“Do you think they’re searching for us?” Farrell whispered, her stomach fluttering nervously. Aidan sat next to her on a short bench with his hard thigh pressed against hers. She felt the tension in his muscles through her thin skirt, and half expected him to leap up at any second, grab her arm, and make a run for the entrance.
Their exit was to be more subtle, though. “Best that we not find out. Come, wife,” he answered quietly. “We will be leaving now. Don’t hurry, but don’t lag, either.”
Aidan stood and extended his hand. Farrell closed her fingers around his and drew comfort from his warm, firm grip. He led her across the room and toward the door, slipping past the soldiers with the nonchalance of a man escorting his wife. Just as he had his hand on the knob, Kate reappeared and brayed, “That’s ’em now! The man and the woman I was tellin’ ye about.”
Aidan swore vehemently under his breath, cursing the pub owner with a profanity that Farrell had heard only once in her life, and with his fingers still tightly interlaced with Farrell’s he jerked open the door and pulled her along with him into a heavy rain.
Terror arced through her like lightning, and Aidan’s iron grip on her arm was so tight, her fingers tingled.
“Halt!” one of soldiers called from the pub doorway behind them. But Aidan didn’t stop until they reached a narrow, garbage-filled alley on the next block. Plunging between the buildings, he pushed her into a tall, shallow depression in one of the brick walls and flattened himself over her, breathing hard.
Farrell could scarcely breathe at all. Her face was pressed hard against his chest, and his shirt buttons dug into her cheek. Heartbeats, strong and fast, mingled with her own galloping pulse, making it impossible to separate hers from his. The male scent of him, laced with a tang of high tension, filled her head. From the street she heard the sound of running footsteps as they passed the alley, but Aidan didn’t move for several moments. To Farrell, who was beginning to grow lightheaded from lack of air, the moments seemed like hours.
Finally Aidan pulled away and her knees buckled, pitching her forward into his arms.
“God, lass, are ye all right?” Aidan whispered, alarmed by her paleness. How easily Farrell fit in his embrace, he realized—her forehead nestled against his jaw. But there was so little to her, all fine bones and softness. She felt much different from the sturdy maids he’d known. And much better. Her hair against his cheek was silky and warm.
She straightened away from him and nodded, gulping in deep breaths. “Aye. J-just let me get my wind.”
“That was too close, the bleedin’ bastards,” he muttered, glancing over his shoulder toward the street.
“Are—are they gone? Those soldiers?”
“Yes, but they may still be creeping about out there somewhere. We were only lucky that they didn’t think to look in here.” His mind racing with strategy, he turned back to her and took her by the shoulders. “Have ye got your feet under you again? We can’t go to the pub and collect our belongings. We’ll have to buy a few things from one of the shops here and get to the Mary Fiona as soon as possible. If we’re caught, we’ll be doomed.”
“I know.” He recognized the fear in her eyes; after all, he’d sometimes seen it when she looked at him. He didn’t want to frighten her but there was no way to put a pretty face on their circumstances. They were dire. Nevertheless, he admired her for not whining as some females might about the personal things she was leaving behind. Farrell had had little to call her own in her young life. He knew she’d brought along her most precious treasures—her mother’s rosary, a small whalebone hairpin, a linen handkerchief. Not important things, and of little value, but her treasures all the same. Yet she uttered not a word of reproach, simply accepting what she knew he couldn’t change. When they reached America, he would buy her new and better things. She deserved no less for her bravery.
“All right then,” he said and edged toward the alley opening. Rain fell in windblown sheets and the street was nearly deserted as people sought shelter in doorways and shops. Across the road, the gray river so closely matched the slate-colored sky it was difficult to tell where one left off and the other began. But the soldiers were nowhere to be seen. “Keep a sharp lookout and follow me.”
