Forever Mine: Callaghan Brothers, Book 9

by Abbie Zanders

  Michael leaned back and closed his eyes. “Karen, the night shift nurse, told me she went into Dad’s room last night and he called her Kathleen.”

  “With all the shit you’re pumping into him, that’s not unusual, is it? You did a bit of calling for Mom yourself when you decided to play Superman and got that hole in your chest a couple of years ago.”

  Michael winced at the memory. He and Maggie had been going through a rough patch, and he’d thought he’d lost her forever. His judgment had been adversely affected, and he’d taken chances he normally wouldn’t have on that op. He’d ended up nearly getting himself killed in the process.

  “Yeah, well, that’s when I was out of it, not when I was awake.”

  Jake sat up straighter, his blue eyes alert. “What?”

  Michael told him about what had happened in the OR. Jake was floored, gaping at him in disbelief. “You think he was talking to Mom? That he saw her?”

  “I don’t know. I’d like to say it was the sedation, but you should have seen the look in his eyes, Jake. I haven’t seen that look since Mom died. He believes.”

  “Jesus.” Jake stood up and started pacing. He made several trips around the office. Michael knew he was thinking the same thing he was: that the thought of seeing his croie again after all these years might be enough of an incentive to ignore the warning signs of an impending heart attack.

  “What the hell do we do now?”

  “Nothing. We could be way off base here, Jake. Let’s give it some time. Nothing is going to happen to him while he’s here.”

  Jake blew out a breath. “Yeah, I guess you’re right.”

  February 1975

  Pine Ridge

  “Getting cold feet yet, young Callaghan?” Declan Kennedy chuckled when Jack slid the dark, frothy draft in front of him. “Your wedding is what, only two or three weeks away?”

  “’Course he is,” nodded Fergus McCandless before Jack could respond. “What sane man wouldn’t?”

  “Aye. I’d rather be shackled and staked out naked than go through that again,” claimed Bob O’Malley.

  “Now there’s a fine visual,” shuddered Brody Mackenzie.

  “Shut it, all of you,” said Brian O’Connell, rising to his defense. “His wedding can’t come fast enough for him.”

  “Ah, a groom eagerly running toward the altar instead of away from it. ‘Tis a novel thing, that.”

  “’Tis not the wedding, but the wedding night he’s running toward.”

  A couple of regulars laughed; Jack smiled but said nothing. Yeah, he was definitely looking forward to that, but there was so much more to it. Kathleen was his croie, his heart, and every day his love for her only grew.

  Danny Finnegan, owner of the establishment which had become his second home, said, “Brian, be a good lad and take over the bar for a wee bit.”

  “I’m fine,” Jack said. His leg was aching something fierce from being on his feet so long, but he hated the sympathy he saw in their eyes. He was afraid that one day, someone was going to ask him what happened, but so far, no one had. He hoped they never did, because he never, ever, wanted to speak of that again.

  “Aye, I know, lad, but there’s something I’ve been wanting te discuss with ye. Grab a couple of glasses and a bottle from the top shelf and come with me.”

  Jack and Brian exchanged glances, then Brian took his place behind the bar. It was no secret that Danny Finnegan had been talking about selling the place. Jack wondered if this was the point where Danny took him aside and gave him the bad news, told him he’d have to look for another job.

  Finding something suitable would be tough, at least until he settled back in and started feeling normal again. If that was even possible. With his wedding on the horizon he needed a means to support Kathleen. Conlan had offered him a job at the diner, but Jack’s pride wouldn’t let him accept. He wanted to care for his wife and future family on his own.

  “Sit, lad, and pour us both a drink.”

  Jack did as he asked. Danny put the shot to his lips, then tossed it back with the ease of a man who had been doing so for ages. Jack poured him another.

  “Do ye know what the secret of running your own bar is, lad?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Doona drink the profits.” Danny laughed, then lifted the glass to his lips. “Go on then. Bottoms up.”

