Carla Neggers (2 page)

2

THEY DIDN’T TALK
on the hike back to their car or the drive back to their borrowed cottage in the Kerry hills across Kenmare Bay. Colin drove. He’d adjusted quickly to driving on the left, but the high, thick hedges and narrow roads—each with its own quirks—kept him on alert.

He’d known he and Emma wouldn’t talk the moment he’d mentioned Declan’s Cross and she’d given him that tight look. He liked to joke that he could do deep-cover work because he himself wasn’t deep, but Emma was. She had layers of secrets. Sharpe secrets, Sister Brigid secrets, FBI secrets.

Emma secrets.

He didn’t have secrets. He just had stuff he couldn’t talk about.

And he had his demons. He’d come to Ireland because of them. His months of undercover work had taken a toll not just on him but on his family and friends—and on Emma, even in the short time they’d known each other. They’d met in September on his brief respite at home in Rock Point.

Then he went away again, and when he came back, he’d brought some of his bad guys with him.

The short version,
he thought as he pulled into the gravel driveway of the little stone cottage he and Emma had shared for the past two weeks. He’d stayed here on his own for several days before she couldn’t stand it any longer—as she’d put it—and got on a plane in Boston, flew to Shannon, rented a car and found him.

Colin hadn’t asked her to turn around and go back to Boston without him.

Maybe he should have.

It was dark now, the wind shifting, turning blustery. He glanced at Emma, but she had already clicked off her seat belt and was slipping out of the car.

Definitely preoccupied.

He was in no rush. Let her take all the time she needed before she told him about the Sharpes and Declan’s Cross. Wendell Sharpe had lived and worked in Dublin for the past fifteen years. Whatever was on her mind likely involved him. Colin had drunk whiskey with old Wendell. Interesting fellow. Maybe not quite the analytical thinker his granddaughter was but definitely a man with secrets.

Colin got out of the car, not minding the spray of cold rain. He grabbed their packs from the back and headed up a pebbled path to the cottage. The front door was painted a glossy blue, a contrast to the gray stone exterior. Finian Bracken, the owner, an Irish priest serving a parish in Rock Point, had told Colin to stay as long as he wanted. They’d become friends over the past few months, maybe as much because of their differences as in spite of them.

Fin couldn’t bring himself to stay in the cottage. It was a reminder of his life before the priesthood, when he’d been a successful businessman, a husband and a father. He and his wife had renovated the tiny ruin of a place, adding a bathroom, kitchen, skylights, richly colored fabrics. It had been their refuge, he’d told Colin, a favorite spot to spend time with their two daughters.

Never in Fin’s worst nightmares had he imagined he would lose all three of them. Sally, little Kathleen and Mary. They’d drowned seven years ago in a freak sailing accident.

Fin had removed any personal mementoes, but Colin thought he could feel the presence of his friend’s lost wife and daughters and the happy times they’d had there.

He set the packs on the tile floor and pulled the door shut behind him. He liked being here. He liked having Emma here. The rest would sort itself out.

He watched her as she got on her knees and carefully, methodically, placed sods of turf in the stone fireplace. Colin liked the smell of burning peat, and a fire would warm up the single room and loft in minutes.

She rolled back onto her heels and stared at the fire as it took hold. Then she glanced up at him, the flames reflecting in her green eyes. “I hate to leave this place,” she said.

“Ah, yes.” He moved closer to her. “The cold, cruel world awaits.”

She stood, and he slipped an arm around her waist, kissed the top of her head. Even her hair smelled like mud, but he didn’t mind. She leaned into him. “I thought we’d have a few more nights together here. It’s the most romantic cottage ever, isn’t it? But we need to go to Declan’s Cross, Colin. At least I do.”

“There is a Sharpe connection to this village, then.”

She eased an arm around his middle, the lingering tentativeness of even two weeks ago gone now. “I’ve reserved a room at the O’Byrne House Hotel,” she said. “It’s on the water, right in the village of Declan’s Cross.”

“That was fast.”

“The joys of smartphones.”

And she’d had her plan fixed in her mind when they’d arrived back from their hike. “Have you ever been to Declan’s Cross?” he asked.

“Once, when I worked with my grandfather in Dublin. I was only there for the day. The O’Byrne House wasn’t a hotel then. It was a rambling, boarded-up private home. It opened as a hotel last fall. Apparently its spa is quite nice.”

