The Darkling Bride

by Laura Andersen

  “We used to date. Not any longer. But Pen is someone who knows my past without ever trying to make me relive it. It makes things easier.”

  That stopped her irritation in its tracks. “I get that. Sorry.”

  “For what? That I have problems making friends?” Had he moved closer, or was it her imagination. “Or that you were jealous?”

  “You rate yourself very high, Aidan Gallagher.”

  “The arrogance is for public view. I think you understand that as well.”

  “You’re trying to tell me you’re really shy and unassuming.”

  The sound he made was part laugh, part pure exasperation. “Only with you. Probably because I never know what you’re thinking.” He raised a hand and lifted a strand of hair off her neck, his fingers brushing her skin. “What are you thinking, Carragh Ryan?”

  That you’ve lost your mind—that I’ve lost my mind—that Nessa would not like this at all—oh dear, I really am a gothic heroine…Her Boston-bred attitude came to her rescue. “I’m thinking that you’ve had too much to drink.”

  “Is that true?” he whispered. His hand stayed cupped between her neck and her cheek, not quite a caress but not quite anything else. “Or are you thinking what I am?”

  “And what is that?”

  “How much I want to do this.”

  His lips touched hers at the same moment his hand tightened and his fingers caught in her hair. His other hand came up to match it, and Carragh found herself being thoroughly kissed in a way she never had been before. She had experienced seductive and aggressive and playful…but no one had ever kissed her as sweetly as did Aidan Gallagher.

  When he pulled away, they both had to steady their breathing. “Was that what you were thinking?” he asked softly.

  A gothic heroine would have said a silent yes with her eyes and a socially acceptable no with her mouth. To hell with that. “Yes.”

  “I’m glad.” He stepped back and offered her his arm. “Then if you’re not going to let me lock you up in the library, at least let me escort you back. Mrs. Bell makes an amazing apple cake. It will disappear fast.”

  There were glances when they returned—mostly discreet, the exception being Nessa, whose scrutiny was unmistakable. Philip looked none too pleased, either. Carragh deliberately turned away from them and concentrated on Aidan at her side. He introduced her to a few people—including the beautiful Penelope, who engaged her in vivid conversation about Boston and Harvard, where it turned out her older sister had gone to school. All in all, she could hardly believe how fast time went. People began departing before she could realize she was tired.

  Aidan, with the exquisite judgment of someone who knew his family well, sent her off to her room before she could be trapped by anyone. “I’ll see you in the morning,” he said, his hand on her elbow at the bottom of the staircase. “I thought we’d leave for Glendalough by eight?”

  She agreed and floated upstairs like the gauzy princesses she professed to despise. The weariness she felt was the pleasant sort that promised deep sleep and good dreams.

  When she opened her door, it took a few seconds to understand what she was seeing, and then she caught her breath in dismay.

  Her bed was a heap of various fabrics—velvet, satin, silk, lace—cut and ripped and tossed on top of each other in what looked like fury. Every single item of clothing borrowed from both Kyla and Nessa had been deliberately destroyed.

  With malice aforethought.

  That phrase swam dizzy laps through Carragh’s mind ten minutes later while the Gallagher family stood in her bedroom and argued about what had happened and what to do about it.

  Philip wondered aloud why no one was calling the police. Nessa, looking pale and fragile, picked through fabric as though trying to reconstruct what had been destroyed. The vintage items, she pointed out to no one in particular, could never be replaced. Carragh stared at Aidan, leaning against the closed door with arms crossed. He was staring at Kyla, standing just inside the doorway.

  “What do you think?” he asked his sister.

  “Me? I suppose the logical response is to call the police.”

  Nessa stopped fussing with the fabric. “There’s no need for that.”

  “I said it was a logical response, not a proper one,” Kyla offered. “I agree with Nessa, there’s no need to involve outsiders in a minor case of vandalism.”

  Aidan’s face was stony. “Vandalism that involved a measure of violence.”

  His sister remained calm. “If it’s Miss Ryan you’re concerned about, Aidan, I might point out that the destruction was directed at Gallagher possessions, not hers.”