  Danny waited until Jack drank his, then said. “This bar has been my home for over seventy years, Jack. My father owned it before me, and his father before him. She has a history, she does. Housed Union soldiers in the Civil War.” Danny’s eyes scanned the place, and having assured that he was among friends, leaned forward and spoke in hushed, reverent tones. “And was the secret meeting place of the Mollies for years.”

  Jack said nothing. He’d heard these stories a hundred times if he’d heard them once. Danny loved telling anyone who would listen (as long as they were local and Irish) that quite a few of his not-so-distant ancestors had been part of the Molly Maguires. The Mollies, as they were known, were a secret society of poor Irish immigrants who slaved in the region’s anthracite mines and rebelled against the rich mine owners and their watchdogs in the latter part of the 19th century. The group went far underground when twenty of them were convicted of murder and other crimes and hung. Though a hundred years had passed, it was still a very sore subject among the locals, and only spoken of in trusted company.

  “And before that,” Danny continued, “she was a fine hotel. Ach, I know she’s not much to look at now,” he said, waving his hand vaguely about, “but she was something back in the day.”

  Careful to keep his expression neutral, Jack dutifully looked around, past the cheap tables and cracked vinyl, beyond the broken fixtures, and tacky linoleum. Thick hand-hewn beams ran the length of the ceiling and supported the upper floors in square-ish columns. Ornately carved-wood trim, now blackened with age and neglect, outlined the doors and windows. The once-white plastered walls were covered in layers of tar and nicotine residue, except in those places where it had fallen away completely.

  “I’ve been a poor steward,” Danny lamented, his eyes suspiciously shiny, “I’ve let her go te pot. Were it not for the likes of them -—” he swept this arthritic fingers toward the bar “ -— and good men like you and your Da, I would have been out of business years ago.”

  Again, Jack said nothing. He didn’t think Danny really expected him to.

  “But my time here is done. I’ve run out of money and the bastards are going to take her right out from under me if I don’t pay the taxes due.”

  “How much?”

  Danny told him, and Jack nodded. It was a substantial sum.

  “The only way I’ll come into that kind of money is if I manage to die in time and my life insurance pays out. Fat lot of good it will do me then, eh?” he chuckled without mirth. “I’ve got no sons to pass her on to, and I’ll not be handing her over to my no-good sons-in-law.”

  The old man scowled as he stared into his drink. It was no secret that Danny didn’t get along well with his daughters; their husbands, even less. Jack stared into his own drink, waiting for the inevitable. In his mind, he began assembling a mental list of the places where he might apply for a job. He didn’t have a college education, but he was a hard worker, and knew enough people to find something. In the meantime, he had his parents’ house and a tidy nest egg he’d managed to build with his service pay.

  “I want you to buy her, young Jack.”

  Jack’s head snapped up. “Excuse me, sir?”

  “I want you to buy the bar. You’ve got roots in this town, lad. Good, strong Irish roots. You are about to be married, and need to make your own way. Buy this place for the taxes due, and you’ll have an established business and enough room to breed all the little ones you want.”

  Speechless—– for an entirely different reason this time—– Jack poured himself another shot and tossed it back. Working in a bar was one thing, but owning one?

  “Just t
hink about it, Jack. ‘Tis all I ask.”

  Reeling from the unexpected request, Jack found himself nodding. “I’ll think about it, sir.”

  “Aye, that’s a good lad. But don’t take too long. Those damn bankers are all but crawling up my arse, wanting te get their grubby hands on her.”

  Hours later, Jack lay in his bed, staring up at the ceiling. It was a crazy idea, and yet one he couldn’t stop thinking about. Owning his own place, running his own business was perfect for him. After spending seven years in the service, he was loathe to ever take orders from anyone else again.

  What would Kathleen think? By the time he’d finished his shift, it had been too late to call, though he’d been sorely tempted. She had grown up in a place of public business. O’Leary’s was a diner, though, and a pub wasn’t exactly the finest place to raise a family.

