Wild Irish Dreamer (The Mystic Cove Series Book 8)

by Tricia O'Malley

  “I don’t think we’ve ever really spoken of Grace’s Cove, so there’s no way you would have known. I’m just shocked to see you here, in my little village, after all these years. How’s it been for you, then?” Fi cleaned glasses automatically as she spoke with him. The habit of tending a bar was ingrained in her and she was always moving, always doing something productive while she chatted.

  “It’s been good. I found my way into the company of my dreams. I get to travel the world. Meet wonderful people like himself here,” Liam said, nodding to a beaming Mr. Murphy.

  “How do you two know each other?” Mr. Murphy asked.

  “Remember when I left uni and took my first job with Sean in Dublin? Liam worked on that project. He’s a colleague of mine,” Fi said, placing him firmly in the friend category. There would be no suppositions around their relationship if she could help it.

  “Well, isn’t that nice, then. Are you doing work for Dylan while you’re here?” Mr. Murphy asked.

  “Nope, though I’d love to come see the community center project one day. I’m here to plan Gracie’s hen party,” Fi said.

  “Sure and we’ll need to clear the streets for that one. The lot of you are terrifying together,” Mr. Murphy said.

  Fi let out a loud laugh. “You’ve been warned then.”

  “I’d be happy to show you the community center if you want to come by one day,” Liam said, leaning back as the serving girl appeared at his shoulder with a tray of stew. Fi stepped away to get silverware and napkins, and by the time she’d returned, two steaming bowls of Guinness stew with some crusty brown bread sat in front of the men.

  “I’d like that, thanks,” Fi said, keeping it noncommittal. Turning, she grabbed another drink order – then stopped in her tracks.

  Liam was Dylan’s Liam.

  The Liam Gracie had told her about.

  The one who had gotten hurt in the cove.

  The man Gracie had almost died healing.

  The man of her dreams.

  Chapter 9

  “You didn’t tell me Liam was that Liam,” Fi said, bursting into Gracie’s cottage without knocking. Not that she had ever knocked, nor was she likely do so in the future. Who needed to knock when there was a dog around to announce her presence? Bending automatically to where Rosie demanded cuddles, she looked up at Grace, who was standing by her long kitchen table, hands on hips, looking down at a pile of jars and creams.

  “How was I to know Liam was ‘that Liam’ when you’ve never mentioned a Liam to me?” Grace asked, skewering her with a glare. “But now I’m offended that you didn’t tell me you had a thing with this Liam, which you obviously did or you wouldn’t be in such a fuss.”

  “I’m not in a fuss,” Fi bit out.

  “You come barreling through the door with barely a hello after months away, griping about Liam this and Liam that. I’m no rocket scientist but I do know that when a woman’s all aflutter about a man, there’s been a situation in the past with said man. So now I’m the one who’s offended that me own cousin and best friend hasn’t told me about her time with this Liam.”

  “I swear I told you.” Fi paused and thought back. Hadn’t she told Grace? She usually told her everything.

  “I’m not daft. I do remember what you tell me. I particularly enjoyed the French lover in the blue grotto –”

  “Okay, okay, enough.” Fi waved that away and stood, surveying her friend. “You look great.”

  “Thanks. Love will do that to a person, I suppose.”

  “No, I mean it. Really great. Your skin’s all dewy and you look… rested. There isn’t the same tension around your eyes.”

  “Sleeping through the night these days. Once I was with Dylan, the dreams dissipated. I can’t tell you how refreshing it is not to wake up sobbing every morning.”

  “Oh, Grace, I’m so happy for you both. I know what an awful time that was for you.” Fi moved across the room and enveloped her cousin in a hug.

  “There, now I get a proper greeting. I’ll put the kettle on. Seems we need to have a wee chat about this Liam of yours.”

  “He’s your Liam. Well, Dylan’s, anyway.”

  “I doubt Dylan knows Liam the way you’ve been knowing him – and if he has, we might be having to have ourselves a wee bit of a chat before I go and marry him.”

  “I didn’t sleep with him,” Fi said, plopping into the beautifully worn wooden rocking chair tucked in the corner by the stove, where it had sat now for sixty years.

