Wasn’t that just the way of the bloody world? she thought, her protective bitterness returning in spades and her fragile heart once more shattered into pieces.
Chapter 1
Moira O’Brien sat in the kitchen of her grandfather’s cozy home by the Chesapeake Bay, a home he shared with Nell O’Brien O’Malley, with whom he’d been reunited only a few short years ago after a lifetime of being separated. The air was rich with the scent of cranberry-orange scones baking in the oven and Irish Breakfast Tea steeping in a treasured antique flowered teapot on the table. Nell had brought it home from Ireland after visiting her grandparents decades ago. She said it had been her Irish grandmother’s favorite.
“What should we be doing about our Kiera?” Nell asked them. Though Kiera hadn’t even come to Chesapeake Shores for her own father’s wedding to Nell or for Moira’s wedding to Luke O’Brien on the same day, Nell had always considered her family, embracing her and fretting over her as surely as she did her own children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren. She was the most nurturing person Moira had ever known.
Moira bounced her baby girl on her knee as she considered the problem they’d all been worrying about ever since they’d heard the news about Peter’s untimely death right on the heels of the far happier news about his engagement to Kiera.
“Kiera will make her own choices,” Dillon said, his tone a mix of resignation and worry. “I know my daughter all too well. Pushing her to bend in the way we’d like will never work. She’ll simply dig in her heels out of pure stubbornness, exactly as she did when she married Sean Malone against my wishes all those years ago. Right now she’s probably regretting the very fact that she let us convince her to move to Dublin in the first place. She’ll be listening to very little of the advice we offer.”
“Well, it’s sure that my brothers won’t be around to support her,” Moira said disdainfully. “She hasn’t once mentioned them since Peter died. I doubt they come around at all these days except to ask for a handout.”
Nell gave her a disapproving look, but Moira knew she was right. Her brothers were following a little too closely in their father’s drunken footsteps. “She belongs here with us,” she said emphatically, keeping her gaze steady on her grandfather. “You know I’m right. She needs the kind of family we’ve found here. A steady dose of the O’Briens will restore her spirits. She wasted years on bitterness and regrets after my dad left. I know she’d say she was working too hard to waste time on love, but the truth is she was too terrified to take a chance that she’d be making another poor choice. We can’t allow her to do the same again.”
To Moira’s surprise, it was Nell who promptly backed her.
“I agree that coming here is exactly what she needs,” she said, then reached over to stroke the baby’s cheek. “And I think our darling little Kate right here and her need for a grandmother’s attention is the very reason Kiera won’t fight us on this.”
Moira saw the light of near-certain victory spark in her grandfather’s eyes and knew Nell had hit on the perfect solution. “You’re suggesting I throw myself on her mercy, tell her that I’m in desperate need of help with the baby, even though our Kate is perfectly content in Carrie’s day care center,” Moira concluded.
“Which has been dreadfully overcrowded since the day it opened,” Nell claimed with exaggerated innocence.
“Dreadfully,” Dillon confirmed, nodding, his expression astonishingly serious for a man who knew they were bending the truth, if not flat-out breaking it. Nell’s great-granddaughter’s child care business was flourishing, that much was true, but she had more than enough competent staff to manage it.
“If you think it will take more to persuade her, there’s your own husband’s pub, which is in dire need of an extra pair of hands,” Nell added. “You’re far too busy with your photography and your travel to exhibitions to help my grandson out as you once did.”
Moira nodded. “True enough. Megan would have me traveling once a month if I’d agree to it. I suspect she’s exaggerating a bit, but she tells me she’s had to turn down requests for shows, because I won’t make myself available as often as she’d like. She’s got quite a knack for inducing guilt.”
“Exactly, but we can use that to our advantage with Kiera,” Nell said. “And my health is far too fragile for me to be spending my spare minutes in the kitchen at the pub keeping a watchful eye on the chef to be sure the menu doesn’t stray too far from proper Irish recipes.”
“Nell, you’ve given us a scare or two, but in all honesty, you’re about as fragile as a steel beam,” Moira replied, but she was laughing at the clever strategy. If she handled the performance convincingly, it would play on all of her mum’s weaknesses, most especially on her need to be useful while keeping a firm grip on her independence.
“And you’re wickedly devious to boot,” she told Nell. “Both traits I admire, I might add.”
“I’ll thank you for that,” Nell said, clearly taking it as the praise Moira had intended. “With a contrary family the size of mine, it’s always best to have a few tricks up my sleeve. Sadly, most of them are onto me now.”
“Isn’t this something we should at least be discussing with Luke?” Dillon asked, inserting a word of caution. “If we intend to push Kiera into a job at his pub, he should be brought on board with our plan.”
“Leave Luke to me,” Moira said confidently. “I think I can convince him of the advantages of having her here. It would allow him more free time at home with me and Kate. Mum is far more experienced at running a pub than I ever thought of being. Not only was she more competent, but she loved it as I never did. She’ll be a true asset.”
“Are we agreed, then, that once Luke’s given us his blessing, Moira should be the one to make the call?” Dillon asked. “It’ll receive a better reception than any suggestion that comes from me. Kiera and I have made our peace, but it’s tenuous at best.” He studied Moira. “How are your skills at bending the truth without getting caught?”
