The Wild Sight

by Loucinda McGary

  Trying hard to contain her mirth, Rylie snorted again.

  “Stop that. You promised.”

  “Sorry,” she giggled. “But if all the single women I know thought they could find such a hunky CPA with an adorable accent in New Jersey, there’d be a mass exodus from California.”

  Donovan took a turn at rolling his eyes. “Very funny. Now I know for certain you’re part Irish with that load of blarney you’re handing me.”

  Suddenly, her pretty face went serious. “I know you don’t want to believe me, but Dermot is my father. After my mother died, I hired an investigator to find him.”

  He blew out a frustrated breath. “Your investigator is wrong, Rylie, and so are you. You’re not Dermot’s daughter. You can’t be.”

  “Why not?” she demanded, clutching his sweater sleeve. “Because I don’t have this Sight thing like you?”

  “No, because—” His eyes dropped to her hand, now lying flat on his forearm. A jolt of heat seared through him and scrambled his brain. “Because . . . ”

  He hooked his unencumbered arm around her slim waist and pulled her against him. His lips sought her tempting mouth. Sucking in her breath, she stiffened for a moment and flattened both her palms on his chest.

  All he could think was how warm she felt. How soft her lips would be. Cradling the back of her head with his free hand, Donovan fitted his mouth over hers.

  With a long sigh, Rylie moved her hands around his neck and went boneless, her lips parting under his. Pulse pounding loud in his ears, he plunged his tongue into the warm, moist recesses of her mouth. A breathy little moanescaped her as her tongue met his, then flicked inside his mouth, hot and sweet.

  Even through the layers of clothing, the feel of her breasts pressed against his chest sent desire flashing straight into his groin. His fingers encountered bare flesh beneath the hem of her top, and he shoved his hand under her shirt to caress the silky skin of her back. She jerked at the sensual contact, and broke the kiss.

  “Oh God!” she panted. “Donovan, oh my God!”

  While Donovan sat momentarily stunned, she flung herself away and leapt to her feet. Snatching up her purse, she darted to the door. He scrambled to stand, banged his shin on the coffee table, and muttered a curse under his breath. “Rylie, wait!” he blurted, but she was already out the door, her shoes clattering on the stairs.

  “Rylie!” he shouted again, and pounded down after her. But by the time he reached the bottom, she was outside. And when he jerked open the back door, she’d already started her car.

  Swearing, Donovan smacked his palm on the door frame, then turned and trudged back up the stairs, leaving the back door open. Inside the apartment, Rylie’s red hooded sweatshirt lay in the middle of the sitting room floor. He picked it up. The material still felt damp from the rain and carried a trace of the sweet flowery scent from her hair.

  Could he have possibly screwed this up any worse?

  He doubted it.

  Donovan laid the sweatshirt over the arm of the couch then sank down on the saggy cushion. Resting his head in his hands, he tried to think.

  Several long minutes later, when all his mind kept replaying was the taste and feel of Rylie Powell, his mobile rang. He knew even before he glanced at the number on the screen—his sister, Doreen. Time to take his lumps and do his penance.With a sigh of regret, he answered.

  Holy freaking hell! The words screamed inside Rylie’s skull as she careened onto the main roadway, car tires squealing on the wet pavement.

  She’d kissed her brother! With tongue! Her brother!

  Except Donovan O’Shea didn’t feel like her brother in any way, shape, or form. And even now, that nasty, dark corner of her mind was shouting for more. What was wrong with her?

  An oncoming car laid on its horn and she jerked the wheel as she realized she was driving on the wrong side of the road.

  “Knock it off, Rylie!” she ordered herself aloud. “Get a grip!”

  Taking several deep breaths, she willed her hands to stop shaking, and she eased up on the accelerator. She needed to wipe every other thought from her mind until she got safely back to her B&B in Dungannon. It didn’t work that way, of course. When she finally dashed inside Cavanagh House, she was still too upset to return the greetings of the manager and two other guests having tea in the parlor.

  Later, Rylie lay stretched across her bed with her pictures in front of her but not really seeing them when the manager, Mary Cooke knocked on her door.