  But they could class it up. He could picture it now, him and Kathleen, working together to restore the place to its former glory, turn it into a staple of the community. It would still be a bar, sure, but the welcoming, respectable kind. One where a man would feel comfortable bringing his wife for a nightcap after the movies. Or where a bunch of local boys could bond over a friendly game of pool or Monday Night Football.

  Like a seed, the idea took root in his gut and began to grow.

  He didn’t have that kind of money laying around though. He’d have to take out a substantial loan using the house as collateral, or sell his parents’ house outright. That wasn’t such a bad thing. There were too many memories, too many ghosts that haunted him when he lay here in the dark, alone, his restless mind unable to find peace. When he closed his eyes, he could still hear his father walking by his room before dawn, off to his job at the mill. Or scent the heavenly aroma of the freshly baked bread and rolls his mother used to make. Or hear Fitz climbing in through his bedroom window, excited because he’d somehow managed to get his hands on the latest copy of Penthouse.

  Maybe it was time to move on. The house was in good shape. If he got a decent price for it, he’d be able to pay off the tax debt on the bar and still have a little left over to make Finnegan’s Pub livable, if not pristine. He was handy enough that he could do most of the repairs himself. Plus he knew enough people that would be willing to help him with the rest for free drinks and a welcoming place to go.

  The more he thought about it, the more he liked the idea. He and Kathleen could make a fresh start, make the place their own. Kathleen was good with numbers; she’d earned her degree in Accounting while he was overseas, often writing about how she found peace in the exactness of it. She could handle the business side of things and he’d run the bar. They could live on the second and third floors, which would be damned convenient.

  It felt right. It would be a lot of hard work and long hours, but it would be worth it. Jack made up his mind. He was going to do it. He was going to sell the house, buy the bar, and begin carving out a new life for him and Kathleen, one they could be proud of.

  He rolled over and closed his eyes. For the first time in a long time, Jack felt a glimmer of hope for their future.

  The next day, Jack went into town and met with a realtor, then walked, whistling, into Finnegan’s to tell Danny the good news.

  Chapter Ten

  September 2015

  Pine Ridge

  “You’re in a good mood this morning. Pleasant dreams?”

  He had a new nurse today. Not Chrissy, not Karen, but an older woman he hadn’t seen before. There was a competent briskness to her movements that reminded him of the service, and he wondered vaguely if she’d spent some time in the military.

  Jack smiled, the residual hope and optimism of his latest dream still fresh in his mind. He and Kathleen, they’d had their whole lives ahead of them then. “Aye.”

  “Well, your numbers are good. Dr. Yim will be making his rounds shortly. In the meantime, breakfast will be here any minute.”

  He wasn’t hungry. His appetite was practically non-existent, but he’d learned the importance of picking his battles. Refusing a meal would earn him a frown, another round of vitals checks, a lecture on the benefits of eating properly, and a note in his chart. So instead he simply said, “Thank you, lass.”

  She paused, her expression softening slightly, and looked him in the eye. Really looked at him, rather than at his identification bracelet, incision or I.V. insertion points. It was probably the first time she had done so. She had striking blue eyes, accentuated by what Kathleen used to call “lines of character” and filled with a look he knew all too well. In that moment, he sensed a kindred spirit. She’d known loss as well.

  “Thank you,” she said.

  “For what?”

  “I haven’t been called a ‘lass’ in a long time. Not since my father died.” Her voice was softer, more feminine than it had been.

  “Hey Dad,” Michael said, breezing into the room. He took one look at the smile on the nurse’s face and stopped, raising a quizzical brow. “Is he behaving himself?”

  “Yes,” she grinned. “He’s quite the charmer.”

  “He is right here,” Jack reminded them, “and he can hear every word you’re saying.”

  Michael chuckled. “Thanks, Kim. I’ll take it from here.”

  The nurse left the room, still smiling, and Michael shook his head. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen that woman smile before. What did you say to her?”

  Jack shrugged slightly, wincing when the action pulled at the staples holding his chest together. He’d have to remember not to do that.