* * *
When Farrell and Aidan arrived at the Mary Fiona, they were both laden with bedding, some used clothes they’d bought, supplies, and a few odds and ends, all of which were getting soaked in the downpour. Darting between buildings and the quay had been harrowing; Farrell expected to see soldiers lurking around every corner. Once, she even thought she’d seen Noel Cardwell, that villain, mounted on a fine black gelding. Fear had squeezed her heart in a cruel grip—if he caught them, she knew he would drag her back to Skibbereen and do unspeakable things to her. But it seemed impossible; Noel would not have ridden on horseback all these miles and in this weather. He would have traveled in nothing less than a coach and four. In any event, the man had not noticed them. Luck had been with them, and they made it to the ship without being seen.
Aidan’s discreet inquiries around town to verify McCorry’s information had proven the man to be telling the truth. There were no other ships in port sailing to New York or any other city on America’s east coast. Hamburg, South America, China, for the love of God. But nowhere Aidan and Farrell needed to go.
So they were bound for New Orleans. They’d find a way to travel north once they arrived, he told her.
The Mary Fiona was a small, rather tired-looking three-masted barque, and when Farrell first set eyes on the ship her heart fell to her feet. She didn’t know much about sailing, but still, how would such a little vessel navigate the Atlantic, an ocean said to be icy and storm-ridden at this time of year?
Coming aboard, Farrell had sat on a coil of rope, so as not to be seen by passers-by. While Aidan spoke with James McCorry, she’d started to feel a bit more hopeful. The ship might be no longer than five or six large farm wagons set end to end, and less than half that in width, but it offered passage, and what other choice did they have? The answer to that question was impressed upon her even more strongly when she picked up a bit of Aidan’s conversation with the ship’s master.
“Aye, laddie, those boys from the pub were already here lookin’ for ye. There even came a dandy in fine clothes with a silk kerchief pressed to his nose, askin’ about a red-haired woman and man such as yerself.” Dear God, Farrell thought, it had been Noel whom she’d seen. McCorry squinted at him. “The soldiers said ye killed a man. The dandy claims yer missus worked in his manor house and stole the family silver.”
Aidan turned to look at Farrell, and her jaw dropped when she heard that barefaced lie. “They lie,” he said simply.
McCorry continued. “Well, be that as it may, I told ’em all ye couldn’t meet my price for passage. But they might come back. I suggest you and your wife stay below decks till we cast off.”
Taking McCorry’s advice to heart, they had carted their new purchases below and found accommodations built with rough planks of timber, nailed or otherwise wedged into place. The two-foot-wide bunks were stacked three rows high on either side of the dark, stuffy hold, and a narrow aisle ran down the middle. Those already on board—single men and rag-tag families with crying babies and wan children of varying ages—all jostled to carve out a place for themselves.
How could her life have changed so dramatically so quickly? Just over three days ago, she’d been at home in Skibbereen, expecting to marry another man. Now she was on a creaking ship, ready to cast off for a land thousands of miles away, with that other man’s wild brother.
They spent the afternoon traveling down the River Lee, and now as the ocean came into view, Farrell and Aidan stood on deck watching the green, misty hills of their homeland slip past in the dusk. Wild and lonely and tragic, it held rivers and lakes, cliffs and hollows and castle ruins, and magic and stories that went back to the beginning of the world.
It was the place where her family was buried.
> It was the place that owned her heart.
Her throat grew tight with tears and sorrow. In the west, a bright band of sunset melted the clouds and lighted the horizon. And in the west lay America.
Although the rain had stopped, a brisk wind chilled her but she only pulled her shawl closer. She didn’t want to go below and miss the last sight of Ireland she might ever have. Apparently, neither did the other sixty or so people making this trip with her and Aidan. They clung to the railings, their faces full of wistfulness and optimism. Some of the women dabbed at their eyes with their apron hems as they comforted their frightened children. The men looked as though they’d all aged ten years in a single afternoon.
Aidan looped his arm around Farrell’s shoulders, and at this moment of farewell she found comfort in his touch. “We’ll see her again, céadsearc. Someday.” He spoke with the rusted voice of a man whose thoughts were far away and in days long past, in the rain-washed glens and dark, magical woods where the fey people were said to dwell. “But we’ll find none like her till then, not even if we search the whole world.”
She glanced up at him, but his gaze was fixed on the beautiful landscape with its tiny inlets and harbors. Angry, hot-blooded Aidan O’Rourke, the man she feared, didn’t look as dangerous at that moment. In fact, she saw tears standing in his eyes.
