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an accident of fate, are my brother.”
Humor flickered across his face. “We’ll be all right, Darcy,” he repeated. “It’s for us to work it out.”
“You’re turning down the assistance of an expert in this particular field of battle.”
He began to score the dough, measuring it into neat squares. “I’ll hold you in reserve, if it’s all the same to you.”
“Well, it’s your choice, after all.” She started out, stopped, turned around. “Does she matter?”
Knowing how well his sister read faces, Shawn kept his head lowered. “Do you think I don’t know what comes out of my mouth goes in your ear, then off your tongue and into her ear?”
“It won’t. If you ask me.”
He looked up then. Loyalty was her finest trait, as far as he was concerned. And he knew she’d sooner break her arm than her word. “Then I’m asking you. I feel it’s my life up on a thin and slippery line. Step off one way, the ground’s solid, off the other it’s a bog. You sink in, and it’s over.”
“Then watch your step,” Darcy advised, and went back into the pub.
The noise level was already rising. It would be a din, hushed down once the music started, and peaking again at every break the band took. Brenna worked the taps with both hands, even while she listened to Jack Brennan lumber his way through a joke he’d heard about a princess and a frog. Though her heart wasn’t in it, she laughed at the end.
When the band began to set up, she ordered herself to pay no mind, no mind at all. But her gaze wandered over nonetheless and locked on the blond singer.
Just the type Shawn would drift back to, she thought. Shallow bastard. What would it take him? A month, a week, a bloody night before he rolled atop another woman?
“I’m almost afraid to ask,” Jude said as she slid onto a stool. “But can I have a mineral water?”
“You can.” Brenna got the glass, remembered ice as Jude had that Yank preference for it. “Why would you be afraid to ask?”
“Because you look as if you want to punch someone. I wouldn’t want it to be me.”
“It’d more likely be myself, or that blonde over there.”
“Eileen? Why?”
“To start, she has tits.” Brenna set the glass down, ordered herself to put the rest aside. “You look well tonight, Jude Frances. Well and happy.”
“I’m both. I’ve gained two more pounds. I can’t get my trousers hooked anymore.”
Brenna took orders and coin, continued to work the taps. “So you’ll make use of all those maternity clothes Darcy talked you into. Don’t you want a table—a chair for your back?”
“No, I’m fine here for now. I’m just staying long enough for the first set, and a bowl of soup.”
“You want a meal?” It came out as an accusation, making Jude stare.
“Well, I’d considered it.”
“You’ll want a table,” Brenna said briskly. If Jude ordered from a table it would be Darcy’s job to go into the kitchen.
“No, I don’t. I’ve gotten some bits and pieces about trouble between you and Shawn. You can’t deal with it, Brenna, if you can’t so much as open that door and shout out an order for soup.”
“Maybe I don’t want to deal with it.” When Jude only folded her hands on the bar, Brenna hissed out a breath. “You know, I’m finding married women a pain in the ass.” She finished building a Guinness, pulled a pint and a glass of lager, and exchanged them for the price. “You’ve got fairy tales on your brain,” she continued. “That’s not how it is here.”
“I might agree with you but for one thing. Well two things. Carrick and Lady Gwen.”
Brenna snorted and started another pair of pints. “They’ve nothing to do with me. I’ll tell you how I’d end a fairy tale,” she continued, thinking of Jack Brennan’s joke. “In mine, the princess doesn’t kiss the frog, but dines well on frog legs at end of day. I’ll get your damn soup.”
Spoiling for a fight, she strode to the door, shoved it open. Shawn was at the stove, a wooden spoon in one hand, a spatula in the other. The heat had his hair curling just a bit, and he needed a trim. He hadn’t bothered to shave, which was an odd thing for Shawn. But under the day’s growth on his jaw was unmistakable bruising.
Before she could speak, the warm, liquid voice of the blond singer drifted into the room. It didn’t matter if it was unreasonable. It didn’t matter if it was uncalled for.
It just pissed her off.
“I need an order of soup.”
“It’s hot and ready,” he said easily, because he gauged her mood. “I’ve my hands a bit full here, if you wouldn’t mind spooning it up yourself.”
“Everyone’s hands are full,” she muttered, but she got down a bowl. “What happened to your face?”
