only patient on the floor. He settled back in his chair after turning it to face his former father-in-law this time, his curiosity piqued over what Aiden could possibly have to say other than “I’m sorry.”
“Why haven’t you ever married?” Shrewd eyes pierced Finn straight through, turning the tables to awkward.
Finn blinked, completely caught off-guard. Whatever he’d thought Aiden might say, that sure hadn’t been it. The question immediately flashed an image of Libby in his mind, and for the briefest of moments, a twinge of the old anger toward Aiden flared in his gut.
“Never forget, son,” Pastor Poppy had once told him, “that bitterness is like handing your enemy a loaded gun to wound you all over again.”
The words now echoed loudly in Finn’s brain, reminding him how dark and bitter his life had been the first few years after Libby left, leaving him an empty shell of a man. That is, until Pastor Poppy had filled him up with a faith that had saved his own sorry soul.
Shifting uncomfortably in the chair, Finn doused the old flames of fury with a silent prayer, forcing a casual shrug. “Marriage just wasn’t for me, Aiden. Nobody knows that better than you.”
“Horse puke!” Aiden shouted, shades of the old nemesis peeking through as narrowed eyes nailed him to the wall. “You’re still in love with my daughter.”
Finn shot to his feet so fast, the chair rattled on its legs. “Was in love with your daughter, O’Shea. And in case it’s escaped your notice, I haven’t seen hide nor hair of her in over seventeen years, so this is a devil of a way to say thank you for saving your neck.”
“Sit down, McShane,” Aiden ordered, raising the hackles Finn always strove to keep under wrap.
Jaw hard, Finn snatched his hat from the credenza, no intention of letting Aiden order him around or resurrect painful memories he’d worked so hard to forget. Striding to the door, he yanked it open, not even bothering to turn around. “Sorry, old man, but if you plan to take a stroll down Memory Lane, you’ll have to do it on your own—”
“Libby’s back.”
Those two words stopped Finn cold, his back suddenly as rigid as the blasted wood door he was itching to slam. All at once, his anger slowly siphoned out as he lowered his head, eyelids sagging closed with a weight he hadn’t anticipated. Of course, she was back—her father almost died and her parents had lost their home in a fire. He’d figured as much, but he’d hoped to avoid her, figuring he wouldn’t have to see her again or have his heart ripped out by the mere mention of her name.
“She’s engaged to be married,” Aiden said quietly, the regret in his tone not near a match for the keen disappointment that seared through Finn’s chest.
“What’s that got to do with me?” he said, unwilling to turn around lest Aiden see just how much he still cared.
“Everything. I don’t want her to marry him.”
A fury Finn didn’t know he still possessed rose up like a phantom as he slowly angled Aiden’s way, his fist knuckle-white on the knob. “Well, you have lots of experience handling situations like that, O’Shea,” he bit out, his voice almost a hiss, “so have at it.”
“Can’t. She won’t listen to me, Finn, but she’ll listen to you.”
Finn stared, eyes gaping as wide as his unhinged jaw. “That heart attack scramble your brain, old man? That stubborn daughter of yours wouldn’t listen when I begged her to stay years ago nor even answer one of the dozens of letters I sent, so I don’t know why you think I would hold any sway.”
“You’re her husband—”
“Was her husband,” he shouted, wondering what in the world he’d been thinking to even consider offering this cock-eyed family a home for the next six months. “She decided on that when she walked away and never looked back, old man, and you sealed it when you filed the annulment papers against my will.”
“She didn’t walk away,” Aiden said quietly as he avoided Finn’s eyes, voice so low Finn thought he’d misunderstood. “I sent her.”
“What?” Finn’s body went cold. “What do you mean you sent her?”
Chest expanding with a deep draw of air, Aiden finally faced Finn head-on, the remorse in his tone as thick as the tension in the air. “I mean I didn’t give her a chance to cool down, Finn, after the fight you two had. I saw my chance, and I took it, hustling her out of town before she could change her mind. I convinced her you would tie her down, never allow her to pursue her infernal women’s causes.”