  “You were intimate with him.” A voice over her ear made Fi jump from the chair and whirl around. Rosie danced at her feet and barked, delighted at the sudden movement.

  “Fiona, you know better than to scare Fi like that.” Grace made tsking noises as she brought the kettle and a basket of scones to the table. Fi glared at Fiona, for whom she was named, who hovered over the rocking chair. Grace had been the only one truly blessed with the ability to see Fiona once she’d passed on, but once in a while she’d made herself available to Fi as well. This appeared to be one of those times.

  “Sure and my heart almost exploded out of me chest,” Fi said, pointing a finger at the ghost. “You can’t sneak up on a body like that.”

  “I wasn’t sneaking. You sat on me,” Fiona said.

  “’Tis true. She was sitting there. You were in too much of a fuss to notice.”

  “How do you live with this woman?” Fi asked, crossing the room to sit at the table. Plopping her elbows on the table, she cradled her chin in her hand, staring balefully at the ghost across the cabin.

  “She respects my space. For the most part. Plus, it’s nice to have company out here. Dylan’s gone much of the day or traveling, and I’m busy filling orders. She’s an excellent resource when I struggle with some of my home remedies.”

  “How is Dylan?”

  “He’s lovely and a blessing and light to my life. Enough about him. Tell me about Liam.”

  “It’s nothing.”

  “It’s obviously something.”

  “No, I’m just making a big deal over nothing.”

  “Tell me.”

  “Forget it. Let’s talk about your hen party.”

  “I will when you tell me about Liam.”

  “I’m being ridiculous. It was nothing. Just a night in passing years ago.”

  “You had a night together?” Grace set aside the cream she had been mixing and plunked herself down at the table across from Fi. “You most certainly did not tell me about this. I would have remembered. Liam is… well, let’s just say if I didn’t have Dylan, he’d be right up there on my list.”

  “Gracie!”

  “It’s true. He’s a very handsome man,” Fiona agreed. “I’d have given it a go in my time if my heart wasn’t spoken for.”

  Fi buried her face in her palms. “Sure, that’s a lovely image I just don’t need right now,” she griped.

  “Women have needs. And those needs should be fulfilled by men like Liam. At least once in their lives,” Fiona said, furthering Fi’s chagrin.

  “Great. Just great. My ghost of a relative has the hots for a man who pleasured me. Can this day get any weirder?”

  “Ohhhhh, he pleasured you? I need details. Immediately. In full glory, at that.” Grace’s face lit up and Fi laughed.

  “You are both weird, you know that?”

  “We’re all weird. We can hear people’s thoughts, see ghosts, read auras, and perform magick. What in any way, shape, or form made you think we would be normal? That includes you, Fi, though I know you do your damnedest to ignore your goddess-given gifts. Gifts that came from my blood, if I must remind you.”

  “I don’t ignore them. I just don’t need them to live.”

  “Ignoring your power is not living.”

  “Listening in on people’s thoughts isn’t a fun life to live either. You have any idea how much shite you have to hear that you don’t want to? It’s a safety measure more than anything.”

  Grace reached across the tabl
e and squeezed Fi’s hand.

  “I know. I don’t envy you that trait. At least not all the time. I can think of times it would come in right handy, though.”

  “Sure, it can. But I really have worked to shield it. If I don’t, I’d never be surprised in me life. Oh! Speaking of surprises – and today has been quite the day for them – my parents gifted me a house. A house on the boulevard by the water. Me own house. Can you even believe it? They must be getting dotty with old age. Who gives someone such a gift?” Fi wondered aloud, then spilled her tea when Grace jumped up screaming.

  “You’re moving back! That’s fantastic news!”

  “Oh, calm down. I didn’t say I was moving back. It’s a place to store me things, is all. Now who’s making the fuss? Calm down, woman,” Fi said, grabbing a dish towel to mop up her tea.

  “Still, it will make it more permanent. You’ll come back more if you have something to tend to here. Oh, but I’ve missed you, Fi. I know you have a fierce wanderlust in you, I understand that. But I’ve missed you.”

