by Nora Roberts
He snapped his fingers at Finn, waiting while the dog happily scrambled out. “Come along with me, lad. They don’t want our kind here.” He strode out, Finn prancing behind him. “Take a lie-down,” Aidan shouted, then the door slammed.
“You look a little tired,” Brenna commented, pursing her lips as she studied Jude. “Aren’t you sleeping well these nights?”
“The baby was feeling frisky last night.” Jude ran her hands in slow circles over her belly, thrilled at the impatient ripple under her palms. “Kept me awake. I don’t mind, really. It’s a lovely feeling.”
“You need to nap when he naps.” Brenna decided to have another piece of toast, and began to load this one with jam. “That’s what I’ve heard, and do the same once he pops out as well. Sleep becomes a precious thing. How are the childbirth classes going?”
“Oh, they’re fascinating. Wonderful. Terrifying. The last one—”
“If you don’t mind,” Darcy interrupted, “I’ve something I need to discuss. I’d hope my two closest friends in the world would have some interest.”
Brenna only rolled her eyes, but Jude tucked her tongue in her cheek, folded her hands on the table. “Of course we’re interested. What is it?”
“It’s—” She found the words stuck in her throat. Hissing, she grabbed Brenna’s tea and gulped it down over her friend’s annoyed protest. “I’m in love with Trevor.”
“Christ Jesus!” Brenna snatched her cup back. “You’ve dragged me up here for that?”
“Brenna.” Jude spoke softly, her eyes on Darcy’s face. “She means it.”
“The girl’s always making a stage production out of . . .” But Brenna trailed off, getting a good look at Darcy herself. “Oh. Oh, well, then.” With a laugh, she leaped to her feet and gave Darcy a smacking kiss on the mouth. “Congratulations.”
“I didn’t win a bloody raffle.” Disgusted, she dropped into a chair. “Why did it happen this way?” Dismissing Brenna as useless, she appealed to Jude. “Without me having time to prepare or figure on it. It’s like a punch in the face, and I have to keep my balance here, as I’ll not be knocked on my ass by any man.”
“You’ve knocked more than your share of them on theirs,” Brenna pointed out. “Seems you’re due for some of the same. I like him.” She took a huge bite of toast and jam. “I think he suits you.”
“Why?”
“Hold that thought.” Jude lifted a finger. “Darcy, does he make you happy?”
“How do I know?” She threw up her hands, then pushed back from the table. “I’m feeling too many things at the moment to know if happy is one of them. Oh, don’t give me those smug, married-ladies’ smiles. I like his company. I’ve never known a man I like being with so much as Trevor. Just being with him. I’d look forward to seeing him even without the sex, and that’s saying quite a bit, as the sex is fantastic.”
She hesitated for a moment, then continued. “And last night, after we’d made love it just happened. It’s like a slamming into you, so you can’t get your air proper and the blood drains right out of your head and your joints go weak. I’ve never been so furious. What business does he have making me fall in love with him before I’m damn good and ready and have decided it’s what I want?”
“Oh, he’s a bounder all right,” Brenna said cheerfully. “Why, the nerve of that man.”
“Oh, shut up. I should’ve known you’d take his part.”
“Darcy.” Brenna took her hand, and though the humor still brightened her eyes, there was an understanding in them that blew away Darcy’s resentment. “He’s what you’ve always wanted. He’s handsome and clever and rich.”
“That’s part of the problem, isn’t it?” Jude laid a hand over theirs, formed a unit. “He’s what you’ve always wanted, or told yourself you did. Now that you’ve found him, you wonder if it’s real. And if it is, will he believe it?”
“I didn’t know it would be this way.” The tears wanted to come, and here, with friends, she let them. “I thought it would be fun, a lark. And easy. But it’s not. I’ve always been able to tell what’s going on inside a man, but I can’t with him. He’s a slick one, Trevor is, and slippery. God, I love that about him.”
That made her cry harder and reach for a napkin to wipe her face. “Oh, if he knew what a mess he’d made out of me, he’d be so pleased about it.”
