by Sophie Moss
“You don’t answer my questions, Tara. What makes you think I’d answer yours?”
“Look,” Tara said, following him when he veered from the path, taking a short-cut through an overgrown pasture. “I’m sorry that she left you and Kelsey and I’m sorry that there are similarities between us, whatever they are. But all I want is a job and a quiet place to live for a little while. I promise I’m not going to hurt anyone. I just know a few things about herbs and healing that my mother and father taught me. And without a doctor on this island, I thought I might be able to help some people while I’m here. It’s nothing for you to worry about or wonder about. It’s just what it is.”
“Nothing is ever just what it is.” Dominic turned, faced her. “And until you can give me a straight answer about who you are and what you’re doing here, on this island, I’m not going to give you a break. Not for one minute.”
“But this is who I am, Dominic. What I was or who I might have been doesn’t matter anymore.”
“It matters to me.”
“Why? What did she do to you to make you so bitter?”
“This isn’t about me.”
“Then who is it about? Who are you trying to protect?” When he just stared at her, Tara took a step back. “You don’t mean…?”
“She’s my whole world,” Dominic said quietly. “I won’t let anyone hurt her ever again.”
“But what do you think I’m going to do to your daughter? How could I possibly…?”
“She’s eight. She won’t know any better.”
“Know better than to what? Talk to me when I’m working in the kitchen?”
“She’s already started asking questions.”
“Like what? Like who I am and where I came from?”
“Not exactly,” he said, starting to walk again.
“Then what?” Tara asked, trailing after him. “What’s she asking that’s so hard to answer?”
“She thinks you’ve something to do with the legend.”
“What legend? What are you talking about?”
“The legend of Seal Island. Surely Caitlin told you when she let you into the cottage?”
Tara shook her head.
Dominic stopped walking. “She didn’t tell you?”
“Tell me what?” Tara asked, exasperated.
“The story of the woman who used to live there?”
“No. I have no idea what you’re talking about. Who used to live there?”
Dominic stared at her for a long time, then shook his head. “Never mind. It doesn’t matter anyway.”
“Wait,” Tara protested. “You can’t say that. If your daughter thinks it has something to do with me, I have a right to know why.”
“Then ask Caitlin to tell you.”
“I don’t want to hear it from Caitlin. I want to hear it from you.”
Dominic turned, regarding her intently for several moments, then glanced at the village measuring the distance it would take them to walk and the time it would take him to tell the story. “If I tell you the story, will you tell me the truth about why you’re really here?”
“No,” Tara answered honestly. “But I’ll promise to keep my distance from your daughter this summer. And I promise not to hurt you or anyone you love.”
Dominic searched her face, but he saw only truth in her eyes. Maybe the story would scare her off. Maybe she’d find enough truth in it to decide it wasn’t worth it to stay. Dipping his hands in his pockets, he motioned for her to follow him.
“Two hundred years ago a woman came to the island,” he began. “She had long black hair and eyes as green as the hills under your feet. Her skin was white as snow. When she moved it was like a dance.”
Tara fell into step beside him, pulled in by the rich, lyrical voice, and surprised it could belong to the same man who’d been nothing but rude to her since she arrived on the island.
“The woman spoke in an ancient tongue that no one understood, or wanted to. And though her beauty was unmatched throughout the land, there was a sadness to her, a kind of despair that followed her wherever she went. Islanders in those days mostly kept to themselves. They didn’t gossip or poke into other people’s lives. But there was something strange about this woman, something that made them whisper.”
Tara stole a glance at his profile, at the hard line of his jaw shadowed by a day-old beard. The wind teased his thick hair off his face, revealing little lines fanning out from the edges of his eyes. There was a time in his life, Tara realized, when he’d laughed. Maybe even been carefree. Her gaze dropped to his mouth, to where another thin scar ran through the bottom lip.
When his gaze drifted over to hers, she pulled her eyes away from his face, forcing herself to focus on the story.
“The woman hadn’t come to the island by boat, or by ferry,” Dominic continued, “or by any other form of transportation used in those days. She simply appeared one day holding onto the arm of an island man named Ian Quigley.”
Gazing down at the path, Tara thought of the woman she’d seen her first night outside the cottage. The shells tied into her hair. The pearls sewn into her dress.
“The woman mostly kept to herself, spending hours gazing out to the sea, wading into the ocean, even in December, when the icy water could freeze you to the bone. But she never went in, never more than to her knees.
“Men would sneak up to the cliffs to watch her, enchanted by her beauty. Despite her strange ways, she was more beautiful than any woman they’d ever seen. It was hard to stay away from her, to tear your eyes from her face when you first saw her. She could put a spell on you, some said. With a single look she could see inside your soul.
“But the only living creatures she ever spent time with besides her husband were the seals.”
Tara glanced up at him. “The seals?”
“Aye.” Dominic nodded. “She would spend hours on the beach with them, sliding her hands over their slick seal-skin. She drew crowds of them. They covered the beaches, slipping in and out of the water to be near her. It was the only time anyone ever heard her laugh. And the sound was so beautiful, so intoxicating; it drove grown men mad.