“A spa,” Colin said, as if he were translating a foreign language.

“I bet it offers a couple’s massage.”

“Dream on, Emma.”

She grinned. “I think you’d enjoy a hot stone massage.”

“I’d rather have you heat up my stones, Special Agent Sharpe.”

“You’re hopeless.” She tightened her hold on him, her grin gone now. “Massages are good for demon fighting.”

He wasn’t going to be distracted by talk of his demons. He drew her against him. “What’s good for extracting Sharpe secrets?”

“There are secrets and there are confidences, and there are things I just can’t tell you.” She broke away from him and grabbed a black-iron poker, stirred the fire. “I wish I had a fireplace in my apartment in Boston.”

“Emma.”

She turned, and now the hot flames deepened the green of her eyes. “It was a great hike today, but I smell like dried mud, sweat and sheep dung.”

“Just mud,” he said.

“Such a gentleman. I’ve no regrets. I love hiking the Irish hills.”

Still trying to change the subject, or at least delay telling him what was going on. He wasn’t easily put off. “Roaming the Irish hills is different from figuring out what drives people to steal art. Is Declan’s Cross the scene of an art heist the Sharpes investigated?”

Emma sank onto a bright blue-and-white rug in front of the fireplace, kicked off her shoes and tucked her knees under her chin as she stared at the flames. “It’s the scene of an art heist we’re still investigating.”

Colin remained on his feet. He was restless, but he knew he had to be patient. An unsolved art theft was right up Emma’s alley as both a Sharpe and an FBI agent. “What was stolen?” he asked.

“Three Irish landscape paintings and an unusual Celtic cross.” She still didn’t look up from the fire. “They were stolen from the O’Byrne House ten years ago, on a dark November night much like tonight.”

“Your grandfather investigated?”

“Not at first. Not until after another theft in Amsterdam six months later.”

“The work of the same thief?”

“We believe so, yes. He’s struck at least eight more times since then. London, Paris, Oslo, Venice, San Francisco, Dallas, Brussels and Prague.”

“A different city each time?”

“Yes.”

“Patterns?”

She hesitated, then said, “Some.”

She didn’t go on. Colin sat next to her, feeling the warmth of the slow-burning fire, her intensity. “Declan’s Cross was his first hit?”

“We believe so, yes. It’s also the smallest location, and the only one in Ireland.”

“Any viable leads?”

“Almost none.”

“And of all the cute Irish villages, Julianne picks this one. Okay. I get it. You want to make sure her choice of Declan’s Cross doesn’t have anything to do with your thief.”

“I have no reason to suspect it does. We can scoot over there tomorrow, welcome Julianne to Ireland, spend the night in a romantic Irish hotel and then get out of the way and let her enjoy her stay.”

“Without a Donovan breathing down her neck,” Colin added.

“If she’s making this trip in part to get over Andy...then, yes, she deserves to be Donovan-free.”

Colin stretched out his legs. “All right. Let’s check out Declan’s Cross and see what Julianne’s up to. If it’s just whales and dolphins, you’re on for that couple’s massage.”

“You jest now, but wait until you’ve had one.”

“Jest.” He smiled at her. “I don’t know if I’ve ever used
jest
in a sentence.”

“Making fun of me, are you?”

She didn’t look at all worried. “Never.” He edged closer to her. “What were you like four years ago when you were working with old Wendell in Dublin?”

“Not as good with a gun for one thing.”

“Quantico changed you.”

“I learned new things there, most certainly. Did it change you?”

He shrugged. “Not that much.”

“You were in law enforcement before you entered the academy. I wasn’t. My grandfather can’t break the law, but he doesn’t have to follow the same rules we do.”

“In other words, he doesn’t care about prosecuting this thief. He just cares about catching him.”

“I wouldn’t put it quite like that.”

“You’re a complex woman of many interests. I’m a simple man of limited interests. Whiskey, sex and—” Colin grinned at her. “I can get by on whiskey and sex for some time.”

“That can be arranged.”

“Good.” He lowered his mouth to hers. “No more questions, Emma. No more thinking. Not tonight.”