Finn could only stare in shock, the painful thud of his heart nearly ticking to a stop. “B-But … she never answered my letters, not one,” he whispered.
A larger knot ducked in Aiden’s throat. “She never got ‘em, son. Her aunt had strict orders to see to that.”
Rage like he’d never known broke through his stupor of stun, boiling up inside as he stormed to Aiden’s bed. He fisted the old man’s hospital gown like meat hooks, jerking him up so hard, Aiden dangled in the air. “You! You ruined my life, you snake-bellied polecat, and so help me, if you weren’t laid up in a hospital bed, I’d put you in one.” He hurled Aiden back onto the bed, bouncing him but good before he strode for the door, sorely tempted to turn back around and give him a piece of his fist. Hand on the knob, he wheeled to scorch him with a glare so full of fire, it singed his own sockets. “I should have let you burn, old man.”
“But you couldn’t,” Aiden said in a rush, his breathing as labored as his words, “any more than you can walk away from Libby right now.”
“No? Watch me!” He bludgeoned a thick finger in Aiden’s direction, pretty sure he needed to leave before he tore the skunk limb to limb. “You and that daughter of yours are cut from the same cloth, old man—conniving and cold-hearted, the both of you. I want nothing to do with you or your blasted family ever again.” Outrage pumping hot in his veins, Finn yanked on the door, body twitching to vent with an exit that would shimmy the roof.
“You can’t walk away—” Aiden started to shout, but Finn had no desire to listen at all. Wrenching the door closed, it thundered in a deafening slam. But not before his blood turned to ice water over Aiden’s final words.
“Legally, she’s still your wife.”
CHAPTER SIX
“Good heavens, Mr. McShane, whatever is going on?” Skirt flapping, the young nurse from earlier scurried down the hall towards Aiden’s room, face as pale as her snow-white uniform.
Not that Finn’s looked much better, he guessed. His blood had drained clear down to his toes, hard-pressed to make it back up to his brain, which teetered on the edge of comatose. At Aiden’s final words, shock had paralyzed his entire body as he stood, hand still on the knob of his former father-in-law’s closed door.
Correction: His current father-in-law.
The very thought ignited his anger all over again, and with a tight-lipped smile in the nurse’s direction, Finn hurled the door open once again, banging it against the wall. “Sorry, ma’am, but the wind caused it.”
Or the windbag.
Stepping back into the room, Finn drilled Aiden with a glare that could have torched both the bed and the man in it. “What-did-you-say?” he whispered, his words little more than a hiss.
“Mr. O’Shea, is everything all right?” The young nurse stood outside the door, her strained tone indicative that she thought her patient might be in danger.
Which wasn’t far off the mark …
“I’d fetch a doctor, miss,” Finn said with a stiff smile over his shoulder, “because Mr. O’Shea’s about to have a setback.” He backhanded the door closed in the woman’s face and strode toward t
he bed, his stance so menacing, Aiden’s jaw steeled in defense. “What do you mean she’s still my wife?”
A hard smile shadowed Aiden’s mouth as he dipped his head, peering up at Finn beneath bushy brows. “I mean, you mule-headed Irishman, Libby never signed the papers,” Aiden emphasized, the seeds of a twinkle in his eyes, “which means she either forgot, overlooked it, or flat-out didn’t want to.”
Finn blinked, a slow smile easing across his face as the meaning of Aiden’s words finally sank in. “You don’t say,” he whispered, gaze trailing out the window in a distant stare, liking the way this sounded a whole lot more than he should.
Libby McShane.
Or better yet …
Mrs. Griffin McShane.
“Yes, sir, I do, and although I would have been spitting fire seventeen years ago if I’d found out then, right about now I’m feeling mighty smug.”
Finn’s smile hooked into a near scowl as he drilled Aiden with a sliver of a look. “I wouldn’t be feeling too blasted smug, O’Shea—you stole seventeen years from me with the love of my life, so what do you aim to do about it?”
