The Angel (23 page)

Simon plopped his bag onto the scuffed hardwood floor. Keira’s eyes were on him, serious. “I appreciate everything you’ve done for me, Simon. I know I’ve had a bad time of it, but I don’t want to take advantage of your generosity.”

“Tell me you want to stay here alone tonight in a way that I’ll believe.”

“I didn’t—” She paused, obviously fighting to hang on to her self-control. “I didn’t expect the sheep. I keep thinking about that blood. And the shovel—my backpack. I feel terrible for Eddie.”

“He strikes me as a man who’s seen a thing or two in his day.”

“And he has his brothers and all those guys at the pub.”

The thought seemed to cheer her somewhat. “My backpack turning up is odd. Maybe Scoop’s right and a hiker found it 210

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and just dropped it off at the pub and went on his way. But maybe it was someone who knew exactly what it was and left it for Eddie—someone who wanted to remain anonymous. Last night, Simon, you mentioned a man you saw—”

“You saw him, too, didn’t you?”

She nodded. “I had a strange conversation with him the night before I was trapped. Nothing ominous—just unusual. Like he knew things about me.”

“A fairy prince?” Simon’s tone was only half lighthearted.

“A hard-bitten looking one, if he is,” Keira said, almost managing a smile. “I’m not suggesting he’s involved, cer

tainly not that he’d brutalize a sheep.”

“Seamus Harrigan seems competent. He’ll investi

gate—”

“You’re right.”

“It’s been a long day,” Simon said simply. She averted her eyes, and he could see that they’d filled with tears.

His heart nearly stopped. “Keira…”

“There’s one more piece of this—I don’t know where it fits, or even if it does fit. My mother came home from Ireland pregnant with me. She dropped out of college. She’s never talked about what happened. When I ask her about my father, she just—” Keira sucked in a breath, turned to him. “She tells me that my father was John Michael Sullivan. And he was. I know that. He adopted me after he and my mother were married when I was a year old. He died in a car accident when I was three, and I barely remember him.”

“I’m sorry, Keira.”

“By all accounts, he was a wonderful man. My uncle thought the world of him. He was an electrician—salt of the earth. The rock my mother needed.”

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“You went to Ireland in search of your birth father?”

“Yes and no.” All the tension and fear of the past few days seemed to have welled up inside her to the point of bursting. But she exhaled, blinking back any remaining tears. “I went because of Patsy’s story—the book I’m doing. But also because I thought I might find some answers, or at least make my peace with not having them. I had a happy childhood, Simon. My mother’s a loving, open woman, deeply committed to her faith. But over the past few years, she’s pulled further and further away from everyone and everything she knows.”

“And you blame yourself?”

“If this is what she wants, I can accept that. I just…” Keira raked her fingers through her hair, suddenly looking ex

hausted. “I keep thinking if I’d stayed closer to home, if I’d shown more interest in her life—”

“Keira, don’t. You’re not responsible for your mother’s happiness.”

“It’s one thing to know that—it’s another to feel it in your gut. The truth is, I’m not even sure she actually got pregnant when she was in Ireland.”

“The monk in your story’s a hermit. Do you think he inspired your mother in some way?”

She lifted her shoulders and let them fall in an exagger

ated shrug. “Who knows?”

“So, I’m trying to picture your mother,” Simon said.

“Does she look more like her brother or more like you?”

Keira stared at him, and he thought he might have gone too far—but then he saw the spark in her eyes, the crack of a smile. “You’re impossible, Simon. You know that, don’t you?”

“Laugh hard, live long—or at least well.”

He went over to her microscopic kitchenette and pulled 212

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two glasses and a bottle of Jameson’s whiskey off an open shelf. Keira didn’t need him there. She had all those cops she could call on in a pinch, and she was smart, capable and resourceful—not such a flake after all.

Maybe telling himself she was a flake was his own way of keeping his distance.

Not that he was doing a good job of it, he thought as he set the glasses on the foot of counter space and opened the whiskey, splashed some into the glasses. He handed her a glass, watched her take a sip. “Keira, I want you to know that I don’t make a habit of kissing someone I’ve just rescued. Never mind if that someone quibbles about who did the rescuing. This morning—”

“It seems like a million years ago, doesn’t it?”

