by Lynne Graham
A weather-beaten older man in a dark suit hurried round the side of the house towards them and came forward to take charge of the stallion. ‘Tolly will ensure that Pluto is brought back to you in a horsebox,’ Rafael Flynn asserted.
Harriet bit her lip, feeling like a schoolgirl being rebuked for imprudent behaviour. She would dearly have loved to seize hold of Pluto herself and frogmarch him back to his stable. But there were too many barriers to be cleared, and she was too sensible to even consider taking such a risk with a horse too powerful for her to hold. ‘I’m sorry you’ve been inconvenienced.’
‘Relax…I would have been gutted had I missed out on those enchanting pyjamas,’ Rafael murmured silkily.
His heavily lidded dark eyes roamed with unashamed intent over the jutting swell of her ripe breasts and lingered there with wicked appreciation before he directed his attention back up to the wonderfully voluptuous promise of her full-lipped pink mouth. If it had not been for Bianca he would have invited his neighbour to join him for breakfast in bed. At the same time, he knew that with regard to Harriet Carmichael he had to take care of business first. He never, ever allowed anything to deflect him from his goal. And she was in for a rough and rocky passage if she continued to oppose him.
Wholly unprepared for his comment and appraisal, and interpreting both as derisive amusement, Harriet flung him a look of angry disconcertion. ‘Very funny. Don’t let me keep you!’
Taken aback by that inept response to a mildly flirtatious comment, Rafael frowned as Bianca chose that inopportune moment to stroll out of the house. ‘The countryside is sublime,’ she sighed, invading his space.
The statuesque blonde was so beautiful that Harriet simply gaped, only glancing away uncomfortably when she appreciated that the other woman was virtually naked below the silk wrap that she had forgotten to close over. The possessive hand she curved over Rafael Flynn’s arm made Harriet feel equally uncomfortable. Had she been guilty of casting admiring eyes over another woman’s husband?
‘Miss Carmichael…’ In a fluster, Harriet focused on the silver haired older man, who had passed custody of Pluto over to a younger man in working clothes. ‘I’m Joseph Tolly. Forty years back our families were neighbours. You have a great look of your mother.’
A huge smile of surprise and pleasure momentarily banished Harriet’s discomfiture. ‘Honestly? My goodness, you must have known her. I would really love to hear what you remember about those days.’
‘You’d be very welcome to visit me this evening,’ the old man told her warmly.
‘I’d be delighted. Where do you live?’
Unaccustomed to being ignored, Rafael watched the exchange of civilities between his usually correct butler and his new neighbour with grim amusement. Bianca was flouncing back and forth like a child threatening a tantrum, because nobody was demonstrating the slightest interest in her either and attention was the oxygen of her existence. With that example before him, Rafael was able to concede that the ability to enjoy a friendly chat whatever the circumstances was inimitably Irish. He could even afford to smile with benevolence at such sentimentality between strangers. Having refused his generous offer to buy her property, his sexy neighbour was about to pay the price for that defiance in what would be a rather less civilised second act. When necessary, Rafael played a long game, and a deep one, and he did not stop playing until success was his.
Encountering Rafael Flynn’s glinting dark, reflective gaze, Harriet felt chilled. A split second later, discarding that sensation, she recalled that she was still standing on the front lawn of his fabulous Georgian mansion, and mortification threatened to eat her alive. How could she have forgotten for one moment that she was parading around in her pyjamas? Was it any wonder that Rafael Flynn was looking at her as though she had escaped from a zoo?
‘Excuse me…’she muttered, turning hurriedly on her heel to trek rigid-backed down the hill. Every big gaudy rose splayed across her bottom felt like a stabbing source of personal torment. The arrogant louse had laughed at her! But, she reflected uncomfortably, he could hardly have missed the juvenile way she had blushed and stared at him with eyes on stalks. Any guy that handsome had to be aware of his effect on women, so he was certain to have noticed. What on earth had come over her? She cringed with chagrin.