A grin curled on Aiden’s face as he settled back in the bed. “Plenty, McShane. Beginning with me and mine moving into your cozy ranch house.”
Finn slacked a leg, hands parked low on his hips. “And just what is that supposed to accomplish?” he said in a lazy drawl, grateful Aiden was willing to stay at the ranch, something Finn hadn’t believed he would do. He allowed his scowl to slide into a smirk. “Besides giving me a monumental pain in the neck.”
Aiden cut loose with what sounded like a rusty bark, and Finn realized it was a cackle, the gleam in the man’s eyes confirming his laughter. “It would give me the chance to insist Libby stays with us, too.”
A wrinkle wedged at the bridge of Finn’s nose as his eyes narrowed. “And what in tarnation makes you think Libby will stay at my ranch when she’s only here for a short time and engaged to boot?”
“Was engaged,” Aiden stressed with a fold of his hands on his ample stomach, his shrewd look explaining why he was one of Virginia City’s most respected businessmen. “Can’t very well marry one man when she’s already married to another.”
Finn grunted and tossed his hat back on the credenza. “Wanna bet? The Libby I knew was cut from the same cloth as her father—stubborn to a fault. She’ll just sign those stupid papers and get the annulment herself.”
“Not if she doesn’t have those ‘stupid papers’ …” Aiden’s sentence tapered off, the wicked glint in his eye making Finn glad that for once, they were on the same side.
Sliding into the chair, Finn hunched forward with hands clasped, striving for a casual air that belied the sprint of his pulse. “So, what do you have in mind, O’Shea?” he said, not daring to believe he could ever have Libby again.
Aiden’s smile was devious. “How long do you think it will take to rebuild my ranch house?”
Finn cocked his head. “I don’t know—six months, maybe, depending on how many laborers you hire. Why?”
“You reckon that’s enough time to convince my girl you’re the one she wants?” A sparkle lit in Aiden’s eyes.
Enough time? Mulling it over, Finn thought of the fire-haired spitfire who’d drawn blood with a china teapot before she’d left. His smile went flat. As Virginia City’s most eligible bachelor, he had no doubt he could convince most widows and unmarried females in the county, just based on the cakes, pies, and casseroles that came his way. But Libby O’Shea McShane?
Humph. A lifetime might not be enough.
“Because several months ago Libby requested I send the legal documents to her after her professor proposed …”
Her professor? A nerve twittered in Finn’s temple in time with the one in his jaw.
“Which is how I discovered she not only didn’t sign them, but apparently I never mailed them to the Archbishop either. Just plum forgot after Maeve begged me to wait until Libby was good and settled in with her Aunt Marie in New York. So, I did, and that was that.”
Finn grinned. “God bless Maeve. I always liked that woman.”
A grunt erupted from Aiden’s square jaw. “Yes, well, she always liked you, too, which is why I had such a devil of a time convincing Libby that moving to New York was in her best interests.”
“Couldn’t have been too difficult,” Finn muttered, mouth taking a slant. “She never once tried to contact me or see me whenever she visited you, which I assumed she did.”
“Not much, I’m afraid.” Aiden leaned back on his pillow, regret shading his face once again. “Just flitted in and out once a year at Thanksgiving, always insisting we have holidays at Marie’s. And since Maeve jumped at any chance to visit her sister and family back in New York, it just became a habit, I’m afraid.” His gaze wandered out the window, the remorse etched into his face something Finn had never expected to see. “Especially since we had no grandchildren to keep us here,” he whispered, as if he, too, regretted the loss of children Finn had always hoped to have.
“So …” Finn interrupted Aiden’s reverie, not willing to waste another moment after seventeen long years apart from the woman he loved. “What’s your plan, O’Shea, because I guarantee that daughter of yours won’t let a piece of paper stand in her way.”
Aiden jolted, returning his attention to Finn once again. “Oh … yes, right.” He sat up straight, eyes thinning in thought. “Well, I’ll just inform Libby that the terms for receiving her paperwork will be moving in with us at your ranch for the six months it’ll take to rebuild our home.”