He swiveled his jaw. “I wasn’t watching my step.”
“Aye. I heard you got yourself a snootful. Well, that’s no answer.”
Since she’d decided to snipe at him, Shawn reasoned, she wasn’t going to wallow and brood. Much better all around. “It served at the time.”
She filled the bowl, set it on a plate. “And now?”
He wanted to lean over, just lean to her while both their hands were occupied and close his mouth over hers. Instead, he lifted a shoulder. “And now I’ll have to be more careful where I step.” For the hell of it, he began to hum in harmony with Eileen’s lovely voice.
“You think it’s as easy as that, do you? Well, it’s not. We’ll talk about this after closing.”
He let her have the last word since it was exactly what he’d intended to say to her. When she stalked out, her face fierce, he went back to work with a lighter heart.
A couple of tourists from Cleveland overindulged. Brenna helped Aidan steer them toward the B and B, on foot, as it was feared they’d break their necks if they attempted to ride their bikes even that far.
Gauging his timing, Shawn slipped out. “Ah, well, you got them off, then. I was thinking you might need an extra pair of hands.”
“No, they should be able to stumble their way into bed.” Aidan watched them lurch and weave down the street and shook his head at their off-key rendition of “Whiskey, You’re the Devil.” “A pair of Yanks straight out of school. Well, but what’s a Grand Tour without one drunken night in an Irish pub, after all?” He caught Shawn’s eye, figured the meaning. “It’s been a long one, so we’ll call it a night. Thanks for helping out, Brenna.”
“It’s not a problem. Good night, Aidan.”
“It’s been longer for you and me,” Shawn said when he and Brenna were alone on the street.
“It has, but it’s not done. I’d like a walk on the beach if it’s the same to you.”
“All right.” He didn’t take her hand, but walked beside her, his own hands in his pockets. “It’s a fresh night. Full of moon.”
“That’s lucky. We won’t freeze or fall on our faces.”
He had to laugh. “You’re such a romantic fool, Mary Brenna.”
“A fool, from time to time. I was foolish with you, knowing my sister’s feelings.”
“With or without you, I couldn’t give her what she thinks she wants from me. There’s no getting past that. I’m sorry she’s hurt, and sorrier still that it was you she struck out at. But in thinking it through, I don’t know if there was a way it could’ve been avoided.”
“I could have waited until her feelings for you faded off, as they will.”
“So, I’m the forgettable sort.”
She glanced up at him, then away. “That scores your pride, but it’s the way it is. She’s barely twenty and can’t see through the stars in her eyes.”
“But there’re none in yours.”
“I see clear enough. I started this with you, and I’d end it. I was prepared to end it. But that’s not the way to solve the matter. Mary Kate won’t forgive and forget just because I step away from you. If she’s to grow up, she needs to learn how to face the hard things.”
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sp; “So, you’ve decided for all of us, then.”
Because he stopped, she turned to him. Moonlight streamed at his back, spilling over sand and sea like liquid pearls. And in its light she saw his eyes weren’t calm and easy, but very near to furious.
“Someone has to.”
“And it’s always you? Maybe I’ve had enough of you. Maybe I prefer having my life on balance instead of being in the middle of two women who want to bite and scratch.”
Nearly as shocked as she was offended, she snapped at him. “I don’t bite and scratch, and I wasn’t looking to fight Mary Kate or anyone over the likes of you. It just happened. And as far as you having enough of me,” she added, “that’s a different tune you’re singing than the one I heard only this morning.”
“I know a variety of tunes. And as you think so little of me, I’d suspect you’d be relieved to part ways in this area. Both of us can find sex elsewhere when we’re in the mood for it.”
“It’s not just sex.”
Ah, he thought, finally. “Isn’t it?” He stepped closer, backing her toward the sea. “Isn’t that what you said you wanted from me?”
“Yes.” What was going on in those eyes of his? she wondered. They were black as night, with thoughts and feelings she couldn’t read. “But we have a caring for each other. I won’t have you cheapen what’s between us that way.”
“But you’ll say what I’ll have and won’t, what I’ll do and don’t?” He snatched her up seconds before she backed into the surf. “Why would you want a man touching you who could be so easily ordered about?”