  “Someone was in this room with shears strong enough to cut and an anger that overrode common sense. If they wanted to merely attack Gallagher possessions, there are many more public spaces in which to do it. Whoever did this had a personal motive.”

  “Or wished to make us think so.”

  It was as though Kyla and Aidan were the only two in the room. There was intensity in the way they stared at each other, trying to divine what might lay behind the other’s words. The tension was so thick that it took Carragh a minute to understand what Kyla had implied.

  “She means me,” Carragh said flatly.

  Everyone swung their gazes to her then, even Nessa looking faintly surprised.

  “She means I might have done all this myself.”

  “Why?” Aidan asked. The sharpness of the word was a reminder that he wasn’t just a Gallagher—he was a police officer who presumably knew how to interrogate suspects.

  Swinging between defensiveness and real fear—Carragh didn’t think violent destruction of haute couture the sort of thing friendly ghosts did—she answered, “As I didn’t actually do it myself, I can’t give you the reason. To get attention, maybe?”

  “That’s absurd,” Aidan said. “Anyway, you were never out of sight long enough to do something like this.”

  Philip spoke up. “She was gone for a good fifteen minutes right before supper.”

  Carragh wondered what she could say in her defense without exposing that private moment outside the library. She didn’t want the precious memory turned over and over by others. Aidan took the decision out of her hands. “She was with me,” he said coldly, his expression daring Philip to press the issue.

  “She wouldn’t have had to disappear,” Kyla pointed out. “It’s her room, no one’s been in it since she left.”

  “You think I did this before the party even started?” Carragh was astonished, then furious.

  “I think it would be folly to overlook the obvious.”

  For the first time, Carragh realized that Kyla truly and heartily disliked her. Maybe even hated her. Was it possible she’d found out about her affair with Philip? If so, then cutting up gowns and throwing the blame on Carragh seemed quite likely.

  Aidan said, “It’s late and we’re all tired. We’ll talk about it tomorrow. Everyone go to bed.”

  Carragh hadn’t heard his lord of the manor voice before—despite her egalitarian views, it was impressive. He stood at the door, waiting for the others to file out. Nessa was the last, pausing to lay her hand on Carragh’s arm. Her palm had the same powdery texture as the onionskin pages of the library catalog.

  “I’m sorry to have exposed you to such unpleasantness, Miss Ryan. I assure you, my only intent in bringing you here was to help with the library. But it seems the castle has other plans for you. You should be careful.”

  When Nessa had exited, Aidan said, “Lock your door behind me.”

  As if that would help her sleep easily after everything that had happened.

  She stared at the painted Jenny Gallagher in challenge. “Now would be a good time for you to start talking,” she said to the woman in the painting. “Perhaps the name of whoever did this?”

  But Jenny merely looked back at her with that serene, timeless gaze.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  Carragh and Aidan slipped out of Deeprath Cas
tle as the sun was rising. He’d knocked on her door at six, asking if she could set off earlier than planned to avoid being caught by any of his family. After her princess outfit of last night, the jeans, hoodie, and trainers she wore were a reminder that this wasn’t actually a fairy tale. Even if the two of them were hunting treasure, of a sort. In her backpack she had protein bars, a notebook and pen, and a copy of the Bride poem she’d been studying. She assumed Aidan had much the same in his. They were half a mile from Deeprath before either of them spoke.

  “I didn’t do it.” Carragh had been practicing ways to say it to convince Aidan to believe her. Not too belligerent, not too needy, no craven appeal to whatever personal feelings had been expressed in the corridor…

  Aidan’s surprise was evident. “I know that. You’re not that stupid.”

  “Thank you for trusting to my intelligence and not my morality,” she said drily.

  “Please. If you were going to break any moral codes, it would be to steal half my library.”

  The clever—and accurate—remark made her laugh despite herself. “That is true.”