  “Miss Powell, someone’s calling for you,” the kindly middle-aged woman said through the door. “Sounds like a Yank, but he says his name’s O’Shea.”

  Panic gripped her. She couldn’t talk to him. Not now.

  “T-tell him . . . ” she choked back a sob. “Tell him I’m in the tub and can’t talk.”

  “All right, dear. If that’s what you want.”

  Rylie listened to the sound of shoes tapping away while she squeezed her eyes tightly shut against the hot prickling tears.

  What she wanted? How about curl up and die of humiliation? But since that wasn’t going to happen, what she really wanted was to go home. Forget everything that had happened since she’d arrived in Ireland. But that wasn’t going to happen either. She heard the footsteps coming back down the hall and a moment later Mrs. Cooke rapped on her door again.

  “Miss Powell, he insisted on leaving his number.” Several long seconds ticked by and when Rylie didn’t answer, the woman sighed. “All right then, I’ll just slide it under the door. He asked for you to call him so that he could apologize. He didn’t say for what.” After several more long moments, the woman sighed again and her footsteps receded.

  The last thing Rylie intended to do was talk to Donovan O’Shea, though she wasn’t going to say that to nosy Mrs. Cooke. Whatever the B&B manager could imagine would pale in comparison to the truth anyway. Still feeling sick and disgusted with herself, she put her pictures and birth certificate away, and studiously avoided looking at the piece of paper lying by the door. Instead, she went over to the window and watched the rain drizzle down onto the hedge-lined garden, the pretty little picture of Ireland concocted for tourists.

  Too bad it wasn’t genuine. In the real Ireland, men left their families and started new ones. Then they left those and went back to the originals. Mothers disappeared and twenty years later, their kitchen knives showed up stuck in long dead corpses. And pub owners who didn’t drink had The Sight, but couldn’t tell you one damn thing of any use.

  An hour later, Rylie stopped staring into the darkness. She’d made up her mind. The only way to know for sure whether Dermot O’Shea was or was not her biological father was a DNA test. First thing tomorrow morning, she would go back to the facility, talk to the charge nurse, and convince Dermot O’Shea to provide her with the truth. And if he really wasn’t her father, as Donovan insisted, then what?

  Her disastrous affair with her boss Joel Davis had left her heart and ego so badly battered that in the eight months since she ended it, she’d gone out exactly once. Joel’s betrayal coupled with the grief of losing her mother had left her dazed and numb. Her sudden, unexpected attraction to Donovan had been confusing enough without the added incest factor. She didn’t have the strength to deal with any of it.

  Rummaging in her cosmetic bag, Rylie found the sleeping tablets the doctor had prescribed for her the week after her mother’s death. She’d brought the half-dozen remaining pills in case she had problems with jet lag. Gulping down two, she put on her pajamas, set her travel alarm for 6 a.m., and crawled into bed.

  A full night’s sleep and a hearty Irish breakfast gave Rylie the strength and purpose she needed to face the man she believed to be her father. At five minutes after eight, she parked her car in the lot of Holy Family Board and Care, got out in the persistent drizzly rain, and hurried inside.

  The same nurse who’d threatened to bodily toss Donovan and her out was once again in charge. Rylie introduced herself and asked to speak with h
er privately. Mrs. Kathleen Garvey, as the woman introduced herself, led Rylie to a private office behind the nurses’ station and asked her to wait until they’d finished serving the residents breakfast.

  Twenty minutes later, Mrs. Garvey reappeared and Rylie told her everything, showed her the photos, her birth certificate, even the gold ring. By the time she finished, a deep furrow creased the skin between the nurse’s pale auburn brows.

  “’Tis quite a compelling tale, Miss Powell,” she said, steepling her fingers. “And surely as wild as any I’ve heard.” Rylie’s shoulders slumped in defeat. “Then you don’t believe me either?”

  “On the contrary,” the nurse replied. “I do. If you were lyin,’ you’d have picked a far easier mark than Dermot O’Shea. And certainly one with more money.”

  “Then you’ll let me talk to him?” Sudden hope pumped through Rylie’s veins.

