Hot Whispers of an Irishman (19 page)

Before the first song began, she leaned closer to Nora. “Do you know the O’Gormans from Castle Duneen?” she asked.

Nora nodded. “Hank and Astrid.”

“Astrid? Exotic.”

“As befits a second wife…and retired lingerie model. I keep her in tofu.”

Vi smiled at the image. “So might you introduce me?”

“Of course I will.” Nora gave her a shrewd look. “Suddenly feeling social, or have you a particular interest?”

“Why do you ask?”

Nora hesitated, looking round the circle of musicians. It seemed she was satisfied that they were too involved in their own conversations to listen to what she might be saying, for she gave a quick nod of her head, then spoke. “We’ve a woman in town named Brenda Teevey who makes it her career to know everything about everybody. It seems she was by your nan’s today, and as she passed, she saw Liam in the field with some equipment of the non-farming kind.”

“Ah.”

“Now, I’m not normally the snooping type,” Nora said, and Vi managed to keep a straight face as her friend clearly believed this to be true.

“But…” Nora said, “I read the shipping receipt when Liam had equipment dropped at the market, and I’ve been asking myself what he’d be doing with radar of any sort out here. Brenda decided the answer for me and no doubt the rest of town, by now. Liam’s after the gold, isn’t he?”

Vi worked up her best incredulous expression. “Gold? Of course not. He’s…” What possible alternative explanation could she give?

Nora laughed. “You’re the poorest liar I’ve ever seen.”

“There are harder fates,” Vi replied. Just when she was ready to say more, the middle-aged man who seemed to be the unofficial leader of the
sessiun
called out “‘Miss McLeod’s Reel’” and with a few taps of the toe, the music picked up.

As it was a song with no lyrics, Vi was at loose ends. Happy for both the reprieve from Nora’s questions and the chance to look around, she sipped her pint.

The tune was halfway done when the pub door swung open and a pair of older men walked in. One she knew well, for she’d left him in Kilkenny last night. Vi edged her stool outward until she could escape from the circle without disturbing the other musicians. She met up with her da at the bar and gave him a hug. Una Rafferty pointedly looked the other way.

“Da, what are you doing here?”

“I stayed late after work to drop your mother’s clothes at the dry cleaner’s.”

Vi gave an answer as tongue-in-cheek as her father’s explanation. “I’m fairly certain she was meaning to have them done in Kilkenny.”

He smiled. “See, now? That’s the trick with delegation. You have to let go of the details.”

“Won’t she be looking for you? It’s well after supper.” A meal was a strictly scheduled event in Maeve Kilbride’s life.

“Some time alone will do her good…and me better,” Vi’s da said, then smiled at her. “So, James says you’re staying with Liam.”

Una rattled the glassware she was stowing away, earning an “Easy, Mam” from Jamie.

“I’m staying in his guesthouse,” Vi replied. “And I want you to know I’m sorry for any trouble I might have caused you last night.”

Her da patted her shoulder. “You made no trouble at all. What troubles we had, we’ve been having.”

Vi hadn’t grown up with blinders in place. She knew that her parents’ marriage had never been idyllic. Still, there was a reason they’d been together over thirty-five years, and she could only hope it wasn’t inertia. The unhappiness in her da’s green eyes hurt, though. She glanced away to see Nora waving at her. The reel had reached its end.

“Get yourself back,” Nora called. “We’re wanting
‘Níl Sé Ina Lá’
from you, and Jamie, another raspberry vodka for me.”

“Time to sing,” Vi said to her da. Jamie slid another small glass across the counter. Vi took it, sniffed its contents, and wrinkled her nose at the sweet yet strong scent. “And a drinking song, at that.”

Da laughed, then his smile faded. “One thing, love,” he said, leaning closer. “Don’t let your mam and me put you off marriage.”

Vi automatically glanced over at Liam, who was in conversation with his brother Cullen at the other end of the bar, with Cullen smirking and Liam looking annoyed. “Don’t be worried. I’ve been off marriage much longer than just this.”