3

JULIANNE MARONEY WAS
half in love with Father Bracken and totally in love with Andy Donovan, and that, she thought, was reason enough to head to Ireland. She grabbed a coffeepot and headed across the dining room to Father Bracken’s table. It was a dreary afternoon in southern Maine, and she was wrapping up her shift at Hurley’s, a popular, rustic restaurant on Rock Point harbor.

This time tomorrow, she’d be in Declan’s Cross on the south Irish coast.

She’d accepted a marine biology internship in Cork, but it didn’t start until January. Impatient, going crazy, she’d jumped when opportunity had knocked last week in the shape of Lindsey Hargreaves, a diver, a marine science enthusiast and a member of the family that had founded the prestigious Hargreaves Oceanographic Institute in Massachusetts.

Impulsive, maybe, but Julianne didn’t care. She was packed. Her flight to Shannon left tonight.

She arrived at Father Bracken’s table overlooking the harbor. “Not much of a view today, Father,” she said, refilling his mug. “Gray rain, gray sky, gray ocean.”

He smiled up at her. “I’m Irish. Wet weather doesn’t bother me.”

He’d ordered fried eggs, ham, toast and jam, a late breakfast by Rock Point standards but not, he insisted, all that late by Irish standards. He’d taken his time, reading a book and jotting notes in a black Moleskine. The lunch crowd, such as it was on a Monday in November, was in now, mostly locals—fishermen, carpenters, retirees, a group of young mothers with babies in tow.

No Donovans, at least not yet.

There were four Donovan brothers—gray-eyed, dark-haired, rugged, sexier than any men had a right to be and not one of them even remotely easy.

They said Finian Bracken reminded them of Bono. Maybe with a little Colin Firth, Julianne thought as she checked to make sure he had enough cream in the little stainless-steel pitcher. He was in his late thirties, relatively new to the priesthood. In his early twenties, he and his twin brother, Declan, had started a whiskey business in Ireland. Bracken Distillers was a success, but the tragic deaths of Finian’s wife and daughters had changed everything.

Julianne didn’t have many details and wasn’t sure she wanted any. She couldn’t fathom such a loss. He’d left Ireland in June to serve a one-year assignment at struggling St. Patrick’s, the Maroney family’s church a few blocks from Rock Point harbor.

He wore his usual priestly black garb. She had on knee-high boots, dark brown leggings and a Hurley’s-required white shirt and dark blue apron. She had her hair tied back. It was golden brown, and Andy used to tell her its natural highlights matched the gold flecks in her hazel eyes.

“You must be about to leave for the airport,” Father Bracken said. “How are you getting there?”

“My brother’s dropping me off.”

“Will you be seeing Colin and Emma while you’re in Ireland?”

She almost reminded him that Colin was a Donovan but instead said, “They’re in the southwest, and they’re supposed to be relaxing.”

Father Bracken’s midnight-blue eyes leveled on her. He had to be aware of the complicated dynamics of Colin’s relationship with Emma Sharpe and the reaction of his family and friends in Rock Point to her. An FBI agent, an ex-nun, a Sharpe. She and Colin were, to say the least, an eyebrow-raising match.

“Have you told them you’re coming?” Father Bracken asked.

“No, but it’s fine. They don’t need to know. I wouldn’t want to interrupt their time together.” Julianne stopped herself, which wasn’t her style. Usually she said too much, not too little. “You haven’t told them about my trip, have you?”

“I wouldn’t without your permission,” he said simply.

She felt her cheeks flame. “Oh, right, of course not. I hope they’re having a good time, and Emma isn’t finding out the hard way what rock heads the Donovan men can be.” She gave Father Bracken a quick smile. “Sorry, Father.”

His mouth twitched with humor. “No worries.”

“I can handle Colin. It’s not that. I’m used to Donovans.”

And she’d never slept with Colin. Never even considered it. She’d known better than to get mixed up with any of the Donovans. Mike, the eldest, was an ex-army wilderness guide on Maine’s Bold Coast. Then came Colin, an FBI agent. Kevin, the youngest, was a Maine state marine patrol officer. But it was third-born Andy, a lobsterman who restored classic boats on the side, who had captured her heart.

She’d slept with him, all right. One of the stupidest things she’d ever done.

Father Bracken was frowning at her, but if he guessed what she was thinking, he kept it to himself. She smiled. “Sorry. Mind wandering.”