As if that were not bad enough, that crack about organic vegetables had hit her on the raw as well. Why shouldn’t she want to have a bit of a go at growing things? It seemed Mr McNally, the solicitor, had repeated everything she’d said—but then why should he not have? She had not asked the poor man to keep her aspirations to get down and dirty in the vegetable patch a big dark secret. Since when had she become so over-sensitive?
After a quick shower, and an even faster breakfast, Harriet began to plan the rebirth of the livery yard in greater detail. A proper name for the business and a sign out on the road would be the first step. Lost in thought, she stroked Samson’s silky ears until the little dog sighed with contentment. She would have to do some research to see which services were most likely to be in demand locally and check out the competition. She also needed to get moving on a repair programme, and talk to Fergal to find out exactly what his unofficial partnership with Kathleen had entailed. Someone to supply help and cover in what was basically a twenty-four-seven business would be very useful, Harriet conceded thoughtfully.
Fergal Gibson drove into the yard just as Pluto was being led out of the huge horsebox that had arrived from Flynn Court.
‘What happened?’ he exclaimed. ‘How did Pluto get out?’
‘The stable door’s damaged,’ Harriet told him. ‘I think he kicked his way out, but I have no idea why.’
‘It could have been Flynn’s helicopter coming in.’ Fergal ran careful hands over the restive stallion in search of injury and with a relieved sigh put him into another stall. ‘I’m really sorry. I’ll put up another bolt. Catching him must’ve been a nightmare.’
‘Rafael Flynn caught him,’ Harriet admitted ruefully.
Fergal chuckled. ‘Women and horses. Now, there is a guy with the magic touch. I hear that he can make them do anything for him.’
Her blue eyes gleamed. She was tempted to quip that that was no doubt why Rafael Flynn appeared to have such a good opinion of himself. ‘Is he married?’
‘Are you joking? I hear his latest lady is some famous fashion model.’
Thinking of the woman she had seen, Harriet thought that figured, and she told Fergal to come inside for tea when he had finished in the yard.
‘One of the local farmers has been looking after Kathleen’s animals for you,’ he informed her then, washing his hands at the sink with the ease of someone very much at home with his surroundings. ‘You’d best decide what you want done with them.’
‘Animals?’
‘Kathleen has a soft touch for strays. There’s an old mare called Snowball that she rescued, and she can still be ridden. There’s a pig too…oh, yeah, and chickens, ex-battery farm inmates,’ Fergal explained ruefully. ‘We’re talking pets and charity cases here, not pedigrees. I had them moved before Eugene McNally did his inventory because he would’ve had them put down. Now you can make the tough decisions.’
Harriet was already smiling at the prospect of a readymade family of livestock which would provide a vital link back to the cousin whom she had to thank for her inheritance. ‘If they had a home with Kathleen they’ll have a home with me.’
His tanned face broke into a warm, attractive grin.
‘Right.’ Harriet curved her hands round the mug of tea in front of her and breathed in deep. ‘You’re using the stables here…’
‘I was hoping we could come to an arrangement,’ Fergal admitted.
‘I’d like that if it is possible,’ Harriet told him honestly. ‘But I do need to make a living, and right now I don’t know if the figures will add up with your horses using that amount of space—’
‘I could start work on fixing up the old stables and move the geldin
gs in there instead. That was phase two of Kathleen’s expansion plan. But the new stables were essential to bring in the owners who wanted their mounts to have only the best.’
Talking to Fergal was easy. He was straightforward, and happy to talk about her late cousin’s original plans. Having been priced out of the riding school business by the high costs of insurance and the seasonal aspect of the tourist trade, Kathleen had hoped to build a livery yard that would be upmarket to attract new clients and increase her income.
‘She must have had savings or something, because she really did spend a mint here,’ Fergal advanced. ‘She bought that pick-up brand-new, and the horsebox arrived only the week before she had the first heart attack.’ His cheerfulness visibly ebbed at that sobering recollection. ‘She was sixty-three and seemed as fit as a fiddle. She was waiting for surgery when she died.’
Harriet watched Fergal swallow thickly and knew that he had been genuinely fond of the older woman. He reminded her of a big, blond good-natured bear, slow of speech and thoughtful and kind.