  Mrs. Garvey gave a resigned sigh. “Yes, but only briefly and I’ll stay in the room. His daughter will be right vexed when she finds out. And as for the son . . . but then, you already know what he’s like.” She shookher head and muttered, “Oil and water,” under her breath.

  Steps light with anticipation, Rylie followed the nurse down the hall. Brown envelope clutched tight in her right hand, she nearly bumped into Mrs. Garvey when the nurse halted and rapped on Dermot O’Shea’s door.

  “Dermot, ye’ve a visitor,” she called, then after two seconds, she thrust open the door.

  Dermot O’Shea pinned Rylie with an annoyed stare as soon as she stepped over the threshold. With his bed cranked into a sitting position, he wore the same blue pajamas as yesterday. His pure white hair drooped across one eye and stuck out at odd angles in back. White stubble bristled on his jaw.

  “Boh?” he grunted and craned his head to see if there was anyone behind her.

  “No,” the nurse replied. She placed his breakfast tray on top of the nightstand, and pushed the rolling table back within his reach. “But Miss Rylie Powell has come all the way from America to see you.”

  “Nuh,” Dermot growled like a petulant child and pointed at the door.

  “Hear her out, Dermot,” Mrs. Garvey scolded, motioning Rylie forward. “’Tis the least you can do.”

  The scowl on the mobile half of his face reminded Rylie of the expression Donovan had worn yesterday morning when he first saw her. Like father, like son.

  The nurse plunked the plastic communication device on the tabletop in front of Dermot, gave her a nod, then stepped back. Setting her purse on the floor, Rylie poked inside the brown envelope, pulled out the picture of her mother and laid it on Dermot’s tray.

  “Do you recognize her? That’s my mother, Jennifer Laski.” She took a deep breath then added, “She died of cancer six months ago.”

  Dermot shook his shaggy head, then reached for the stylus attached to his communication device. “Sorry” flashed across the screen, followed by, “Pretty. Like you.”

  Breaking eye contact, Rylie pulled out the other photos and placed the one of her as a toddler with her mother in front of him. “Maybe you recognize her here? Twenty-seven years ago, when she was a student at NYU, she married an Irishman, and a year later they had me.” She laid out the photos of her with her father. “I have no memory of my father, and my mother seldom spoke of him. But my birth certificate lists his name as Dermot O’Shea.”

  “Nuh,” Dermot insisted and tapped out “Not me” on his communication device.

  She smoothed the copy of her birth certificate on top of the photos and stared unflinchingly into his pale eyes. “Your son told me you spent a lot of time in Liverpool thirty or so years ago. My mother said my father came from Liverpool, and before that Belfast.”

  The muscles in Dermot’s jaw clenched. He stabbed the stylus at the words “Not me” still on the screen. Then he tapped out, “I luvd Moira.”

  Donovan’s mother. Tears blurred Rylie’s vision and she squeezed her eyes shut to keep them from spilling out. After taking a couple of deep steadying breaths, she finally dared to open her eyes and speak again.

  “So if you’re not my father, then you won’t mind taking a DNA test.” She did not make it a question.

  Dermot gave an unintelligible grunt and another of his half-scowls. For the briefest moment, Rylie thought she saw something flare in the depths of his pale blue eyes.

  “’Tis a very simple test,” the nurse interceded, patting Dermot’s shoulder. “Just a cotton swab inside your mouth. Doesn’t hurt a bit.”

  The old man’s gaze moved from Rylie to the nurse and back again. He shoved Rylie’s photos and birth certificate toward her, then tapped out, “Yes.”

  Giving a nod of approval, Mrs. Garvey patted his shoulder again, “There now, that’s more like it.”

  Rylie swept her things back into the envelope, careful not to touch Dermot’s gnarled fingers. Instead of feeling triumphant, she felt oddly deflated.

  “You can pick up a test kit at the hospital,” Mrs. Garvey informed her. “’Tis only three blocks away. I’ll call the lab so’s they can have one ready for you, shall I?”

  “I’d really appreciate it.” Without looking at Dermot again, Rylie turned and walked with the nurse out into the hall.