  He showed no desire to speculate about who might have destroyed the clothing, but Carragh had her own ideas. She had carefully retrieved each piece of fabric last night and laid them in a neat pile on the desk, assuming that Mrs. Bell would be tasked with removing them. And while she’d worked, Carragh had turned over the possible identities of the vandal. If not Kyla, then she’d bet money on Philip. He knew she’d been out of sight of Nessa and the others last night, no doubt watched Aidan slip away after her, and was certainly malicious enough. Carragh didn’t fool herself that it was because she was such a fascinating creature—Philip merely believed in controlling his women and not the other way around. Her rejection must have seriously wounded his ego.

  Once again the Round Tower was the first thing she saw, its conical cap drawing the eye up and pointing it toward heaven. Or the sky, if one was less religiously inclined. Approaching as they did from the southeast, they had to traverse the length of Glendalough. With no one else in sight at this early hour, Carragh could almost imagine the distant figures of monks and clerics and students—and Darkling Brides—pacing slowly along the green paths to their various duties. Or hear the bells ringing from the seven churches that Glendalough had been known for.

  Aidan pointed out Trinity Church in the distance to their right, much closer to the road than the rest of the ruins, with local Laragh houses looking down on it. They crossed the river and came up the path that bordered St. Kevin’s Kitchen—with its own round tower, which looked like a chimney—and St. Kevin’s Cathedral. Next to the church an enormous stone cross loomed over the surrounding graves. Unlike most Celtic crosses, this one had no carving on its face.

  “Stop a minute,” Aidan said. He stepped next to the eight-foot cross. “Legend says that if one can stand with one’s back against St. Kevin’s Cross and reach around to touch one’s fingers together, one’s wish will be granted.”

  Carragh studied it skeptically. “That certainly seems to favor someone with longer arms. Have you ever done it?”

  “Tried, but you’re right, a seven- or eight-year-old’s arms aren’t long enough. You should try it.”

  She laughed, but dropped her backpack in the grass and pressed her back firmly against the stone cross. “Now I just…reach?”

  No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t quite make her fingers touch. Aidan encouraged her. “Just another inch, even half an inch—”

  Carragh stepped away. “I could only get another half inch if I dislocated one or both of my shoulders. And then I should merely have to wish them whole again. You do it.”

  From the moment Aidan put his back to the cross, his mind seemed to be elsewhere. Or, more accurately perhaps, else when. Had his mother stood here and cheered him on as a child?

  When his fingers met, she crowed, “And there’s a wish the saint shall have to grant you. What will it be?”

  “I can’t tell you that,” he said with mock sternness. “But don’t worry, I won’t waste my wish on something…” He paused, the look in his eyes similar to the one he’d turned on her last night. Just before they’d kissed.

  She swallowed. “On something trivial?”

  “On something I figure I can accomplish on my own.”

  “What have I told you about arrogance?” But Carragh couldn’t help smiling. “Keep your wish, then. And lead on.”

  To get to the Lady Chapel—St. Mary’s Church, as it was known today—they had to veer southwest from the Round Tower, past the Priest’s House and through the main part of the monastic graveyard. The remains of the nave and chancel church were soft-edged against the iffy light of the morning, the stones looking less jagged and more inviting. The nave dated from the tenth century, and Aidan took her around to the west side, where the original doorway remained, with its granite jambs. When they passed beneath it, he directed the flashlight he’d brought above their heads.

  “Look up.”

  Carragh stretched onto her toes, straining to see.

  “Look just there.” Aidan guided her eyes with the light. “It helps if you know what you’re looking for. It’s the center of—”

  “A saltire cross!” Carragh cried.

  “Yes.”

  The saltire was a diagonal cross, most commonly seen on the flag of Scotland. The four arms of this one reached out from a central circle, each arm also ending in a circle.

  “Why is it here?” she asked.

  “Probably another form of sanctuary cross, like the one at the gatehouse. Since the chapel was outside the inner circle walls—and likely was a dedicated church for women—perhaps this was a safe space for women who needed sanctuary? No one knows for certain.”