“You may be right, but not,” Jude added, “for the reasons you might think. He has feelings for you. They show.”
“He has feelings, all right.” Some of the bitterness came through now, and she savored the taste of it on her tongue, as she might a medicine that cured madness. “He’s talked to Carrick.”
“I knew it.” Triumphant, Brenna slapped a hand on the table. “I knew you’d be the third. You knew, didn’t you, Jude?”
“Logically, it followed.” But Jude was watching Darcy again. “You haven’t seen Carrick, or Gwen, have you?”
“Apparently neither of them has time to chat with the likes of me.” And she wasn’t sure if she was relieved or annoyed by the fact. “However, they’ve time for Magee.He told me that Carrick’s aiming toward the two of us, and wanted me to know—made it very clear— that he’s no intention of falling in love with the legend. He’s not looking for love and vows of forever from me, no indeed. He wants me,” she muttered, her eyes going dark, narrowing, sparking. “In bed, and for his recording label. I’ve accommodated him on the first, to our mutual enjoyment, and I may just accommodate him on the second. But he’s going to find Darcy Gallagher doesn’t come cheap.”
Jude felt a twinge of apprehension. “What do you have in mind?”
Her eyes might have been wet, but determination flashed through them. “I’ll have him crawling, belly down, before I’m done with him.”
“I don’t suppose you considered meeting on equal ground?”
“Hah.” Darcy sat again. “If I’m to be miserable and confused and scared to the bone, then by God, he’ll be the same before I’m finished. When he’s blind in love with me, I’ll get a ring on my finger before he gets his vision back.”
“And then?” Jude murmured.
That part of the business was murky, so Darcy dismissed it with a shrug. “Then the rest takes care of itself. It’s the now I have to deal with.”
FOURTEEN
FOR DARCY, THE now had already started, and she didn’t intend to fall behind. Back at the pub, she went directly to the kitchen. Irritated that Shawn wasn’t in yet, as he made better coffee than she, she began to measure and brew. Once it was on, she checked her appearance in the mirror she’d hung by the door.
A little damp and windswept, she decided. Perfect.
She poured a mugful, gave her cheeks a quick slap to be sure her color was up, then stepped back out into the thin rain.
She had to pick her way over rubble and debris, skirting the thick block wall. Trevor wasn’t up on the scaffold, which pleased her. She could hardly climb up herself and deliver the coffee. Still, she paused for a moment, looking up at the men who scrambled around. With timber now, which she could only suppose was for the roof. If she concentrated, she could almost see how it was to slope up into a gentle rise as if it had grown somehow out of Gallagher’s rather than been added on.
It was a clever design, and clever of Trevor, she thought, to have seen that in Brenna’s drawing. But he’d be a man of vision, one who could see the potential of things and had the skill to turn a supposing into reality.
Oh, she admired that. It was just one more side of him she’d found herself loving.
There was the side of him for his family as well, the love he so obviously felt for his parents. And the hurt, not so obvious, from his grandfather’s lack of affection. It touched her, the loyalty and the vulnerability. It made him so much more the man.
The bastard would make a simpering fool of her if she wasn’t careful.
She could see where windows and doors would go from the rough openings in the dull gray block. That bloc
k, she knew, would be faced with stone and the stone would weather until it was impossible to tell where the new began and the old left off.
A merging, she thought as she began to walk again, of tradition with change. Of Gallagher and Magee. Well, the man might have vision, but she wasn’t ready for him to see just how complete she intended that merger to be.
She stepped through one of the openings. There was activity inside the walls as well. Planking had already been set over the concrete she’d watched them pour that first day. Pipes and wires and rough boards were poking out here and there. And the din as more were drilled and set into the block was amazing.
She saw him now, crouched down beside one of his crew, eyeballing a pipe that jutted out of the wall. He was covered with a fine gray dust that she supposed came from drilling into the block. Why that, and the tool belt slung at his hips, should have set her mouth to watering was just another part of her dilemma.