“No apology necessary. Be sure to tell Sean Murphy I said hello.”

Sean Murphy owned the cottage Julianne was renting in Declan’s Cross. She’d expected to stay in a bed-and-breakfast, but Father Bracken had arranged for the cottage after she’d brought him his fried eggs yesterday morning and told him about her trip. He and his fellow Irishman were friends somehow. Julianne didn’t have any details. She was curious but felt awkward prying into Father Bracken’s private life.

“I will,” she said. “He’s not a priest, is he?”

“No, but he’ll look after you if you need anything.”

“This will be great. I’m really excited. I can get the lay of the land, figure things out ahead of my internship. I’ve never been anywhere. I’ve told my folks and my brother, and Granny, naturally, but I don’t need everyone in town knowing my business.”

“Meaning the Donovans,” Father Bracken said with a smile.

“Trust me, it’ll be easier if I just go on my way without the benefit of their opinion of my sanity.”

“Well, then. Godspeed, Julianne. Give my love to Ireland.”

“Thanks, Father, I will.”

She withdrew with her coffeepot. She felt good about her impromptu trip. It wasn’t just a chance to get things sorted out for January or even to put space between her and Andy. She would also be helping with her new friend’s marine science field station.

She and Lindsey Hargreaves had hit it off when Lindsey had stopped at Hurley’s last Wednesday. Not even a week ago. Lindsey had explained that she and some diving friends had been diving in Declan’s Cross that fall, and she’d had the idea of launching a field station there. She’d flown home for a few days to work on some of the details.

A mutual friend in Declan’s Cross had mentioned Finian Bracken, co-owner of Bracken Distillers and now a priest in America, and Lindsey had thought it would be fun to say hello while she was in southern Maine for a day trip. She hadn’t given Julianne the name of the mutual friend, but now she wondered if it was Sean Murphy.

Short, slim, dark-haired and dark-eyed, Lindsey had a contagious energy and enthusiasm about her, and Julianne had volunteered to show her around the area. They’d spent the afternoon together, then stayed in touch by email after Lindsey went home that night and returned to Ireland on an overnight flight on Thursday. When she indicated she’d love to get Julianne’s take on the field station, Julianne had seized the moment and booked a round-trip ticket for a two-week stay.

Tomorrow, they would be sharing the cottage Father Bracken had arranged. Lindsey had been only too happy to take a break from the “primitive” conditions at the building she’d rented in Declan’s Cross for her soon-to-be field station.

Julianne was convinced that as last-minute as this trip was, it was the right thing for her to do. Her grandfather would be pleased, too, she thought with a rush of affection. Jack Maroney had died last year, far too soon. He’d unexpectedly left her some money, with instructions that she was to go a little nuts with it, have some fun and not be in such a grind all the time. Julianne thought he’d love Declan’s Cross. If the photographs she’d found on the internet were at all accurate, it was as adorable an Irish village as she could ever imagine.

She’d had a hard time after her grandfather’s death. She still had her parents and older brother—who were all skeptical of her Ireland adventure. It was November, she was going alone, she was going at the last minute and she didn’t really know the woman who’d invited her.
And
she had limited funds, even with her grandfather’s mad money. She needed to finish her thesis and get a real job, which she hoped this trip and then her internship would help facilitate.

She had it all rationalized in her mind.

Barely able to contain her excitement, she ducked into a back room and changed into a sweater and jacket. She could smell lunch cooking in Hurley’s spotless kitchen. The kitchen was hopelessly outdated, but some of the best clam chowder in New England came out of its dented pots.

By the time she went back through the dining room, Kevin and Andy Donovan were approaching Father Bracken’s table. There was no way to get out of there without passing them. Julianne tried zipping up her jacket to give herself an excuse not to make eye contact, but Kevin said, “Hey, Julianne. Hanging out with Father Bracken?”

She found the knowing note in his voice annoying. It wasn’t as if she were
seriously
fixated on Father Bracken. Just mildly fixated. “Not really. You boys having lunch? The soup special is a nice butternut squash bisque. You’ll like it.”

“It sounds orange,” Kevin said.

Andy grinned, then settled his dark gray eyes on her. “I didn’t see your car outside. How are you getting home?”

“Walking.”