“But Ian Quigley didn’t like it when she spent her days with the seals. He’d heard the women whispering, heard the gossip down at the pub. And he forbade her to go near them.
“Some say it was because she was not altogether human. Some say she was one of the women of the sea. Ian found her on the beach during a Lammas Stream, when the selkies were said to come ashore. And the more the islanders looked at the woman, the more convinced they became that the legends of the selkies were true.”
Tara swallowed, remembering the ferry captain’s words two days ago. ‘You’ve heard of the legend? It’s just a tale for the tourists. But you’re not looking for that, are you?’ “I thought a selkie was a seal?”
“A selkie’s a special kind of seal,” Dominic explained. “One who can take the shape of a woman on land.”
Tara felt a strange tremor race through her.
“When a selkie comes to shore, she’ll shed her seal-skin and hide it for safekeeping. Because if a human man finds it, the selkie will belong to him. She is powerless under his control, unable to escape, or return to her home.”
Tara thought of the woman she’d seen on the cliffs, the tears streaming down her face, the sorrow in her eyes.
“It’s said that Ian Quigley found her seal-skin and hid it from her. It’s said that in trying to find it, to reclaim it, she was driven mad.”
Suddenly, Tara felt cold inside. Cold all over.
“It’s said that she bore a daughter and in her madness, pushed the child’s crib out to sea, so that the seals would take her far away from the island. After watching the seals circle the crib, and watching her infant child drift away, she bound her wrists and ankles with kelp and walked into the sea.”
Dominic waited until her gaze slid back to his face. “They say the daughter survived, that she was rescued by a fishing boat, taken in
by a family on the mainland. Years went by and she married. She had a daughter, and then that daughter married and had a daughter, and so on until several generations passed.
“But when the selkie took her life,” he explained, “she cursed herself, trapping her spirit on the island. She will never escape. Her spirit will never return to the sea until her descendent comes back to the island to set her free. Every year, a Lammas Stream returns to Seal Island. Seven days and nights of high tides bring with it her only chance to escape, to return to her home, and to lay her spirit to rest with her kind.”
Tara pulled her gaze from Dominic’s face and discovered they were outside the pub. Rubbing her hands up and down her arms to warm them, she forced out a laugh. “That’s quite a story.”
“Some would say it’s more truth than story.”
“Well, I don’t believe in fairy tales.”
“Funny,” Dominic said. “Neither do I.”
Chapter 5
The sun warmed her face. The heat seeped into her bare arms stretched over the sides of the rowboat. The sea rocked the boat gently, like a hand rocks a cradle, from side to side. She smiled as she floated farther out to sea. It didn’t matter that she didn’t have any oars. It didn’t matter that she’d lost sight of land. All that mattered was she was alone, she was safe, and she was far, far away from him.
A shadow passed overhead and she opened her eyes, sitting up suddenly as dark clouds blotted out the sun. Her hands gripped the edges of the tiny boat as the wind kicked up and the ocean began to stir. Whitecaps chopped over the surface. The sea churned and shook. She scrambled to the middle of the boat, fighting to balance the tipsy vessel.
Seawater pooled into the boat, swallowing her bare feet, rising to her ankles, then her shins. She cried out, bailing water with both hands. But the water rose faster than she could scoop it out. Thunder cracked like a whip. The front end of the boat lurched, plunging into the sea.
Lightning flashed. Rain poured from the sky. Swells slammed into the little boat and the wood cracked and splintered. She screamed as she was thrown from the boat and the ocean sucked her under.
Struggling to swim, to fight her way to the surface, she sank further and faster and when she couldn’t hold her breath any longer, she panicked, gulping saltwater into her burning lungs.
Time shifted, shapes morphed. The song of the sea surrounded her, threading its sweet melody into her soul. Tara blinked, opening her eyes underwater. Seawater flowed freely into her lungs. And she found that she could breathe.
Why had she never tried this before?
She kicked her legs, swam deeper, and jerked when big hands grabbed her, hauled her from the sea. She choked, gasping as cold fingers closed around her throat.
Did you think you could run from me, Sydney? Did you think you could hide?
She fought him, clawing at his skin, peeling it off his face. He screamed, enraged that she would try to fight him. And when he pushed her head under and held her there, she flailed, floundering for something to hold onto, to pull herself up, as the dark waters that flowed so easily inside her moments ago clogged her lungs. One last moment of sweet delirious madness took her, and then her whole body went limp.
***
Tara sat up, gasping, soaked in sweat. She switched on the light, kicked at the tangle of sheets twisted around her feet. It had found her here. It was the same dream, every time. It chased her no matter how far she ran. She would never escape it. She would never escape him.
She sucked in a breath, pushed to her feet. No! She would not let him defeat her like this. She would not let him creep into her thoughts. Crossing the room, she pushed open the door to the hallway, and jumped when a shadow fell across the floor.
It was only the curtain, the wind teasing the fabric into a beam of silvery moonlight. But she shrank back into the room, watching the dark shadows dance, her heart still pounding.