Still, she wasn’t so dazzled she didn’t know to bide her time, and wait until he rose, grunting in answer to something his man said, and turned. Saw her.
She watched his eyes change, and it was perfect. That instant of awareness, the connection that was like a hot spark flying dangerously. It wouldn’t have surprised her a bit to see it land and leave a burn mark in the floor at her feet. Delighted, she stepped toward it, and him.
“I wanted a look at what’s what before I got to work.” She smiled, held out the mug. “And I thought you could use this to ward off the damp.”
It only pleased her more that it was suspicion more than surprise that crossed his face. “Thanks.”
“You’re very welcome, indeed. I suppose I’m in the way here.” But she turned a little circle, looking. “But it’s interesting, and it’s moving along so fast.”
“It’s a good crew.” He knew at the first sip she’d made the coffee. It was good and strong, but she didn’t have the same touch as Shawn. Suspicion grew. Just what, he wondered, did she want?
“Sometime when you’re not so busy, perhaps you’d show me how it’ll be.”
“I can show you now.”
“Can you? That would be lovely.”
“We’ll come through the pub there.” He pointed toward the back wall of the pub that was snugged now between the new block. “We won’t cut through for a while yet. You can see the levels are different. We’ve sloped the breezeway down. That’ll give us more height without taking the roofline out of proportion. The breezeway widens.”
“Like an open fan, I remember.”
“That’s right, so it becomes the lobby rather than having it a separate area.”
“What are all these pipes stabbing out here?”
“Rest rooms, either side of the lobby area. Brenna thinks we should use the Gaelic for ‘Men’ and ‘Women,’ the way you have in the pub. I want dark wood, planked, for the doors.” He narrowed his eyes, brought the image into his head. “Under it all, everything will be modern, slick. But what people will see is age.”
What he saw, among the work and supplies and equipment, was the whole of it, shining and complete. “Bare floors,” he continued. “We’ll match them to what you already have. Soft, faded colors, nothing bright or vivid. We’ll have some seating in the lobby, but keep it small, intimate. Benches, I think. We’ll get some art for the walls, but keep it spare and all of it Celtic.”
He glanced at her, lifted his brow when he saw her staring at him. “What?”
“I suppose I thought you’d go for the modern and slick, outside as well as in.”
“Would you?”
She started to speak, then shook her head. “Not here,” she realized. “No, not here, not for this. Here you want duachais .”
“Okay. Since I want it, why don’t you tell me what it is?”
“Oh, it’s Gaelic for . . .” She waved her hand as she tried to find the right translation. “For ‘tradition.’ No, not just that. It has to do with a place most particularly, and its roots and its lore. With, well, with what and why it is.”
His eyes narrowed, focused. “Say it again.”
“It’s duachais.”
“Yeah, that’s it. That’s just exactly it.”
“You’re very right about wanting that here, and I’m glad of it.”
“And considerably surprised by it.”
“A bit anyway, yes. I shouldn’t be.” Because his perception unsettled her, she moved away. “And into the theater?”
“Yeah, doors again, two across.” He took her hand, an absentminded gesture that neither of them noticed. But others did.
“The audience area, three sections, two aisles. Full house is two hundred and forty. Small again, and intimate. The stage is the star here. I can see you there.”
She said nothing, only studied the empty space ahead of her.
He waited a beat. “Are you afraid of performing?”
“I’ve performed all my life.” One way or another, she thought. “No, I’ve no stage fright, if that’s what you mean. Maybe I need to build that image in my head, as you’re building your theater, and see if it stands as sturdy. You’re proud of what you’ve done and what you’re doing. I intend to be the same.”
It wasn’t why she’d come out. She’d meant to surprise him, to flirt with him, to make certain he thought of her through the day. Wanted her through the day.
“I like your theater, Trevor, and I’ll be pleased to sing in it with my brothers, as discussed. As for the rest”— she moved her shoulders, took his empty mug—“I need a bit more convincing. We’ll likely have a session tonight.” She’d make sure of it. “Why don’t you have your supper here, stay for it. Then after, you can come into my parlor. This time I’ll pour the wine.”