‘You should come to the Point-to-Point races with me tomorrow. It’s the last meeting of the season,’ he told her with enthusiasm. ‘I’m running Tailwind. I can introduce you around. People need to know you’re open for business.’
‘I’d like that.’ Belatedly conscious of the speculative masculine look of appreciation she was receiving, Harriet glanced away and tried not to smile. She was flattered that he appeared to find her attractive. But she suspected that Fergal Gibson might be a wild flirt, and if she responded it would probably wreck any prospect of their establishing a good working relationship. Unless she was reading him wrong, it would be easy come, easy go with Fergal, and that had never been her style. But maybe a silly rebound fling was what she needed right now…after all, she had been extremely sensible and cautious all her life and where had it got her? Luke, she reminded herself squarely, was with Alice now.
*
‘What’s your interest in Harriet Carmichael?’ Rafael asked his elderly butler smoothly, while Bianca chatted to a friend on the phone about how sublime Ireland was—with the exceptions of the weather, the absence of large shopping outlets and nightclubs, Rafael’s cold and comfortless ancestral home and the amount of time he spent in the stables.
Tolly gave him a little smile. ‘Now, wouldn’t that be telling?’
Rafael laughed with true appreciation, for only Tolly would dare to tell him to mind his own business. ‘What do you know about her?’
‘That she’ll not be single for long,’ the older man forecast with assurance, his blue eyes twinkling.
Rafael elevated a mocking black brow. ‘On what do you base that belief?’
‘She’s a fine-looking girl with a lovely smile and land and a business. When it comes to a good catch the local lads are neither blind nor stupid. No, that little lady will be snatched up and off the market by the winter.’
‘Maybe she craves something rather more exciting?’ Rafael murmured softly.
Tolly’s weather-beaten features stiffened. ‘I don’t think so, sir.’
Sir? Rafael wondered why the old man should be so thin-skinned about a young woman he had only met that day. Was it because Tolly had once known her family and already considered her part of the community? Or was he simply showing his disapproval of Rafael’s infinitely casual attitude to women and sex? Whatever, Rafael was very much amused by Tolly’s sudden formality. Across the room, Bianca was now dancing, her hips shimmying to the driving beat of the music she had put on. She shed her jacket slowly, provocatively tugged her suede belt free of her tiny mini-skirt and treated herself to a seductive appraisal in the vast gilt mirror. Rafael decided that his next lover would be less vain and more intelligent and switched on the business news.
*
Joseph Tolly lived in a small, incredibly neat gate lodge beside the distinctly ruinous rear entrance to the Flynn Court estate. For all his arrogant confidence, Harriet reflected, with a stab of wicked satisfaction that shook her, Rafael Flynn was clearly too poor to adequately maintain his ancestral home. So why the heck had he attempted to buy Kathleen Gallagher’s property from her at such a healthy price?
The old man appeared at the door before Harriet even reached it. ‘Come on in,’ he urged with a broad smile of welcome.
She was touched to see the careful preparations he had made for her visit. A snowy white lace-edged cloth had been laid on a tray that bore old-fashioned floral bone china and a luscious chocolate cake. The simply furnished room was immaculately tidy and every wooden surface gleamed.
‘Will you tell me everything you remember about my mother’s family?’ Harriet urged her host eagerly, and then, rather more self-consciously, her cheeks colouring, she added, ‘You must be wondering why I’m asking a stranger when she’s still alive. My mother isn’t very nostalgic about the past.’
‘Perhaps there wasn’t much for her to be sentimental about,’ Joseph Tolly said gently. ‘In those days this community was struggling to survive. There wasn’t much employment. Even now the tourists need encouragement to travel several miles of twisting road from the nearest town to visit Ballyflynn. Have you been to see the old place where your family used to live?’
‘I don’t know where it is.’
‘Your mother’s family lived a field away from mine, on a smallholding about two miles out of the village. The house is derelict now, but I’ll draw you a little map so that you can go and have a look around.’
‘Thank you…I’d love to do that,’ Harriet confided.