  “I’ve missed you too,” Fi said, “but I’m not settling down here. I’ll be renting out the unit below and giving the money to my parents. I can’t just accept a gift like that.”

  “I can understand where that would be hard for you. But you have to know it was done out of love. You never let them help you.”

  “It’s important to me that I can stand on me own.”

  “You’ve proven that now, haven’t you? No reason not to accept a gift like that at this point. It would be different if you were just out of uni accepting gifts of that nature. But you’ve gone out and proven yourself and your ability to provide for yourself. You have to let the people who love you do something for you once in a while.”

  “This is a big something,” Fi said. She’d always been uncomfortable with receiving gifts, though she loved to give them.

  “And you say, yes, thank you, I love you. Let your parents give you their gift of love,” Fiona admonished from across the room.

  “I did, and I do. But love doesn’t have to be tangible gifts. Or a house.”

  “It’s Shane’s way of showing love. He knows it will be a property that can be a nest egg for you for life. Don’t be difficult,” Fiona said.

  “I’m not…” Fi hunched her shoulders under Fiona’s glare. “Yes, Fiona. I hear you.”

  “Now, back to Liam.” Grace broke off a piece of cranberry scone and buttered it. “You know he’s the Liam I saved.”

  “I do now. I wish I had known the connection sooner. It’s right terrible what happened to him at the cove.”

  “He took a risk. That’s his nature. Luckily, he believes in magick and all things mystical, so you won’t have that working against you two.”

  “There is no… it’s not ‘us two.’ It’s just… it was one night.” Fi threw up her hands.

  “A night you still haven’t told us about,” Grace reminded her.

  “It’s really nothing,” Fi said. Then she sighed and launched into the full details of her night with Liam in Croatia, leaving nothing out. Once she was done, she waited while Grace studied her.

  “You never called him.”

  “Why would I? It was a one-night thing. He was broken-hearted. I was moving to another country. It doesn’t matter.”

  “It’s rude.”

  “Oh please, it’s not rude. There was no expectation of anything. You don’t have to call if you don’t want a relationship.”

  “But you said you were his friend first. You took him out on a mate’s night. Mates would call.”

  “She’s right,” Fiona chimed in.

  Fi jumped, having forgotten the old woman was there for a moment. “Since when does a woman owe a man a call after he chooses to please her? Isn’t she allowed to take her pleasure and leave? She owes him nothing. How many times do men do this and women just accept it?”

  “But he was being nice by leaving a note. He was treating you with respect and being a friend. You could have just sent him a breezy text checking in or something. Maybe saying thanks for a good night, hope to see you down the road – you know, putting him back in the friend zone but still being polite.”

  “I think she was worried about the fact that he threatened her carefully curated lifestyle,” Fiona observed.

  Fi got up. “Okay, I’ve had enough. I’ll catch up with you later, Gracie. We can talk hen party stuff tomorrow. I need to go.”

  “Oh, Fi, don’t go off in a huff.”

  “I’m not in a huff. I’m just done speaking on this. And I have things to do. Important things.” Fi breezed out of the house, right into a wall of rain, and ran to her car. Knowing she was being impossibly childish, but not particularly caring, she turned her car toward town.

  Chapter 10

  He could feel her body under his hands.

  Still. After all these years, it was as though Fi had imprinted on his brain and he couldn’t rid himself of her essence. She was a study in contrasts, lean limbs and sharp cheekbones, with a lusty laugh that could spear straight to a man’s gut. She wasn’t overtly feminine, not like the women he usually went for, but something about her reluctance to embrace the flowery womanly ways made her all the more sensual and appealing to him. Her slim jeans and loose button-down shirt seemed like a casual afterthought, and it made him want to unbutton her shirt slowly, revealing the smooth curve of her breast to him, and trail his lips over her skin like he’d done once before.

  If only he hadn’t been in his cups that night, he was certain he could have remembered even more details that now eluded him.

  Fi had ducked out shortly after seeing him – something about a hen party and seeing Grace – but her cheeks were flushed, and she’d been quick to make her goodbyes. Liam liked when her cheeks tinged pink; it reminded him of her curled in bed, sated beneath him. Shifting uncomfortably on his stool, he tuned back into what Mr. Murphy was saying.