Rather than wait for his answer, she slid her free hand into his hair, lifted her mouth to his. And with the promise of more, should he care for it, in her eyes, she turned and walked away.
The minute she opened the kitchen door she smelled the baking. Apples, cinnamon, brown sugar. Shawn must have come in just behind her, and had been busy since. There was a pot already simmering on the stove, and he was chopping whatever else he intended to put in it on the thick board.
He barely glanced at her. “You can put apple crumble as the sweet on the daily, and Mexican chile as well. We have some fresh plaice, for frying.”
Rather than spring into action, she wandered to the refrigerator and got herself a bottle of ginger ale. Here, she thought, sipping it and eyeing her brother, was a source that would be brutally honest and one she trusted completely.
“What do you think of my voice?” she demanded.
“I could do with hearing a good deal less of it.”
“It’s my singing voice I’m referring to, you bonehead.”
“Well, thus far, it’s cracked no glass that I’m aware of.”
She considered heaving the bottle at him, but she wasn’t done with it. “I’m asking you a serious question, and you could do me the courtesy of answering in kind.”
Because her tone had been stiff rather than hot as expected, he lowered his knife and gave her his full attention. The broody look she was wearing he was well accustomed to, but not when there was real worry in her eyes.
“You’ve a beautiful voice, strong and true. You know that as well as I do.”
“No one hears themselves as others do.”
“I like hearing you sing my music.”
That, she thought, was the most simple and most perfect of answers. Her eyes warmed and rather than throw the bottle, she set it aside to hug him.
“What’s all this now?” He rubbed a hand over her back, patted when she sighed and rested her head on his shoulder.
“What does it feel like, Shawn, to have sold your music? To know people will hear it, people who don’t know you? Is it grand?”
“In part, aye, in part it’s the grandest thing. And it’s scary and befuddling all at the same time.”
“And still, deep down, it was what you always wanted.�
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“It was. Keeping it deep down meant it didn’t have to be scary and befuddling.”
“I like singing, but not as my life’s ambition. It’s just what we do, when the mood strikes. The Gallagher way.” She drew back. “Tell me this, then, now that you are selling your music, does it take any of the joy out of it, or make it seem like no more than a job?”
“I thought it might, but no. When I sit down and there’s a tune in my head, it’s just the tune as it always was.” He stroked a finger under her chin. “What is it, darling? Tell me the trouble.”
“Trevor wants to record me. Like a contract. Like a career. He thinks my voice will sell.”
There were a dozen things he could say, jokes that any brother might spring to out of habit and that odd affection. Instead, because he sensed she needed it, he gave her the easy truth. “You’ll be wonderful, and send us all mad with pride.”
She let out a sound that ended in a shaky laugh. “But it wouldn’t be like a session or a ceili . It would be real.”
“You’ll travel, and get rich, which is what you’ve always wanted. And it’ll come from what’s inside you, which is the only way it’ll make you happy.”
She picked up the ginger ale again. “You’re awfully smart all of a sudden.”
“I’ve always been smart. You only admit it when I agree with you.”
“Hmm.” She sipped again, her mind working quickly now, picking its way through obstacles and traps. “You and Brenna are working together in a sort of way. I mean you write the music, but she pushes it. She’s the one who arranged for Trevor to hear it. She’s in a way of being your business agent, or partner, or whatever you might call it.”
Shawn’s answer was a grunt as he picked up his knife and began chopping again. “She can get on her bossy side about it, let me tell you.”
That had Darcy biting her lip. “Does it cause problems between you?”
“None that wouldn’t pass if she’d mind her own.” But when he glanced up again and saw Darcy’s face, he laughed. “Well, for heaven’s sake, why the worry? I’m just winding you up a bit. It’s true enough she pushes, and I can dig in when she shoves too fast and too hard. But I know it’s that she believes in me. It matters, nearly as much as it does that she loves me.”
