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“It’s fine. Thank you.”
Father Patrick sat in the chair across from mine with a happy groan. “Are you from the States?” he asked, and I nodded. “This is a pretty lonely place for a honeymoon.”
“My husband is from here.”
“County Antrim?”
“Is that . . . is that where we are?”
His eyebrows furrowed, and I’d revealed too much. “He’s from a tiny town. A sheep pasture, he said.”
“Well, there’s plenty of those around here.”
“Are you here by yourself?”
Father Patrick nodded. “During the week. Sunday mass, I have a few visitors. Not as many as I used to but . . .” He gave me a bright smile. “St. Brigid’s flock is small but mighty.”
I took a sip of the tea, which was exactly what I needed—warm and sweet.
“How about you?” he asked. “What do you do at home?”
A bitter laugh slipped out of me. I’d been put in charge of a foundation that probably wasn’t even real. I was the widow of a man I hated. The pawn of a powerful woman. “Nothing,” I said with every bit of honesty I had in me. “I am nothing back home.”
“No one is nothing,” he said quietly.
I’d been a sister, perhaps my only success, and Zilla might consider that marginal.
“I wanted to be a teacher,” I said, for absolutely no good reason, except this man made me long to be a version of myself I could be proud of.
“Brilliant,” he said. “What grade?”
“Fifth.”
“Ah. Not quite teenagers but no longer kids. A good age.”
“You were a teacher too?”
“Wanted to be, like you.” He shrugged, his eyes on his tea.
“And then you found the church?”
“No. Actually, I was hoping to be a teacher within the church. But the Lord had other plans.” A wave of melancholy rolled over the room. “Ach,” he said with a grin. “Would you like to come see the sanctuary? It’s a modest church but it was built in the 1700s and the altar was carved out of the jaw of a whale that had washed up on the beach in Carrickfergus.”
“You’re joking.”
“I would not joke about our holy altar. Or our eight bells cast by Rudhall.” He stood. “Come on, then.” He led the way up the two steps and down the other hallway that opened into the sanctuary. It was dark and quiet. The beautiful light wood pews were empty but glowing. The ceiling soared over our heads.
“It was built on a Celt holy site by monks who’d fought off the Vikings and the Normans. It was burned down. Twice.” He grinned at me and the affection he had for this building was sweet. Moving, really. “The IRA used to meet here too. The front door still has bullet holes from a fight with the English soldiers during The Troubles.”
The morning sun was coming in through the east windows, lighting up the stained glass. Christ in yellow and red wearing a thorn crown and a purple robe was partially obscured by a chain link over the glass.
“Why is the fencing on the inside?” I asked.
“A remnant from when the church was a parochial school.” His smile was rueful. “The students threw rocks from the pews.”
“You haven’t taken it down?”
“There’s no money. Or help.” He shrugged. “It’s also a good reminder.”
“Of what this place was?”
“Of what it never should have been.”
His words were so fierce, there was nothing to say in the face of them. The church didn’t mean much to me, but it was beautiful and quiet. Holiness came from work; I understood that. It came from suffering and trial. It was the quiet after the storm, the rest after the battle, and this building had seen its share of battles. Its holiness was hard won.
It reminded me just a little of Ronan sleeping in the chair. His rest well earned.
Blasphemous, I know.
I wished I could pluck these thoughts out of my head, this softness out of my heart, because he didn’t deserve any of it. But I didn’t know how. Wanting what I shouldn’t was sort of my thing. My stupid, gullible thing.
“Come,” he said. “Let me show you the whale bone.” He stepped past the pulpit just as thunder split the sanctuary’s quiet. The doors at the end of the center aisle rattled loud and hard.
“What in the name of the Father?” Father Patrick asked, stepping back and away from the doors like they might blow in.
But I knew. The devil had come, and my time was up.
“Do you have a cell phone?” I asked.
“A what?” Father Patrick, who had been living alone and in silence with a cow, was not keeping up with the sudden change of pace I’d brought to his life. Hell was coming through his doors, and I was running out of time.
CHAPTER FOUR
Poppy
“A phone, Father Patrick. Do you have a phone?”
“Sure,” he said, blinking at me.