  “Sure and that’s a sad loss for Cork in the hurling this weekend,” Liam quickly agreed, catching on that Mr. Murphy had wound his way back to sports. The old man had a routine to his conversations. It started with weather, moved on to politics, and finished with sports. After that, he’d be ready to take in any local gossip and add any tidbits of his own. Liam had learned more about how the village of Grace’s Cove was run by patiently sitting down with Mr. Murphy than he had at any of the board meetings with the village council.

  “What’s my girl to you?” Cait startled him from the conversation, having snuck up behind him like a cat. She jammed her finger into his ribs.

  “Hey!” Liam jerked away, shooting Cait a disgruntled look. “Damn, that finger is like steel.”

  “Next time it’ll be a knife if you’re hurting my girl.”

  “She’s a vicious one, Cait is,” Mr. Murphy nodded, sipping his Guinness. “I’ve seen her make Theodore O’Flanagan crawl out of here – all sixteen stone of him.”

  “He deserved it, that he did, Mr. Murphy.”

  “Never said he didn’t. But a wee lass like yourself should have trouble handling a man of his size.”

  “Pssh, he’s a pussycat.” Cait waved that away and turned to focus on Liam. “You didn’t answer the question.”

  “I didn’t want to interrupt this lovely discussion,” Liam said, turning to take a sip from his own pint and collect himself.

  “Are you avoiding me, Liam Mulder?”

  “I am not. I’m just enjoying this fine beverage your lovely establishment has provided for me today.”

  “Listen to the man. Evading the question,” Cait said.

  “It does seem so, Cait. Perhaps you should let the man to his peace then. It’s hard to enjoy a pint with the hens pecking at you,” Mr. Murphy said, then winced when he saw Cait’s face. It was enough to make Liam laugh, for he didn’t think he’d ever seen the pub owner so flummoxed before. Emotions warred on her face – from wanting to clock Mr. Murphy on the head to wanting to give him leeway because he was pushing ninety and had be
en her most loyal customer.

  “It’s a rare man who can get away with speaking such to me,” Cait decided, though Liam saw her fists ball at her sides.

  “Cait, I’ll intervene before you tell dear Mr. Murphy here why he’s been a bit sexist in his comments.”

  “Have I?” Mr. Murphy sat back and pulled at the newsboy cap he’d forgotten to take off. “Well now, I suppose that’s something I should apologize for. I understand it’s important to pay more attention to these things nowadays. I didn’t realize how on trend I was.”

  Liam wasn’t sure if condescending remarks could be considered ‘on trend,’ but seeing as how the old man looked apologetic, he decided to let Cait handle this one.

  “No woman wants to be made to feel like she’s just pestering a man while he’s having a drink. I have a valid interest in Liam’s stake in my girl, so I’ve a right to ask. Whether he’s having a pint or not,” Cait said.

  “She’s speaking the truth, Liam.” Mr. Murphy wisely threw Liam to the wolves. “What’s our Fi to you then?”

  Lovely, now he had the two of them teaming up against him. If he didn’t nip this in the bud, the whole village would be sniffing about in hours.

  “I met Fi years ago when I was working on a contract for Sean up in Dublin. She came in as the translator.”

  “Her first job,” Cait said, narrowing her eyes as she thought back.

  “Aye, so it appears. I thought she was lovely and invited her for a drink.” Liam held up his hand as Cait shifted an assessing look at him. “That was back before I knew not to mix business and pleasure. Also, I didn’t know the familial relationship with Sean. He informed me and I canceled the date.”

  “Smart man,” Cait murmured.

  “I ran into Fi once again in Croatia – oh, say maybe seven or so years ago? I’d just had my heart broken and she was a friendly face. Not surprisingly, being your daughter and all, she sized up my situation quickly. She decided I needed a night out with mates to get me over my ex-girlfriend, poured a bottle of whiskey down my throat, and took me to kick my arse at pool. All in all, it was exactly what I needed to move forward. I was going to propose, you know.”