Moira laughed. “An improvement on yours, and that’s a fact.”
* * *
Luke walked into his house on Beach Lane well after midnight, expecting to find his wife and daughter sound asleep as they usually were. Instead, he opened the door to discover the soft glow of dozens of candles and his wife wearing one of those shimmery gowns that skimmed over her curves and never failed to cause a hitch in his breath in the few seconds before he managed to get it off her.
Suspicion warred with heat, but as usual the heat won. With his gaze locked with hers, he tried to assess the glint in her eyes as he crossed the room and accepted the glass of champagne she held out to him.
“It’s been a while since I’ve had a welcome like this at the end of the day,” he murmured, his gaze drifting to the swell of her breast where the gown had dipped low.
“And it’s long overdue, it is,” Moira said, her voice soft and filled with promise.
She pushed him back against the cushions of the sofa and settled snugly against him. “I’ve missed our time like this. Haven’t you?”
“It’s not as if our love life has been lacking,” he commented in a choked voice as her hand tugged his T-shirt free and slipped below to caress bare skin.
“Not lacking for sure,” she conceded. “But less spontaneous. You can’t deny that. With our schedules so demanding, we practically need an appointment to have a moment like this.”
“And you’ve been missing the spontaneity?”
“Old married couples need an occasional spark to liven things up,” she said, and managed to say it with a straight face.
As intrigued as he was by where this was heading, Luke couldn’t seem to stop the laugh that bubbled up. “Old married couple? Is that how you’re thinking of us these days? When did we both turn gray and start hobbling around? In my opinion, we’ve barely left the honeymoon ph
ase.”
She frowned at his teasing. “If you’re not interested after I’ve gone to all this trouble,” she huffed in typical Moira fashion. She’d always been too quick to take offense.
He brushed a wayward strand of hair from her cheek. “I am always interested in you,” he contradicted. “And will be until the day I die. However, Moira, my love, I know you a bit too well to take this seduction at face value. You have something on your mind. Out with that and then we’ll get to the rest of the evening as you’ve planned it.”
She looked as if she wanted to argue, but in the end she sighed and sat back, then took a healthy gulp of her champagne. Since Moira rarely indulged in alcohol, Luke figured whatever she was about to tell him was likely to be something she knew he wasn’t going to want to hear.
“It’s about my mum,” she confessed.
Luke’s antenna went on full alert. He and Kiera had called a tentative truce since he’d married her daughter, but they weren’t exactly close. And though he sympathized with what she must be going through since Peter McDonough’s unexpected and sudden death, he couldn’t imagine what that had to do with him.
“I was with Nell and my grandfather earlier,” Moira continued.
“So they’re involved in this, too?” he asked, his antenna now waving as if there were a dozen signals coming at him all at once, none of them boding well. If his grandmother was involved, there was a very good chance it involved the sort of sneaky meddling that terrified everyone in the family. The only person even better at it was his uncle Mick O’Brien. Thankfully, so far his name hadn’t come up.
“Just tell me,” he instructed his wife. “What are the three of you conspiring about when it comes to your mother, and what could it possibly have to do with me?”
Moira leaned toward him, her expression earnest. “You know how devastated she was by Peter’s death. We think she needs a change of scenery if she’s not to go back to her old ways.”
“Her old ways?”
“You know, retreating from the world, wallowing in her misery and bitterness,” she explained. “I’ve already heard hints of that when we’ve spoken. She feels betrayed. The walls are going back up. It happened after my dad left. I can’t let her waste the rest of her days being all alone again. She’s still young enough to enjoy a full and happy life, if only she’ll allow it.”
Luke recalled how impossible Kiera had been when they’d first met in Ireland. The only person topping her in that department had been the woman sitting right here with him, her skin glowing, the strap on her gown sliding provocatively low, and her voice filled with passion, albeit of an entirely different sort than when he’d first walked in the door. What sort of idiot was he to have redirected that passion to this conversation?
“I’m guessing you three have come up with a solution to save her from herself,” he said warily.
“We have,” Moira said enthusiastically. “We think she needs to come here, to be with us, with all of the O’Briens. She needs to be surrounded by family. It’ll show her just how a life is meant to be lived. We’d be setting a good example.”
Though Luke desperately wanted to argue, to claim it was a terrible idea to remind Kiera of all the family closeness she’d just lost when Peter died, he couldn’t do it. Despite the flare-ups of old family feuds and conflicts, there was healing power in the O’Brien togetherness. He’d experienced it his entire life. And there was healing magic in Chesapeake Shores, as well. He’d have to be hard-hearted to deny that to Moira’s mother.
“Fine. She’ll come for a visit,” he said. “Why would I object to that? When we built our house, we included a guest suite just for such a visit. When you furnished it, I know you did it to your mother’s taste, hoping she’d find it comfortable the first time she came. I believe her favorite Irish blessing hangs on a plaque just inside the door.”
“She’ll find it welcoming, there’s no doubt of that,” Moira said. “But there’s a bit more. We’re thinking of something a little longer than a quick visit.”