Da kissed her cheek. “My Vi, more often thorn than flower. Get back to your music.”

At that moment, she could think of no finer place to be.

Liam scowled at his brother Cullen. This was proving to be the sort of day to knock shite out of a man’s optimism.

“I’m not after the gold,” he repeated even though he knew it would do no good. Cullen had his teeth sunk into the idea and wasn’t about to let go.

“Then why would Brenda Teevey see you out to the Kilbride property today? She says you looked a right fool, walking the field with equipment sticking out from you like a—”

“Enough,” Liam said.

“Then you have an explanation? This ought to be brilliant.”

“Vi was thinking a new well might be in order before she sold the place,” he replied as smoothly as he could given the absurdity of his words.

His brother snorted. “Aye, and I’ll be playing for Kilkenny Hurling in the All-Ireland matches next year.”

Liam took a quick swallow of his whiskey and melted ice and tried not to look at the men gathering around Vi as she finished her third song of the night. Proverbial moths to the flame, they were. His damn flame.

“Don’t be an arse, Cullen,” he said.

“Come on. Admit it and be done with it.”

“And if I am searching?”

His brother shrugged. “Good luck to you. The treasure’s yours, after all.”

Liam opted for a tacit admission. “I don’t want word spreading.”

Cullen laughed. “You’d be better off asking for a housebroken sheep. Brenda knows you’re up to something, and the whole town will by closing time tonight.” He inclined his head toward a table where a group of women were all looking their way. “She’s started already.”

As if to confirm the truth, Brenda waggled her fingers at Liam, who managed a half civil nod in return.

“You’d best find the gold fast, if it’s to be found,” Cullen said, then pushed away from the bar. “Now if you don’t mind, I’m going to go charm a redhead.”

Not if Liam got there first. When Cullen’s progress was slowed for a moment by sour old Paddy MacGuire making for the door to have a smoke, Liam seized the advantage.

“I should have run him down,” Cullen muttered, hard on Liam’s heels. “Ninety-some years spent being mean is more than enough.”

Liam arrived behind Vi just when she was taking her bows for her song. He settled a hand on her waist and said close to her ear, “I need to talk to you.”

“After the next song?” she asked, looking over her shoulder at him.

“Now would be better.”

She turned on her stool so she was facing him. “All right, then…”

“Outside, I’m thinking,” he said while subtly planting an elbow in Cullen, who seemed to be exploring what it might have been like to be a Siamese twin.

Vi frowned, and Liam prepared to apply stronger persuasion. She relented, though.

Once outside, they edged past Paddy MacGuire, who spat at Liam’s feet, whether out of habit or in retribution for Liam’s past sins, he’d never know.

“Down here,” Liam said, taking Vi’s hand and drawing her in front of the optician’s shop next door.

“Why the secrecy?”

Why, indeed, except out of some futile hope that gossip could be stopped? “Just needing some fresh air, is all.”

“You might have noted that we’re now nationally smoke-free in pubs.”

“Right. Of course.” He took a second to assemble his thoughts. “Here’s the thing, Vi. Word is out that I’m after the gold, which means I’ll not be taking a step without someone behind me.”

“Aren’t you overstating matters? Duncarraig’s a large town and with plenty else for entertainment.”

“Something better than the promise of wealth? Not possible.”

She shook her head. “That’s a sad thing to be saying. I can think of dozens of things better than money.”

He couldn’t begin to see how his comment was sad and he needed to be pushing on in any case. “Stay with me, here,” he said. “Among my plans for tonight was to meet the O’Gormans and find my way into the castle, and your denials to the contrary, I expect you had much the same in mind.”

“And if I did?”

“Time’s not in our favor now that others will be watching us. We need to be working together now, Vi…not just in the same place.” He hesitated as a couple walked by, the woman far taller than the man.

“Good evening,” Vi offered.

“Good evening” came the reply in an American accent.

