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Table of Contents

SEE ME IN YOUR DREAMS

The McKenna Legacy

Patricia Rosemoor

Copyright © 1996, 2010 Patricia Pinianski

See Me in Your Dreams
was originally print-published by Harlequin ®

In memory of my late husband, Edward Majeski

Overview:

Keelin McKenna inherited her grandmother’s ability to dream through other’s eyes and becomes haunted by a teenager’s dreams. The girl is in danger and needs her help. Her father, Tyler Leighton, thinks Keelin is trying to run a scam on him until she dreams of something known only to him and his daughter. As they work together to find the girl, they can’t fight their attraction or stop themselves from falling in love.

Heat Level:

Sensual

To My Darling Grandchildren,

I leave you my love and more. Within thirty-three days of your thirty-third birthday-enough time to know what you are about-you will have in your grasp a legacy of which your dreams are made. Dreams are not always tangible things, but more often are born in the heart. Act selflessly in another’s behalf, and my legacy will be yours.

Your loving grandmother,

Moira McKenna

P.S. Use any other inheritance from me wisely and only for good, lest you destroy yourself or those you love.

Prologue

THE DARK SWALLOWED HER WHOLE, making her feel smaller than ever.

She lay frozen. Waiting. Counting the seconds…the minutes…the hours.

Finally, the house grew perfectly still.

Her ragged breath piercing the silence, she gathered her courage and slipped out of bed. She threw off her nightshirt, tugged on soft jeans and an even softer T-shirt. The familiar cotton garments soothed her flesh that was pebbling despite the warmth of the June night.

She acknowledged her fear.

And as she stuffed a change of clothing, a sweater and a few personal items into a backpack, her thoughts were as liquid as the waves washing onto shore outside her window.

Can’t stay here any longer.

Not one minute.

No more lies.

She buckled up the backpack. Her hands shook, making her bracelet resonate. Strands of leather intertwined with ancient charms and symbols that she didn’t fully understand – and that had somehow become a part of her – tinkled like a fairy windchime.

Scooting her stockinged feet into high tops, she took a deep breath. She was ready. Except for money. She didn’t have enough. She knew where some cash was, though. She’d have to take it.

That would make me a thief,
she thought uneasily.

No worse than a liar,
an inner voice countered.

A thrill shooting down her spine, she sneaked down the stairs, avoiding the one that creaked. A moment later she was in his study, ransacking his desk for the handful of tens and twenties he always kept available in case of an emergency. She stuffed the cash into her wallet, the wallet into her jeans pocket.

Returning to the foot of the stairs, backpack straps secured around her shoulders, she stopped for a moment, tears gathering in her eyes…a lump in her throat threatening to choke her.

Why did he do it?

Why?

Now that I know, everything is ruined.

Sick inside, she rushed toward the front door, knocking into the pedestal, making the new stone sculpture teeter on its base. She caught and steadied the free form that reminded her of an angel about to take flight. Certain her pulse drummed so loud it could be heard in the farthest reaches of the house, she was astonished when no responding sound warned her that she was about to be apprehended.

Even so, she fled the dwelling as if the hounds of hell were on her heels. She burst into the moonless night, unseeing, moving by rote, by memory tracing her way down into the ravine.

Brush thrashed around her legs.

Gasps broke from her heaving chest.

Lake water battered the nearby shoreline.

None could drown out the frightened beat of her heart.

Chapter One

County Cork, Éire

AS ALWAYS, WHEN KEELIN MCKENNA entered the work shed behind the old-fashioned thatch-roofed cottage, she sorely missed the solid if diminutive presence who had been part of the place for so many decades. She passed under the bunches of drying herbs and other plants hanging from the rafters, inhaling deeply as she approached the workbench–the healing scents helping to assuage the sorrow that was becoming more distant with each passing day.

Not that she would ever forget Moira McKenna.

The year before, at ninety-three, the elderly woman had finally relinquished her earthly existence to join her late, much beloved husband Seamus, and had left Keelin the possession most precious to her – the bit of land with its cottage amidst a field of wild herbs and a carefully cultivated supplemental garden. Over the decades, some of the locals had appointed Moira McKenna healer, while others had disparaged her as witch. Keelin had called the dear woman Gran.

Knowledge of potions and poultices gathered over the years, from the time she was a toddler at her grandmother’s knee, added to the spirit that made her want to help others, were Keelin’s true inheritance from the woman who had been the backbone of the McKenna clan.

She didn’t want to think about the other…the darkness that dwelled deep inside her…that, too, had been one of Moira’s many facets…the thing that made them both different.

She shook away the traces of last night’s frightening dream and concentrated instead on her purpose. If only her stubborn father had listened to her (if only her voice had been stronger, Keelin thought guiltily) perhaps Da would not have had the heart attack that almost killed him. Well, if she hadn’t been vigilant enough before, she would do what she could now.

Wanting to be at the main house when her father arrived home from hospital, she hurriedly gathered the supplies she needed – root of valerian and dried blue lavender blossoms. Mixing them together, she placed a small handful in each of a dozen muslin pouches. When suspended beneath the tap so that hot water flowed through them, the herbs would make an exquisitely scented fresh infusion that would also be soothing, hopefully relaxing her quick-tempered father and helping him to the restful sleep so necessary to healing.