Plainly embarrassed to be caught with his emotions showing, he released her and dashed his shirt sleeve across his eyes. Then he reached into his pocket. “I got this while ye were choosing the blankets.” He withdrew a plain, thin silver band and held it out on his open palm. “Since we’re wedded, I thought you should have a ring. Tommy gave Clare my mother’s wedding ring when he married her. This one isn’t as grand—it has no carving on it or writing inside. But, well, I thought ye might like to have it.”
Surprised, she reached out a tentative hand. “I guess I hadn’t thought of a ring. Everything has been so—so—”
“Desperate.”
She sighed. “Aye. Desperate.”
“Still, I know how much little things like this mean to a woman.”
She tipped a glance at him. “Yes, I’m sure ye do.” He looked sincere, but she couldn’t let herself accept that. She remembered the neighborhood gossip last summer when he’d taken wildflowers to Bridget McDermot every day for three weeks. Everyone—including Bridget, no doubt—had expected to hear news of a proposal. But it hadn’t come, and Aidan moved on to Moira Flannery. Moira had received no flowers that they knew of, but she and Aidan had been seen walking in the moonlight often enough. For a while, anyway. And his prior history with women was no different. Still, that had all happened in the past, and there was no point in being ungracious, especially now.
“Thank you, Aidan,” she said simply. Taking the ring from his palm, she slipped it on her finger and held out her hand for his inspection. “It fits just fine.”
That earned her a faint, satisfied smile, as if she had accomplished some spectacular feat. And for an instant, she saw that look again in his eyes, possessive, without beginning or end, beyond place or time.
“That’s good. I only guessed at the size.” He glanced up. “Farrell,” he said softly, and nodded toward the receding island of their birth, “look your last.”
Farrell turned to let her eyes drink their fill. Ireland shone in the brilliant sunset, distant and green and luminous, like the gemstone it was often compared to. Overhead, gulls squawked in the rigging as the sails filled and they left the last of the cove waters to set out upon the ocean.
Somehow, someday she would return to the land of her birth. Somehow. But right now she had control over nothing but her heart and her own mind. She could let grief and fear consume her, or she could choose to survive. But for Farrell, there was really just one choice. She would go to America and she would survive.
“Go mbeannaí Dia duit,” Aidan murmured to the tiny emerald on the eastern horizon.
“Go mbeannaí Dia duit,” she echoed faintly, her wet gaze fixed on the tiny speck of land as she crossed herself with a trembling hand.
May God bless you.
CHAPTER FIVE
“A murderer, ye say! And a thief! Didn’t I just know it!” The owner of The Rose and Anchor, who called herself Kate, wore a shocked expression and slammed a meaty fist on the bar. “I thought the pair had the odd look about ’em. But them so weary and tattered and all, I couldn’t turn ’em away. I sold them stew and let them a room. What else could a God-fearing woman do but show a little Christian charity?”
This question raised hoots of derisive laughter from nearby patrons.
“God-fearin’!”
“Christian! That’s a ripe one, Katie, girl.”
“I could use some o’ that charity meself, Kate.”
“Shut yer filthy gobs, the rotten lot of ye! Phaw!” she bawled at them, her braying voice gurgling with phlegm. Then she favored Noel Cardwell with a helpless, ingratiating smile and said, “I’m just a poor widow woman and I have me business to run. I can’t be too choosey when . . . ”
While she prattled on, Noel eyed the massive, ochre-toothed hag of an innkeeper and wished for perhaps the hundredth time that he’d never let his father maneuver him into making this miserable trip. And he silently cursed Aidan O’Rourke for stealing his woman—for he saw Farrell as his possession now, much as he viewed his horse and his lands. He also cursed O’Rourke for being the baseborn dross that he was, forcing Noel to track him down in the most unsavory of places. He knew that Farrell hadn’t stolen anything from Greensward Manor, but the claim gave more weight to his story. The pub was filled with rough-looking barrel scrapings of humanity, all watching him like ravenous curs waiting for a crumb to drop. By one of the steamed-over windows, a wretched specimen sawed out some tuneless noise on a fiddle, adding to the general din. The stinks that assaulted Noel’s nose—boiling pig’s feet, dirty human feet, unwashed bodies, smoke, overloaded privies, and God only knew what else—made him wish for his handkerchief-mask again. But that wouldn’t do in this place. As it was, he could feel the assessing gazes of those curs upon him, examining his dress, trying to gauge how much money he might be carrying and whether he was an easy mark.