“Actually, no.”

Color rose in her cheeks, but he decided it wasn’t from embarrassment. She was remembering their kiss, too.

“Simon, I know you’re doing a favor for Owen—”

“It’s gone beyond that, Keira.”

“I suppose it has. I don’t even know that much about you, and—well, here we are.” She spun over to the table with her glass of whiskey, but didn’t sit down. “How did you get into search-and-rescue work?”

“I started picking up skills in high school and college.”

It was the truth as far as it went. “My father died when I was fourteen. Learning how to survive and to help other people in extreme conditions gave me something to do.”

“What happened to your father?”

“He was killed in the line of duty. He was a DEA agent.”

“How awful. Do you have any brothers and sisters?”

He shook his head. “Cousins, and my mother remarried not long after—a guy with three kids from a previous marriage.” He walked over to the table and picked up a book

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with a beautifully illustrated cover of a girl running into a magical forest. He immediately recognized Keira’s distinc

tive style. A collection of fairytales. Her photo with the flowers in her hair was on the back. “Is this a recent book?”

“Last year. Normally I don’t keep my books out in the open—I prefer to focus on current projects. But I looked up a poem before I left for Ireland—“The Fairies,” by William Allingham. ‘
Up the airy mountain, Down the
rushy glen
…’”

“‘We daren’t go a-hunting for fear of little men.’”
Keira smiled, obviously pleased. “You know it?”

“My father taught it to me.”

“It’s a fun one. Some believe Irish fairies are angels who aren’t good enough to be saved nor bad enough to be damned. Others believe they’re the remnants of the old Irish pagan gods and heroes who went underground to live. I’m not trying to prove or disprove Patsy’s story on any level—I just want to record it accurately. That comes first. Then I want to come up with illustrations that will capture its essence.”

“Your personal connection?”

“I don’t know for sure I really have a personal connec

tion. I went to see my mother the afternoon before the auction, and she wouldn’t tell me a thing.”

Simon could see his comment had triggered Keira’s tension again and shifted the subject. “Do you need quiet and solitude to work?”

“It depends.” She pulled off her sweater and tossed it onto the back of a chair, looking more relaxed. “Sometimes I lose myself in what I’m doing and nothing distracts me. I could be anywhere, and it wouldn’t matter. Other times I need total peace and quiet. I know I have an attic apart

ment, but I’m not exactly the artist-in-the-garret type.”

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“What about the cottage you rented in Ireland?”

“I expected to get a mix of time to myself as well as time with other people.”

“You were also on a mission,” he said.

She nodded. “I had personal as well as professional reasons to go to Ireland. I should have told you about the personal reasons.” She took two quick sips of her drink and set the glass down, then pointed to her couch. “It’s a pullout.”

“Unlike the couch at your Irish cottage,” he said.

“What’ll you do if you have nightmares about slugs and spiders again tonight?”

“Trust me, I won’t. I’ll fetch some linens.” She eyed him with a frankness he found both unsettling and sexy. “I can see you’re not going to your boat.”

She retreated into her bedroom. Simon sat on the sofa and put his feet up on the coffee table—it looked as if that was okay to do—and flipped through Keira’s fairytale book. Her work, which clearly appealed to both adults and children, had heart, imagination and a style that was uniquely hers. Even the art snob at the auction had been captivated by the two paintings she’d donated, although he’d probably never admit it.

But she still didn’t own a phone, Simon thought, getting to his feet when she returned with an armload of linens. He took them from her. “Go on to bed,” he said. “I’ll take it from here.”

“I can help.”

Watching Keira shake out sheets was more than he could take right now if what she wanted was sleep. “I can handle it.”

“You’ve been at my side since you yanked me out of the ruin,” she said, touching his arm. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome. Now, that’s it, right? No more grati

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tude.” He set the bedding on a chair. “It gets in the way after a while.”