Undoubtedly he would refuse any more advanced remedies from her. But, even if he scorned it, rolled his eyes and shook his head as he was wont to do over things he didn’t understand, this she could do for him. And one other thing. A truly momentous thing. Perhaps she could bring him some inner peace.

But how to make the announcement?

After tying off the last pouch, Keelin gathered all together in a basket, left the shed and headed across the field of wild herbs and over the rolling pasture toward her parents’ home. And just in time. Her brother Curran and sister Flanna were helping Da from the car as Ma and Great-aunt Marcella, on short leave from the convent that had been her home for her entire adult life, looked on.

Basket swinging from her arm, thick auburn hair whipping around her face, Keelin ran to join them. “Da!” she yelled.

James McKenna turned to wave at his oldest daughter. His whitened hair reflected only glimpses of the red that had once crowned his head. His eyes, though, were still as green as the fields around them, where cows with new calves grazed. They were Moira’s eyes. And Flanna’s eyes. Like Curran, Keelin had inherited their mother’s gray.

Keelin enveloped the wiry body that should have withstood the curse of high cholesterol, even if her father was a dairy farmer. “How are you doing, Da?”

“Just grand. Good as new.”

But she could see the lie to Da’s words in his eyes. He might be recovering physically, but his near death experience had affected him deep in his soul, whether he would admit it or no. The reason she had to act, to set things right in the family.

“See, the sun has even made an appearance to greet me,” he said expansively, raising his face to the golden rays.

Auspicious, Keelin thought, for the weather was more fickle than any lover. Most days were soft with the mist that greened the fields year-round. But the sun could pop in the blink of an eye. A body could take both umbrella and swim suit along on any excursion, for she was sure to have opportunity to use both.

“Get yourself in the house, James Joseph McKenna, before you expire from heat exhaustion,” Keelin’s mother Delia demanded. A handsome woman, skin smooth and only a bit of silver threading her black hair, she appeared far younger than her husband, though only five years separated them in truth. “Come along now.”

Da shook his head and made a sound of exasperation even while following orders. “No need to fuss, woman.”

Though all his children knew he loved being fussed over. Keelin exchanged grins with Curran and Flanna. They linked arms, taking up the rear of the group as they entered the two-story limestone house that had for many years sheltered grandparents, parents, and siblings. After Seamus died, however, Moira had moved back to her old cottage. Then, lured away by fine horseflesh, Curran had gone off to Galway; Flanna had entered university in Dublin, after which, she’d chosen to stay to design her jewelry; while Keelin herself had taken a flat in Cork to be near the herbalist shop she ran with two other women. That is, until Moira’s inheritance had made a commuter of her.

At the doorway, Keelin automatically dipped her fingers into the small font of holy water and crossed herself as she entered the foyer. For the past several years, her parents alone had wandered the rambling rooms with tall bay windows and views of the rolling pastures that were green year round. The exception being holidays and the like, when grand stories and laughter once more filled the house. Perhaps she would be able to make certain that soon more such occasions would present themselves, Keelin thought with hope, still wondering how she would tell Da what she was about to do.

Her father settled in his great stuffed chair before the stone fireplace and looked around him. “Ah, this is satisfying to a simple man such as myself. Having me whole family in attendance.”

“Not your
whole
family,” Marcella corrected him, straightening the collar of her habit. The elderly nun had never been one to mince words.

“Now, Sister Mary, don’t you be bringing
them
up,” he complained.

“Da, it was
you
who brought up the subject when you were in a desperate way,” Flanna reminded him. “You wished the three could be together one last time before you died!”

Bless her soul, Keelin thought, gathering her courage.

“Well, I didn’t die, did I?” With the full drama of a true Irishman sorely beleaguered, he said, “And they didn’t care enough to come to my side when I was near death, so why should I be giving them a thought?”

“Ah, Da, you’re being unreasonable,” Curran told him, swiping his thick black hair away from his forehead. “You wouldn’t let us contact them so they would know you were sick in the first place.”

With the way of her Murphy ancestors, Delia teased, “You always did have a bit o’ the blarney in you, James.
Tsk, tsk, tsk
. You know you want a wee peak at Rose and Raymond again…” She suddenly sobered. “God willing.”

An uneasy silence muted all voices for a moment. Keelin hadn’t considered her aunt or uncle might have gone on – and her never having set eyes on either of them. She couldn’t tell himself what she was about, then. Couldn’t raise Da’s hopes. A refusal from one of the other two triplets would be bad enough. But if one of them weren’t even alive…

Shaking away the chilling thought, Keelin quickly reconnoitered. “I have an announcement.” Though not the one she’d intended.

Five pairs of quizzical eyes turned to her.

Da asked, “What is it, lass?”

“I’m going on a trip. Tomorrow morning, as a matter of fact. Business.” Her mouth went dry with the lie. “To meet with other herbalists.” Heat rose along her neck like fairy fire. “And it’s out of the country.”

“Where to?”

Taking a big breath, she said, “America,” and waited for an explosion of temper.