  He countered Michael’s question with one of his own. “What does Maggie think of you being on a first-name basis with all of these pretty nurses?” Jack asked with a glimmer in his eye.

  “My wife knows that she is the only woman for me. I remind her of that daily,” he smirked.

  “I always knew you were a smart boy.”

  “So how are you today, Dad?”

  Michael’s expression—– what Jack liked to call his ‘Marcus Welby mask’ -—gave nothing away, but the concern in his eyes was plain enough.

  “Why not just come out and say what’s on your mind, son? I didn’t raise you to tap dance, and I’m too damn tired and sore for it.”

  Michael pulled a chair up close to his bedside and sat down. When he spoke, it was with carefully chosen words and a far-too-even tone. “Having something like this happen can affect more than your body. It can mess with your mind as well.”

  Jack narrowed his eyes. “Boy,” he began in warning, his tone low, “stop right there.” He’d been through a hell of a lot worse than a heart attack, and he’d be damned if he was going to start talking about his feelings. “I had a heart attack, just like thousands of other people do every day. You fixed it, end of story.”

  To his credit, Michael dropped his eyes, just like he did when he was a young lad. But he was far from dropping the subject. “Is it?” he said softly. “When you were out of it, you were talking, you know. To Mom.”

  His sons might have gotten his brawn, but they’d definitely inherited their mother’s tenacity. Jack peeled him with a steely glaze. “That’s what this is about? Me mumbling incoherently when you’ve got me pumped up on God-knows-what?”

  “You spoke as if you could see her.”

  “Not a day goes by I don’t see your mother,” Jack told him, pointing to his head, “up here. And not a day goes by I don’t talk to her, either. That’s been true for almost twenty-five years, ever since the day she passed. Your mother was, and continues to be, the love of my life. If you think that ended when she died...” he paused, swallowing down the painful ache he still got every time he thought of that day, “then you don’t understand shite.”

  A swell of emotion rose up within him; Jack sank back into the pillow and closed his eyes. He hadn’t cried in front of his boys since they lowered Kathleen’s casket into the ground, and he wasn’t about to start now.

  “I’m sorry, Dad. I didn’t mean to suggest - ”

 
Jack waved him off with a wave of his hand. “Go on then. Go tend to someone who needs you. I’m tired.”

  It took a few moments, but he finally heard a sigh and the near-silent scrape of the chair as Michael returned it to its previous position. “All right, Dad. I’ll check in on you later.”

  Jack grunted.

  “Don’t be too hard on him, Jack,” a familiar feminine voice said. “He’s worried about you.”

  Jack opened his eyes to find Kathleen sitting on the edge of his hospital bed. It wasn’t nearly as much of a shock as it might have been. He’d been feeling her presence for a few weeks now, and sensed she was the one behind his dreams. This was probably a dream, too, or the result of the medication, but he didn’t care.

  He sighed. “I know. They all are. Except now they suspect I’ve gone off the deep end.” She chuckled softly at that, and the sound sent ribbons of warmth through him. How he missed her laugh.

  “Are you real, Kathleen? Or just the creation of a desperate man’s mind?”

  “Does it matter?” she asked softly.

  Did it? No, he realized, not really. If she wasn’t real, and his mind was simply conjuring these images of her, then so be it. He’d take her any way he could get her. “No.”

  His answer pleased her, because she gifted him with a smile. Just like it had all those years ago, it soothed his soul and eased his pain.

  “Good. Then close your eyes, Jack, and keep remembering. We were just about to get married, I think.”

  “Aye,” he agreed with a smile. “And have our first big fight as well.”

  March 1975

  Pine Ridge

  “Have you told Kathleen about buying the bar yet?” Brian asked, adjusting Jack’s tie. Standing in the small room near the front of the church, they waited for the opening notes of the wedding march. It was just the two of them; Jack and Kathleen had wanted to keep things small and simple, and that included the wedding party. Brian was standing up for Jack as his best man; Kathleen had her sister Erin as matron of honor.

  “Not yet. I want it to be a surprise.”