But she didn’t take her hand from his arm, and he knew it didn’t have a damn thing to do with gratitude. He was tired, she was tired. Simon knew he should just send her to bed and tell her to put a chair in front of her side of the door and he’d do the same on his side. So they wouldn’t be tempted.

He’d just never been one always to do what he thought made sense.

He whispered her name, and it was enough. They were kissing before he knew he’d even moved. The taste of her, the feel of her slim body against him, were just what he’d imagined during the long trip across the Atlantic. Need ripped through him, immediate, hot. He wanted to be inside her, now.

She opened her mouth to their kiss and pressed herself hard against him, as if she’d been thinking about this moment, practicing it in her mind.

“I dreamed about this on the plane,” she said between kisses. “For all those hours. It was worse than my night

mare, I swear.”

She laughed, and it was sexy and a little wild and good to hear. Simon relished the spark in her eyes, the flush in her cheeks as the trauma of the past two days receded. He scooped her up and laid her on the couch. She was slim and lithe and had long, graceful limbs that tantalized his imagination. The rugby shirt and jeans had to go. He wanted to feel her smooth skin in his hands. He wanted to taste every inch of her and make her ache for him.

Something in his expression must have alerted her, because she draped her arms around his neck, skimmed her 216

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fingers up into his hair, then locked her eyes with his.

“Make love to me, Simon. Let me make love to you. It’s right. I know it is.”

“You trust your instincts.”

“It’s not just instincts.” She lifted herself to him, kissed him. “Remember, I brought water and food and a flashlight with me out to the ruin.”

“No rope,” he said.

“If I’d had a rope, I’d have climbed out of there in time to make that call to Bob, and you’d still be in London. And, anyway, who goes hiking with a rope?”

He kissed her again, and it was all he could do not to rip off all their clothes. She slipped her hands under his shirt, placing her palms on the small of his back, and he caught the hem of her shirt. He heard her breathe, give a small gasp of awareness of what came next. But he had her shirt off in seconds. He cast it aside.

She lay back on the couch, and now he saw a touch of self-consciousness in her. He didn’t look away. He gazed at her, her skin creamy, almost translucent.

“You’re beautiful,” he said.

Her hands trembled, but not with nervousness, he decided, as she went to unfasten her bra. “I can’t get it…damn…”

Simon tried the clasp, couldn’t get it either, and just ripped it. “I’ll buy you a new one,” he said, tossing it onto the floor with her shirt. But she didn’t say anything, and he wasn’t sure she could. “I didn’t do all those damn Sudoku puzzles on the plane for no reason.”

He skimmed his hands over the swell of her breasts. She moaned softly, lying back onto a lacy pillow. He went with her, lost in the taste of her, the feel of her pulse quicken

ing under his touch.

She started to wriggle out of her jeans, and he helped

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her, drawing them down her slender legs, adding them to the pile on the floor.

“I don’t…” She fought for a breath. “I’ve never…”

“Never, what, Keira?”

“It’s so fast. You, me.”

“But it’s right,” he whispered, slipping his hand between her legs, felt her response, saw the same want and need in her eyes that were in him. “Tell me if you want me to stop.”

“No. Oh, no.” She smiled, moved against him as he eased his fingers into her. “Don’t stop.”

“Good,” he said, and he circled, probed and thrust, until finally she grabbed at his shirt.

“Your turn,” she said raggedly, clawing at him. They dispensed with his clothes, and she drew him back to her, drifting her fingers over his flesh just as he’d dreamed last night and again on the plane, but reality was ever so much better.

“Now,” she said, guiding him to her. “Simon…please…”

He didn’t hold back, and they joined together in a frenzied haze of desire, heat and hunger. His body was ahead of his mind, responding, giving, taking, never doubting. He felt her body shudder and quake beneath him, her fingers digging into his upper arms as she came and came, then came again. Finally, he let go, thrusting fast and deep and hard, aware of her clutching his hips now, drawing him into her, taking him with her as they rose to the next peak together.

In the stillness that followed, he felt her heart racing and smiled. “It’s a wonder we didn’t fall off this little couch.”