‘Shall I tell you what I remember best about your mother?’
Harriet nodded very seriously and offered to pour the tea.
Watching her take charge of the tea tray, Joseph Tolly smiled and settled himself more comfortably into his shabby fireside chair. ‘Your mother must have been about fourteen when she decided she didn’t want to be known as Agnes any more, and she started calling herself Eva instead.’
Harriet blinked in surprise, for she had not known that her parent had chosen that name for herself. Agnes? But then all she had ever known of Eva’s history was the absolute basics: that her mother was the daughter of a small farmer who had been widowed while she was still a child. Her older teenaged brother had been killed in a tractor accident.
‘What a rumpus she caused!’ Tolly chuckled. ‘The nuns at the convent school had no tolerance for girls’ fancies, but your mother defied the lot of them—even the cantankerous old priest that we had then.’ His expressive eyes invited her to enjoy his warm humour. ‘Unfortunately I think she paid the price for it, because your grandfather took her out of school early and she was a bright girl.’
‘What was my grandfather like?’ Harriet prompted eagerly.
‘Dermot Gallagher had a mean temper on him,’ Joseph told her, with a look of honest apology at having to make that admission. ‘He wasn’t a lucky man, and his disappointments soured him and made him a harsh parent. He wouldn’t let your mother have a life like other girls, so when she ran away nobody was that surprised. If she wasn’t working on the farm, he hired her out to work for other people and kept her wages.’
Harriet was sobered by what she was learning, and finally appreciated why her mother might have preferred to leave that distant past buried. ‘I wish she’d told me what it was like for her then. I had no idea her childhood was that tough.’
‘Your cousin, Kathleen, once told my late wife that when your mother tried to stand up to Dermot he would threaten to have her locked up with the nuns. That may sound unbelievable to you, but right up until twenty years ago certain convents ran commercial laundries staffed by young women who had been put in their charge because they were supposedly a threat to decent society. More than one disobedient daughter ended up in those unhappy places, and some of them never came out again.’
Harriet lost colour when she made the connection. ‘You’re talking about the Magdalene Laundries?’
‘Yes.’ Tolly nodded grave confirmation.
‘Life was very different here then. No one would have dreamt of interfering between a father and his child.’
‘She must have felt so alone…’ Harriet thought that it was hardly surprising that when Eva had finally escaped her father’s threats and restrictions, partying had held rather more appeal for her than parenting.
‘Hasn’t Eva the life now, though?’ Joseph remarked in a determinedly cheerful change of subject that suggested he was more comfortable skimming the surface of her mother’s past. ‘I saw a picture of her in an old magazine last year. She looked like a queen in a ballgown at some charity do. She’s come a long way from the young woman who used to help out in the village shop.’
‘Could you give me the names of any of her schoolfriends?’ Harriet suspected that the key to discovering her father’s identity would most likely be found amongst her mother’s contemporaries.
‘I was acquainted with the family situation, but not with much else. We were of different generations.’ His eyes veiled, he served her with a mouthwatering wedge of chocolate cake, and for a few minutes there was silence as Harriet did justice to it.
‘I imagine that there was quite an uproar after my mother ran away.’ Harriet was thoroughly relaxed, and happy to match Tolly’s frankness with her own. ‘I’m very keen to find out who my father was.’
Clearly unprepared for that admission, Joseph looked startled. ‘But surely your mother—?’
‘No…she’s always refused to say,’ Harriet admitted ruefully.
‘But you can hardly go around asking awkward questions of people you don’t even know,’ the old man pointed out. ‘You could cause offence, and you might also cause trouble by casting suspicion on an innocent party. I would strongly advise you to speak to your mother again.’
Harriet suppressed a heavy sigh. She was not close to Eva, and worked hard at conserving the relationship she did have with her. The last time she had tackled the older woman on the score of her parentage Eva had taken strong umbrage.
Joseph gave his guest an anxious appraisal. ‘I think you also need to ask yourself what you’re hoping to get from the information you seek. Your father may be a man who let your mother down when she most needed his support. He might have no interest in knowing you.’