“Where have they gone to now, these two with the odd look?”
Kate’s expression turned regretful. “I hate to be the bearer of bad news to a such fine gentleman as yerself, but I believe they found passage on a ship that left on the early afternoon tide, about five hours gone now. Some soldiers were in here earlier lookin’ for them as well, but I believe the scurvy pair got away.”
“Where was the ship bound?” Noel asked, feeling as if he were trying to pull teeth from a chicken.
Kate put a thick, reddened finger to her chin in a revolting but sincere imitation of a coy gentlewoman. “Well, now, I can’t seem to remember what I overheard. After all, they didn’t tell me . . . ”
Pulling a half-crown from his pocket, he held it up to her. He was nearly as repelled as amused by the greedy gleam that came into her small, pale eyes. She made a swipe at it but he held fast and closed his fingers around it.
“Are you sure you don’t know?”
“They went out on the Mary Fiona, bound for New Orleans.”
Damn that James McCorry, Noel thought savagely. The bastard had lied to him. Ignoring the grubby countertop, he leaned an elbow on the bar and briefly rubbed his forehead. God, this was far worse than he’d imagined. “New Orleans—America?”
“Yes, indeed.”
“And it docks nowhere else before heading out to sea? Liverpool, perhaps?”
Kate’s nearly hairless brows snapped together and for a moment, the ridiculous, feigned expression of a demure lady cracked. “Jesus bleedin’ Christ, do I look like a bloody port schedule?” He showed her the coin again, and she resumed her mannerly pretense. “I mean, no, sir, not so far as I know.”
He pushed the half-crown across the bar and she snatched it up so quickly, the motion was a blur. Sighing, he straightened a
nd lifted his elbow from the sticky bar. He knew the Exeter was in port. His father was the majority shareholder of the ship. It was just more bad luck that O’Rourke hadn’t decided to buy passage on her. If he had, this would all be over by now.
“Ye’ll be needin’ lodging and board for the night, I would imagine, sir,” Kate ventured, still posturing. “I’ve a nice room upstairs and a leg of mutton turnin’ on the spit in the kitchen—” She turned toward the kitchen doorway. “Ann! Cut a piece off that mutton and put it on a plate! A clean plate, mind!”
“Thank you, no. I’ve already taken other lodgings,” Noel replied, flipping open his cloak to reveal a wicked-looking pistol tucked into his waistband, just in case some of the denizens of this filthy place had ideas about following him. “But I appreciate your help.”
“Anytime, sir, anytime,” were Kate’s croupy words. “It was my pleasure.” This last, apparently, was more than the men in the bar could bear with straight faces. As Noel escaped to the dark street, the wave of muffled snickers gave way to full-throated hoots and catcalls that only added to the fury mounting within him. From within, Kate rebuked her customers with a string of colorful obscenities.
The cold night air, though laced with the odors of river and fish, was clean and blessedly crisp compared to the interior of The Rose and Anchor. Mounting his horse, a fine black his father had grudgingly given him for the trip, he made his way to a bridge that crossed the river, watchful for unseen threats that might lurk in the shadows, ready to pounce on a well-dressed, prosperous-looking man. He saw no one but an occasional doxy, sidling along the narrow street. They called to him but he ignored them and rode on.
America. That bastard O’Rourke had sailed for America and had taken Farrell with him. He had become the focus of Noel’s wrath. He’d stolen Noel’s intended mistress, the woman who had literally wriggled from his grasp and humiliated him.
If not for O’Rourke, he could have smoothed over his father’s outrage. After a time, the whole fuss would have died down and his life would have resumed its comfortable routine. Instead he was faced with the twin catastrophes of Michael Kirwan’s thievery and the escape of the man’s killer.
The Irish Bride Page 6