“The O’Gormans,” Vi murmured, then moved to step in behind the couple as they neared the pub. Liam stayed her. He needed her word, and he would work out the consequences of getting it, later. “Together, Vi?”

She looked at the door that had just closed behind the couple, then back to Liam. “All right. Together, I suppose.”

Her concession had been grudging at best. Liam took her hand and kissed it, then kept her fingers meshed with his. They walked toward the pub.

“It’s for the best,” he said. “Now let me handle getting us into Castle Duneen.”

Vi halted. “You? And there’s some reason you think you’ll do a better job?”

“Desperation. Walking the edge of it makes a man sharp, and that’s all I have left.”

“Don’t be forgetting massive ego. You’ve still plenty of that,” she said, then swept inside before him.

“You should have known better than to have crossed her, boy,” Paddy MacGuire opined and then threw a smoldering cigarette butt at Liam’s feet.

Aye, optimism had died tonight, and Liam would drink another whiskey to mourn it.

Arrogant man, thinking he could charm his way into a castle better than she. She had charm…perhaps of an opinionated sort, but it was charm nonetheless.

Vi looked about the bar and spotted the O’Gormans, drinks in hand, settling in at a corner table. Finding them was no difficult task as Astrid was even taller than Vi, and everything one would anticipate of a young and well-married former lingerie model.

Hank O’Gorman, on the other hand, looked much like what Vi expected Roger might, were a spell cast and he to shed his canine skin and take human form. She smiled at the thought of a wee male dog-selkie. It was an unkindness to the Irish legend, but accurate to be sure.

Closer to the fire, the musicians were just ending a harried version of “Malloy’s Jig.” Vi and Nora made eye contact, and Nora motioned toward the O’Gormans as she set her fiddle to rest.

As Vi walked toward the American couple, out of the corner of her eye she spied Liam and Cullen heading from the bar with equal intent. She picked up her pace, and she and Nora arrived at the O’Gormans’ table simultaneously, with Liam and Cullen trapped behind them like the next couple in a wedding receiving line.

Hank and Astrid stood. Nora offered up introductions, playing hard on the note that Vi was an artist. Astrid perked up in a most gratifying way and offered Vi and Nora the two remaining seats at the table. Vi gave her a “
go raibh maith agat
” before sitting, figuring that a thank you in Irish was sure to earn her points with a couple enough in love with the land to sink unimaginable sums into renovating a castle. Liam’s low scoff let her know that her ploy had not gone unnoticed.

She gave a glance toward the bar, where it seemed that James and her da had taken over tending duties. “Liam, would you mind too much bringing me a glass of water?” she asked him. “So long as you’re standing, that is.”

“My pleasure,” Liam replied so sweetly that Vi knew he’d be sending some vinegar her way later.

“So, Vi, tell us about your work,” Hank O’Gorman said.

“I paint, mostly, though I’ve been known to wander off in other directions.”

“I’ve a painting Vi did of Castle Duneen above my fireplace,” Nora said. “It’s brilliant.”

Slender and quite too beautiful, Astrid spoke. “You’ve painted Duneen? Wonderful! Is your studio in the area?”

“I’m afraid not. I live in County Kerry.”

“Too bad. I’d love to see your work.”

“There’s always Vi’s website,” Cullen offered from his spot watching over the table.

Vi looked up at him. “You’ve seen my website?”

“And beautiful you are in your green dress.” To the O’Gormans he said, “Would you like to pop into the office and see Vi’s work?”

They agreed, and the whole lot of them were trooping to the computer just as Liam was heading back in their direction.

“Have a rest, man,” Vi said, hitching her thumb toward the empty table. “I’ve handled the castle for you.”

“Not likely,” he said, handing her the requested glass of water.

Once the younger generation of Raffertys were evicted from the office computer, Cullen settled in. Vi’s website appeared on the screen nearly immediately. Hank and Astrid watched with rapt attention as Cullen brought up images of Vi’s larger paintings on silk.