“And if she refuses?” Finn cocked his head, unconvinced.
“She won’t. It took me over a year to get the paperwork that far, so she’d have at least that on her own, plus she wouldn’t have the clout of Monsignor Murray behind her request.”
“That won’t stop her,” Finn said, quite certain that time was on Libby’s side and “her professor’s.”
Aiden all but preened. “No, but money will.”
Finn stared, eyes in a squint. “What do you mean, ‘money will’? I heard she was a teacher at some fancy girls’ school in New York—doesn’t she support herself?”
Husky laughter bounced off the walls. “Yes, Libby teaches at Vassar—”
“Vassar?!” Finn bolted straight up in the chair, a swear word teetering on the tip of his tongue. “No wonder I couldn’t track her down! I’d heard it was at The Convent of the Sacred Heart, whose Mother Superior,” he said with a dangerous glint in his eye, “threatened a restraining order if I didn’t stay away and stop sending letters.”
A ruddy shade of red crawled up the old man’s neck while Aiden laughed, the sound awkward as he scratched the back of his head. “Yes, a little rumor I started to keep you off-track I’m afraid, Finn, so I apologize once more.” He shifted in the bed, all business again. “But whether The Convent of the Sacred Heart or Vassar, the salary is minimal at best, so it hardly pays the bills for her comfortable lifestyle. Nor does it subsidize her passion—her blessed suffrage involvement. Which means I’m holding all the cards in this game of high stakes, McShane, so if she refuses, I’ll simply pull all my funds.”
Finn shook his head, well aware that Aiden O’Shea was both a card—and business—sharp who would win anyway he could, regardless of blood relation. Leaning back in his chair, Finn was tempted to prop his feet on the bed. “I just assumed she supported herself,” he said quietly, gaze trailing out the window while the final argument he and Libby had ever had replayed in his brain.
“Over-my-dead-body,” he’d shouted the day she left, nose to nose with the woman who’d riled his blood in more ways than one.
“That can be arranged,” she’d screamed right back, stomping out of his life so fast, she’d left a cold wind in her wake.
And a dead marriage.
Something cramped in his chest and he finally understood that he bore part of the blame for the demise of their relationship. They had both been so blasted young and ev
erything had happened so blasted fast that neither had the time to learn what marriage was really all about. No time to figure out that true love was a give-and-take process that, if nurtured by faith, eventually mellowed into giving one’s all.
Unconditional love. Something Finn had become painfully aware of when his sister died and left him with four kids to care for, nieces and nephews who had mostly healed his heart. Mostly. Finn released a silent sigh of regret, remembering all too clearly how the heat of attraction between Libby and him—and there had been plenty—had erupted into the heat of their anger, both so dad-gum pigheaded that when the smoke finally cleared, their marriage had gone down in flames.
Along with my heart.
A gruff clear of a throat interrupted his painful reverie, and Finn was suddenly aware that Aiden was staring at him as if Finn had gone soft in the head. And obviously he had if he was considering a cock-eyed venture like winning Libby back. Firming his jaw, he studied Aiden through razor-thin eyes. “Why are you doing this?” he asked, hardly able to believe that his former foe was now his partner in crime.
“Why?” It was Aiden’s turn to ponder his remorse as he gouged the bridge of his nose, a wash of ruddy color rising up his throat. “Well, son, I have a number of reasons, but the main one is because my miserable life passed before me in that fire, a flash of conviction that leveled far more than my home, I assure you.” He finally peered up with a rare humility despite the tight press of his lips. “It scorched my pride along with my house, Finn, showing me what a fool I’d been over the years, especially holding a grudge against you.”
Finn eased back in his chair, head cocked and arms folded. “Mind if I ask why on the grudge, sir? Never could figure it out.”
A large knot hitched in Aiden’s thick throat as he looked away. “I blamed it on your pa, of course, after he made that spectacle at my bank, claiming I cheated him.” He grunted, gaze trailing into a hard stare. “Cost me a fair amount of business that year, he did, but at least I managed to win most of it back after he—”
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