She needed to do something to distract herself. Hesitating for only an instant, she grabbed the sweater from the foot of her bed and let herself out into the night. Walking the moonlit path to the pub, she balked at every shadow, jumped at every sound, but she forced herself to keep moving, to put one foot in front of the other until she was standing in the alley, pushing her key in the lock and letting herself into the kitchen of the pub.
She grabbed the first cookbook she could find, started gathering ingredients and pouring them into the pan. The image of her husband’s face seared the backs of her eyes, but she pushed it away, focusing on the recipe. She was stronger than this. She was stronger than him. The scent of cinnamon and melting butter drifted up through the floorboards, and Dominic woke to the sound of footsteps moving around downstairs.
Sitting up, Dominic untangled his legs from the sheets. Shaking off the memory of a strange dream of a rose bush whose flowers had all died and in place of thorns its branches grew long sharp knives, he pushed to his feet and pulled on a pair of jeans. When he reached the first floor, the overpowering fragrance of roses collided with the sugary scents from the kitchen and he fought the sudden spell of dizziness, pushing open the door and staring when he spotted Tara at the stove.
Tara turned when she heard the door open. She watched Dominic rub his eyes, trying to focus. His hair was mussed and his eyes were still bleary from sleep. The shadow of stubble along his jaw had grown darker and thicker, making the rugged planes of his face look even more dangerous. His chest was bare, revealing the strong, well-defined muscles of his chest and arms. And when her gaze drifted down that hard, muscular stomach to where his jeans slung low across his narrow hips, she dropped her spoon into a saucepan of boiling butter. The hot liquid splashed her fingers as she backed away, untying the apron from around her waist. “I shouldn’t be here. I shouldn’t have come.”
When he took a step toward her, Tara reached blindly for the rolling pin. Her knuckles went white on the handle where she hid it behind her back.
A strange, painful twist in his gut had Dominic crossing the room to her, struggling for air over the smell of the roses. And when she looked at him with those big green eyes, he felt like he was falling, like the whole world was closing in around him. They were only inches apart. He could feel the heat from her. Smell the dizzying scent of the roses mixed with her own sweet scent. He reached out, brushing a sprinkling of flour from her cheek.
She braced when his hand stayed on her cheek. But instead of the memories this time, instead of the heartache and the pain, something different coursed through her. It came fast and hard like lightning. The rolling pin fell from her hands, clattering to the floor. She tried to step away, to break the connection, but her legs wouldn’t move.
Dominic felt something pulling him down, a force so strong it felt like it was sucking him into the ocean, and when he drew his hand back, a strange tingling sensation shot through his fingers. He glanced down at his hand, saw that the tips of his fingers were singed and steam rose off the marked skin. He turned his hand over slowly. “What is this?”
Reaching for the counter, Tara tested her legs and when she found that they could move, she took a step back. She made herself look at him, made herself meet those intense gray eyes and her pulse hammered, knocking against her throat.
The pop and splatter of the butter boiling over on the stove snapped Dominic back to reality. He went to the knob, switched off the gas and, when he turned, it was like seeing her for the first time. She was wearing her sweater inside-out. Her hair was tangled. There were pillow marks pressed into her face and she was standing in the middle of the kitchen in only her socks.
But the absurdity of finding her here in the middle of the night in her pajamas fell flat when he saw the look in her eyes, the same look that he’d seen in his mother’s eyes every time she’d looked at his father.
“Tara,” Dominic took a step toward her.
Tara opened her mouth to speak, but no words came out and she felt like she was falling off a high, high cliff. Backing away from him, Tara reached for t
he door. “I— I have to go,” she stammered, fighting to keep her voice steady, fighting to keep her knees from giving out. She spun on her heels and pushed out of the kitchen, leaving Dominic to stare at the door as it slapped back in place, causing a rain of rose petals to flutter to the ground.
***
Dominic bided his time. He stayed out of the kitchen when he came down to greet the first customer and tried to ignore the sickening scent of the roses Tara had arranged in vases throughout the barroom. But it was impossible to ignore them when it was the one thing on everyone’s mind.
“So this is where that smell’s coming from,” Margaret Connelly said, picking up a vase and studying the rich, dark color of the petals. “Rory said he smelled them all the way over to the bogs this morning on his walk.”
“I ran into Brennan a few minutes ago,” Sarah Dooley added. “He said he couldn’t sleep last night. Kept dreaming about getting trapped in a hedge of roses.”
“I thought I smelled something funny down at the docks this morning,” Donal piped in, rubbing his thumb over one of the stems and jerking back when it pricked him.
Dominic grabbed the vase, dumped the entire thing in the trash.
“Did you order them from the mainland?” Maggie asked.
“No.”
“Then where did they come from?”
“Tara’s house,” Sarah answered. “She fixed up a brew for Brennan yesterday. Said it’d help him with his arthritis. He said it did. But he’s not sure how he feels about having those nightmares as a side effect.”
Dominic thought of his own dream, of the thorns like glistening knives. He yanked another vase off the bar and threw it into the trash.
Maggie watched Dominic reach for another vase. “If they came from Tara’s garden, then that means they’re growing up at your cottage. Did you plant them?”