  They passed into the remains of the nave, elegant in its proportions despite the lack of roof and the jagged walls that ended at various heights. Through another doorway they could see the chancel, which had been added at a later date, but Carragh wanted to linger in the nave.

  “Do you know,” she mused aloud, “I used to say that I wished I could live in the past. But my mother is a terribly practical woman—judges mostly are—and she used to point out all the difficulties. Lack of sanitation and hygiene and bad diet, not to mention the fact that the odds that I would have been living in a castle as a noble were dreadfully low. Much more likely, she used to tell me, that I’d be born a peasant, either die in childhood or live long enough to bear ten children and count myself lucky if three or four of them lived to grow up.”

  “So you gave up your fantasies.”

  “No, I simply decided that if I actually did wind up in the Middle Ages or the Renaissance, I’d have taken the veil.”

  He laughed. “Become a nun?”

  “Why not?” she challenged. “If you were of sufficient birth, you could get an education that most women weren’t offered. And even if you were a peasant, at least you had somewhere stable to live and eat. And it removed at one stroke a woman’s highest risk of death—childbirth.”

  “I suppose that’s true.” He regarded her closely. “I suppose I can see the studying part, but—”

  “But how would I manage to live without a man like Aidan Gallagher offering to kiss me?” She couldn’t help teasing; it had been so long since she’d met anyone she wanted to talk and laugh with, and not just touch.

  That didn’t mean she needed to throw herself at him. “Didn’t we come here to see the graveyard?” she reminded him.

  There wasn’t much to see—a few stone slabs in the grass, broken reminders of the lives buried beneath them. “Not many markers,” Aidan pointed out. “But then, there wouldn’t be, would there? Not as it was meant for unbaptized children.”

  Hard to get more depressing than that. Carragh steeled herself against sentiment and said, “We’re here to find a clue. I hope you can figure out what your mother intended.”

  As Aidan walked slowly through the overgrown grass, Carragh watched him and held
her tongue. Figure out what your mother intended. Your dead mother. She considered how she might feel if their positions were reversed, and her instant shudder told her everything she needed to know about the strain he must be under. Hadn’t she flatly refused to open the door to her own past?

  Impulsively, she stepped to his side and touched his arm. “We don’t have to do this, Aidan. Wherever your mother’s hunt wandered, surely it ended at the castle. And who’s to say this has anything to do with their deaths? We’re probably just wasting our time.”

  Something flicked her ear. Carragh’s hand went up automatically, but she already knew there wouldn’t be any convenient bug or errant leaf blown there. Not when the flick had been accompanied by a sigh of pure exasperation.

  “You’re right,” Aidan announced, oblivious to the invisible. “Not about it being a waste of time—we both know it isn’t. But let’s forget the clues, forget the hunt, for a few hours. Let me take you out on the Upper Lake. I know someone with a boat nearby—I want to show you Temple na Skellig.”

  Carragh half expected another sign or sound of displeasure, but Aidan’s plan seemed acceptable to whatever force of heaven or imagination walked with her. “As long as you promise you know what you’re doing,” she said. “I don’t swim.”

  * * *

  —

  You could tell the temperature of a family by appearing when they did not expect it. The temperature at Deeprath Castle was distinctly frosty this Saturday afternoon. Sibéal could feel it the moment she pulled her complaining car into a makeshift parking spot. Afraid her car would not be able to tackle the long rocky drive again, she left it just before the open iron gate and walked the mile to the castle with a distinct sense of moving back in time.

  What was it Philip Grant had said about Deeprath? “Nothing happens there that the castle doesn’t know about.” Now to just figure out how to get the castle to talk to her.

  She had learned to recognize the clues her body gave her as a case moved to a close. A muddled case that didn’t reach a clear conclusion was accompanied by muddled physical symptoms like congestion and inflammation. But when a case was on the verge of breaking, her senses sharpened and clarified, often leaving her with tension headaches and muscles that hurt at each day’s end from being held tight all day. She had that feeling now, and knew if she could keep her head and not be lost in the minutiae of details and possibilities, she would have the answer Superintendent O’Neill had demanded by Monday.