Not that I had been any better. I accepted my envelope from the family solicitor but hadn’t managed to open the damn thing all these months later. Dad didn’t raise me to be a coward, though, so I made a promise to myself. I was going on a solo, several-day hike, something Dad and I had planned to do together, and I’d open it then.
He would like that I was going ahead with the plan.
He would not like me going by myself.
“Shouldn’t have gotten on that damn helicopter, then, Dad. I’m not replacing you, and you aren’t here to argue your point,” I spoke to the empty bedroom.
So, alone it would be.
I wasn’t naïve, or not too naïve. I totally knew my family would try to bully me into changing my plans, but I’d grown up with a master teacher in how to work around overprotective men. Mom had run circles around Dad’s grumbles and growls for years.
Mom already tried to talk me out of the hike, but my face must have shown my determination. In the end, she’d sighed and softly said, “You may look like me, Bébhinn, but you are every bit your father’s daughter.”
It was the greatest compliment I’d ever received.
two
THE O’FAOLAIN RESIDENCE—DUBLIN, IRELAND
BÉBHINN
“Happy birthday, Brother-Uncle,”Bébhinn said softly before giving Bran a hug and kiss on the cheek. She loved her brothers, Bran and Patrick, who were married to her mother’s sisters. As family trees went, theirs tended to confuse the hell out of people. She avoided the explanation when she could.
Her dad’s cheeks and the tops of his ears used to turn pink when someone insisted on the whole story. Mom’s two sisters married two O’Faolain brothers. What caused most of them to have two familial designations was Bébhinn’s mom marrying the brothers’ dad. Her mom became Bran and Patrick’s sister-in-law and stepmom. The waters became muddier as the three couples had children.
Bran didn’t allow her to keep the embrace brief, which she had absolutely planned on doing. Too much love and tender moments brought an instant lump in her throat, but if Bran needed it, she would give it.
He cupped the back of her head and brought it to his chest. She felt, as well as heard, the thumping of his heart and the heavy breath of emotion he released ghost over the top of her head, and felt her eyes prick with tears. Like she knew they would.Nope. Nope. Nope.She wouldn’t cry and make the occasion any sadder than it already was. She counted to ten before wiggling from his embrace.
Bran gave her a look that made her squirm. He knew she was hiding her feelings and didn’t like it. He relented, though, and with a small smile, said, “Thank you, Sister-Niece.”
She’d always been close to her brothers. The passing of their father had brought another level of closeness. She liked that the family had closed ranks, so to speak, keeping anyone but their closest friends out, but it also meant that the men in their family were getting too used to herding their women into protective bubbles.
Bébhinn’s nephew-cousin, Jonathan, groaned. “Jesus, Uncle Bran. Remember your promise never to speak of our convoluted family ties? I begged you and Dad both. It would ruin my chances with women. They’d run away screaming, thinking we’re all a pack of inbreds!”
Jon was shaking his head and chuckling. He was always good at reading a room and knew that everyone present was valiantly trying to keep their shit together. She smiled at Jon, acknowledging his attempt to lighten the mood.
“I don’t think it’s our family tree but your personality that would send them running, dumbass,” Daniel deadpanned.
Daniel, Bran’s son and Bébhinn’s other nephew-cousin, just leaned against the downstairs bar, shaking his head at his cousin’s theatrics. Daniel, Jonathan, and she were as close as siblings, having grown up together. Daniel had just turned twenty-two and was working on his MBA at Trinity. He and his parents all shared February birthdays. Jonathan was twenty-one. His birthday wasn’t until the fall. Bébhinn would be twenty-one in a couple of months.
It always amused her to see Bran, Pat, Daniel, and Jon together. The four were striking but also freakishly similar. Their height and white-blond hair turned heads wherever they went.
She didn’t bother giving Daniel a birthday hug, since he was as good at sensing her moods as his father and probably wouldn’t let her go. Instead, she smiled his way, hoping no one could see that the smile didn’t reach her eyes. “Happy birthday to you, too, dickhead.” He smirked and flipped her off. He smiled but his eyes remained serious.
Bébhinn glanced toward her mother, Rowan, standing just outside the family circle, to see if she found her nephew’s antics amusing. She was pale and dabbing her eyes.Damnit… She hated seeing her mom so…so brittle. Moments like this one sent a shock of panic flooding her system because it felt like she was losing her mother too.
She was a literal carbon copy of her mother. With Native American and Irish heritage, both women, and Bébhinn’s aunts, Raven and River, were pale-skinned, short, petite, hazel-eyed, and sported thick, long black hair.
The Byrne women married into a family that was as polar opposite as couples could manage. The O’Faolains were all tall and muscular. Her uncles’ white hair was a shocking complement to her aunts’ dark-headed loveliness. Bébhinn’s father, Hugh, was—had been—a big, bold, dark-haired, Oklahoman oil tycoon and entrepreneur. He loved his three children fiercely and loved his wife with an unapologetic intensity.
Mom had been his whole world.Do not go there, Bébhinn, she chided herself. Thoughts of her parents, and what had been, equaled leaking eyes and wobbly lips.
Turning to her Aunt Raven, Bébhinn gave her a kiss and a hug too. “And happy birthday to you, as well, Auntie Rav.” Raven had recently cut her hair to just above her shoulders. It was chic and lovely. Despite all the family upheaval, Bébhinn knew it was only a matter of weeks before her mother and Aunt River followed suit. She and her cousins had always believed that the Byrne sisters, their mothers, shared a hive mind.
“Thank you, sweet girl. I’m glad you could make it,” Raven said while brushing her finger down her niece’s cheek.
Raven bit her lip and looked away for a brief moment. Long enough to control her emotions. It seemed that’s all this family managed anymore. Managing.