“It’s about to rain.”

“Good. I like rain.”

She didn’t tell him she was walking because she knew she had a long drive to the airport and then a long flight ahead of her. She got out of there. She didn’t want Andy finding out about her trip until she was safely aboard her Aer Lingus plane. Rock Point had always been home for her, but she’d lived on campus much of the year as an undergraduate and then a graduate student at the University of Maine. Then in August, immersed in her master’s thesis, struggling with finances, she’d moved in with her recently widowed grandmother in Rock Point and had taken on as many hours as she could at Hurley’s. It didn’t matter what time she was working. A Donovan was
always
there.

Overexposed, she’d weakened, violating her personal Golden Rule never to get involved with a Donovan. When Andy, the rake, the heartbreaker of Rock Point, had stayed after closing one misty September night, she’d let him walk her home.

She’d been lost from the moment he’d brushed his arm against hers.

This, she thought as the cold November air hit her, was why she was going to Ireland. She had to let go of her anger and misery. She had to get Andy Donovan out of her system and find herself again.

* * *

Forty minutes later, Julianne set her purple soft-sided suitcase on the rug in the entry of her grandmother’s small house on a quiet street between St. Patrick’s Church and Colin Donovan’s Craftsman-style house. Her grandmother stood in the living room doorway, her thin arms crossed on her chest in worried anticipation. At seventy-five, Franny Maroney didn’t bother to pretend she wasn’t a worrier. Her hair used to be as thick and golden brown as Julianne’s, but now it was white, carefully curled once a week at the only beauty parlor in Rock Point.

Granny had dug the purple suitcase out of the attic and presented it to her only granddaughter for her trip, telling her in no uncertain terms that every young woman should have her own suitcase. Not that Granny had ever done much traveling herself. Hence, the pristine condition of the fifteen-year-old suitcase.

“Do you have your passport?” she asked for at least the sixth time.

“Yes, Granny.” Julianne patted the tote bag—her own tote bag—that she planned to take on the plane. “It’s right in here.”

“You’re sure? Sometimes I think I’ve put something in my bag and discover later it’s still home on my dresser. I suppose that’s because I’m old.”

It wasn’t because she was old. Her grandmother had been forgetful for as long as Julianne could remember. “It could also be because you always have a million things going on. You’re not one to be idle.”

Granny seemed to like that. “You’ll send me a postcard from Ireland?”

Julianne smiled. “I’ll send one every day.”

“That’s too expensive. One will do. I don’t mind if you email me photos but I’d love to have a real postcard from Ireland.” She lowered her arms and frowned, her eyes a true blue, unlike Julianne’s gold-flecked hazel. “Do you have a plan for emergencies?”

“I do, Granny.”

It amounted to taking care not to max out her credit card and calling the Irish police if she had an accident or got into trouble, but Julianne didn’t tell her grandmother that. Granny was all about planning for disaster to strike. She’d already warned Julianne about dark fairies.
“Not all fairies are good, you know.”

Her grandmother had been telling her as much since she was a tot, reading her bedtime stories about nasty pookas, scary banshees and mischievous leprechauns. Julianne wasn’t inclined to believe in fairies, good or bad. The prospect of a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow or a shrieking banshee warning of imminent death didn’t faze her. She was a marine biologist, not a folklorist.

“Have you told Father Bracken you believe in fairies?”

Granny waved a slender hand. “He’d understand.”

Probably he would, if not just because he was Irish. Church attendance was up at St. Patrick’s since Father Bracken’s arrival in Rock Point. Parishioners insisted they wanted Father Callaghan to return from his yearlong sabbatical, but they were falling in love with their Irish priest. He’d helped Granny get past her anger at God for her husband’s death. Whatever spiritual guidance Finian Bracken had offered, Franny Maroney was back at church and not as depressed and irritable.

Julianne wondered if her crush on Father Bracken was a sin. She would have to find someone else to ask, that was for sure.

She gave her grandmother a quick hug. “You have fun while I’m off to Ireland, okay, Granny?”

“Don’t you worry about me. You just live your life and be happy. I’m fine here on my own.”

“I know you are.”

As Julianne started to grab her suitcase, her grandmother tucked a twenty-dollar bill in her hand. “Buy yourself a Guinness or two while you’re over there.”