  “Tommy!” the woman bellowed down the corridor. “Help Mr. O’Shea with his bath and change his clothes.” Then she turned to Rylie. “I’ll make that call straight away. Can you find the hospital? The lab’s on the bottom floor at the back.”

  Nodding, Rylie shuffled out the front door, through the still drizzling rain to her car.

  The wiper blades on the Morris left more water on the windscreen than they removed. Donovan squinted through the smears as he turned into the parking lot of Holy Family. Just as he suspected, Rylie’s dark blue rental car occupied the same spot as yesterday. Cursing under his breath, he pulled into the empty space next to it.

  He should have driven straight here and not bothered to stop at her B&B first. But when the manager told him Rylie had left early, he’d known exactly where she went. Heaven knew how long she’d been here and what she’d been doing. This was his punishment for forgetting to set his alarm. After a restless night, he’d finally fallen asleep sometime after one and woke up just before eight.

  Still muttering curses, he slammed the car door and strode toward the entrance. Inside his jacket pocket, his mobile rang for the third time this morning, and for the third time, he ignored it. Doreen, or whoever was calling, could just wait awhile longer. He shoved through the door, and seeing no one at the front nurses’ station, didn’t slow his pace until he reached his father’s room.

  Without stopping to knock, he thrust open the door. His father sat in the chair, the nurse on one side of him, and Rylie on the other.

  “Precisely what do you think you’re doing?” he demanded.

  Rylie met his gaze then turned and wouldn’t look at him, while the nurse gave him a haughty glare. “Morning, Mr. O’Shea. Your father consented to give a DNA sample for Miss Powell.” She secured the cotton swab she held inside a plastic container and handed it to Rylie. “There ya go, m’dear.”

  Shoving the container into her purse, Rylie finally looked at him again. Her flinty eyes sparked with challenge.

  Donovan chose to ignore her for the moment and addressed his father instead. “Is this true, Da?”

  Dermot gave what passed for a nod and a grunt of approval.

  “Has anyone else been in to see you this morning?”

  “Nuh,” his father answered.

  “But the physical therapist is due any minute,” the nurse chimed in at the same time. “He’s working with Mrs. O’Halloran right now. So I’m afraid you can’t stay long.”

  Donovan gave the nurse an equally frosty glower, then addressed his father in a low, tightly controlled tone. “Remember what I said yesterday about the PSNI, Da. They will find out the truth of it.”

  “Nuh,” Dermot repeated, then gurgled a half-intelligible obscenity.

  Donovan co
uld feel his control starting to slip. “Fine, have it your way then.”

  Before he finished speaking, the old man’s pale eyes moved from him to Rylie and back again.

  “Boh?” Dermot grunted, glancing sidelong at Rylie once more.

  A rap on the door prevented Donovan from questioning his father further. The physical therapist stuck his head inside.

  “Time for your session, Mr. O’Shea.”

  “Out with the pair of you.” The nurse shooed Rylie and him in front of her as if they were wayward lambs.

  Donovan didn’t bid his father good-bye and he noticed Rylie didn’t either. When they reached the entrance, the nurse bustled off to her office. He positioned himself between Rylie and the front door, blocking her exit.

  “Why didn’t you call me back last night?” His tone sounded a bit sharper than he’d intended.

  Her eyes jerked up and confronted him. “I didn’t want to talk to you.”

  He took a deep breath and unclenched his hands. “Well, I wanted to apologize to you. I lost my head, and I’m very sorry I upset you.”

  She looked away, dark lashes sweeping down. His fingers twitched, and he battled an unreasoning urge to reach for her.

  “Are you angry at me for . . . ” She glanced at her purse. “Coming here and . . . you know.”

  Still trying to control his unruly libido, Donovan shook his head. “Of course not, though I am surprised Dermot agreed.”

  “Me too,” she said in a distinctly disappointed voice. “They told me at the hospital lab that it could take two or three weeks to get the results.”

  “And you have to go home before then,” he finished for her.

  She nodded, shoulders drooping in defeat. Her dejection and vulnerability sent a wave of empathy washing over him. Not knowing your own parentage must be bloody awful. Was that what made him want to comfort Rylie Powell? Put the sparkle back in her eyes?