And here it comes, Luke thought, barely containing a sigh. “Tell me.”
“I’m going to ask for her help with Kate,” Moira began slowly, then added in a rush, “And you’re going to give her my old job at the pub.” Her smile brightened. “Won’t that be grand? With all of her experience, she’ll be far more help than I ever was.”
He studied the hopeful glint in his wife’s eyes and didn’t even try to contain the sigh that came. When he didn’t immediately speak the emphatic no that hovered on his lips, Moira beamed, clearly taking his silence as agreement.
“And you’ll talk to Connor about getting her a work visa as your Irish consultant, just as you did for me?” she asked, referring to his cousin, who’d become a first-rate lawyer. “I understand it may be a bit trickier these days with changes in the law, but I have every confidence Connor can manage it.”
“I’m a bit surprised you haven’t already discussed this with him,” Luke said.
“Never before talking to you,” she said with a hint of indignation that made him chuckle.
“Then you weren’t a hundred percent certain I’d go along with your scheme?”
“Maybe ninety-five percent,” she admitted. “You’ve a stubborn streak that sometimes works against me.”
“Pot calling the kettle black,” he retorted. “You know you have me twisted around your finger. And what you can’t accomplish, Nell can. I’m quite sure she’d have been by first thing tomorrow if you’d put out a distress call.”
“But it’s not coming to that, is it?” she asked hopefully.
Luke studied his wife closely. “Does it mean so much to you to have her come and stay for longer than a brief visit?”
“I think this change is what she needs. So do Nell and Grandfather. And I owe her, Luke. She gave up everything for my brothers and me. I don’t think I realized how hard she worked or how many sacrifices she made until I’d had a taste of working in a pub myself. I used to blame her for not spending more time with us, but now that we have Kate, I can’t imagine being away from her as much as my mum was away from us. It must have been hard for her to put work over her children. My brothers may be ungrateful louts, but I’m not.”
“No, you’re definitely not that,” Luke said, though he couldn’t help regretting it just a little. Then, again, having Kiera underfoot would be a small price to pay for the joy that Moira had brought into his life. “I’ll call Connor in the morning.”
Her eyes sparkled. “Seriously? You’ll do it?”
“Was there ever any doubt? Now, come here, Moira, my love,” he said, beckoning her closer. “Let’s not waste this effort you’ve gone to tonight. I know you think we’re somehow going to gain more time to ourselves with this plan of yours, but I have my doubts. I think we need to take full advantage of this bit of spontaneity.”
“There will be more chances, I promise,” Moira said, launching herself into his arms. “You’ll see.”
It helped her case that the strap on her gown slid off. After that, Luke could barely think of his own name, much less any arguments he might have wanted to offer.
* * *
Moira was thoroughly pleased with her efforts the night before. She might have used a little manipulation to get her way, but she was pretty sure Luke was pleased enough with the reward for his acquiescence.
When there was no response to her tap on the kitchen door at Nell’s, she headed for the garden. Sure enough, Nell was on her knees weeding, while her grandfather observed.
She settled into the Adirondack chair next to his. “Shouldn’t you be helping?” she asked him.
“Fool woman chased me off,” he grumbled. “She claims I don’t know a flower from a weed. Now, I ask you, how am I supposed to tell the difference this time of year? They’re all just green things poking through the dirt.�
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Nell glanced up at that. “Wasn’t a nursery among your business interests in Ireland?”
“Yes, and others ran it quite successfully,” he countered.
Nell turned to Moira. “If he were half as uninvolved in that business as he claims, you’d think by now he’d have let me educate him about the difference,” she said tartly. “I think he finds it convenient not to know.”
Moira laughed. It was obviously a familiar argument. “Something tells me you’re right, Nell. My grandfather has mastered any number of skills over the years. If he’s not grasping this one, there’s a reason for it.”
Nell took off her gardening gloves. When she went to stand up, Moira started to her feet to assist her, only to be waved off.
“The day I can’t get up on my own, I’ll have to give this up,” Nell said. “And since I don’t intend to do that until I’m dead and gone, I’ll manage.”
“At least you got her to take a break for a cup of tea,” Dillon said. “I’ve been trying since I came out here. It’s probably stone-cold by now.”
Still he poured her a cup and set it on the table beside her chair. “If you’d like a cup, you’ll need to run into the house for one,” he told Moira.
“Nothing for me. I just dropped Kate off at day care and stopped by here to give you both an update.”
“You’ve talked to Kiera, then?” Nell said.
“No, only to Luke. He’s agreed to the plan.”
“I’ve no intention of asking how you persuaded him,” her grandfather said. “I’ll just accept the outcome as a blessing.”
“He’s promised to speak to Connor this morning to get him started on the paperwork. Now, if you’ll make an airline reservation for Mum, I think we can put our plan in motion,” Moira told him.
Dillon nodded at once. “I’ll go straight in and do that now, though I’d probably best buy the kind that’s refundable just in case she balks,” he said. He touched Nell’s cheek. “Shall I warm that tea for you?”
I'll Be Home for Christmas Page 29