Flights of Angels (Exit Unicorns Series) (92 page)

“I don’t think it matters much what the building is.You know anyone who’s connected even tenuously with the Simon brothers becomes a moving target.”

“Aye, I know that, an’ I don’t.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean, Casey Riordan?”

He gave an inward wince. When she called him by his full name in that tone, it didn’t bode well for the direction of the conversation.

“It’s a good opportunity an’ it would be a couple of years of guaranteed work. I want somethin’ more for us than survivin’ from one payday to the next. I want to give ye all ye deserve, and I want to know that Conor can have an education an’ a chance to be anything he’s a mind to be.”

“He’s not even two years old yet,” she said sharply, fear winding its tight wires through her vocal chords.

“Aye, an’ how long have we known one another woman? Close on seven years now—an’ it seems both a lifetime an’ a day. The time goes past quickly, does it not? Opportunities are never lost, Jewel. They’re simply picked up by other people. An’ maybe this is my gift horse.”

“If you’d take a moment to look in its mouth, I think you’ll find its teeth are razor sharp.”

He had gone to her then, knowing that she was afraid for more than one reason. He put his arms around her, lending her his strength for what he said next.

“Besides,” he had said, tone soft, “we’ve another wee mouth on its way.”

“What! It’s too early to know for certain…” she had trailed off under the scrutiny of his gaze and he saw that she knew too and was afraid of what might lie ahead, despite how well things had gone with Conor.

“No, it’s not.” He touched the side of one breast lightly. “Yer gypsy woman was right. It was a good night to make a baby.”

He had known for a few days now that she was pregnant again, for he had watched her get out of the bath one morning and seen the changes in her body. He had noted how she held herself differently as though she were being more careful than was her usual manner. She always seemed suddenly and infinitely fragile to him when she was pregnant and he wished there was a way to shelter her and keep her safe, just as her body sheltered their child.

She had cried a little then, because he was right, because she was terrified and overjoyed all at the same time.

Then she said the thing that he had known she would say, and was prepared for.

“I make more than enough with my work for Jamie.”

“I think ye can understand, Jewel, if I would rather not use the man’s money to keep my own family.”

“I cannot lose you, Casey,” she said, stiff and unbending in his arms. “I won’t lose you. I couldn’t survive it.”

“And I can’t stop livin’ in order to survive,” he said. He had thought she might hit him then, for her face had gone deathly pale and her eyes turned the deep, heavy green they did when she was incoherent with fury.

In the end though, her need of his reassurance now that the pregnancy was an acknowledged fact was greater than her anger. They had made their peace for the present, in the way that they most often did, and he had felt beneath his hands and lips the changes in her body that he had seen before.

He was not fool enough to think the conversation was at an end, but he thought perhaps he was going to take the contract, for otherwise there was no work to be had for more than a few days here and there.

The fire was simmering low, the cherry red of the coals now faded to an umber-edged gold. There was no more putting off what he had come down here to do. He sighed and confronted the blank white of the paper with a determined stare. There were things that needed saying, much as a man might not wish to say them, much as a man might feel superstitious about such acts. Still, he was a pragmatist and pragmatists knew not to put off to tomorrow what a man ought to do today.

He put the pen to paper and took a deep breath.

Dear Jamie
, he began.

Chapter Sixty-seven
March 1975
Invasion

Spring came early that year
. By March the grass had greened, and in the fields small balls of wool began to appear, wobbling against the legs of larger balls of wool. The fields shimmered pale silver and green under the rains and there was the sense of expectation and energy that the season always brought. Already the crocuses, snowdrops and hellebores had bloomed, wetly defiant through the storms of February.

With the ending of winter, Pamela emerged from the nausea that always plagued her early pregnancy and felt a resurgence of her own energy. The doctor had assured her that the baby was doing just fine and she could resume all her normal activities as soon as she felt able. If only the doctor could convince Casey that all was well she might actually have a hope of getting back to normal. As it was, the man was worried enough for ten people. Certainly there was reason. She had hoped that the successful pregnancy and arrival of a hearty, hale baby in the form of Conor would go some way toward soothing his fears, but it had only had a marginal effect.

It was a day late in March and she and Conor were spending the morning out of doors, for the sun was warm and the soil rich with light and the promise of growth to come. And Conor loved the dirt as much as any wee boy did. She put him on a blanket in the grass with a few toys and Finbar keeping guard beside him, as the dog always did. Casey, never one to wait, had already turned the soil and tilled in the compost and manure in anticipation of setting in his early crops: potatoes, broad beans, onions and leeks. The seedlings were already well started and taking up much of her kitchen counter space and spare room. The potatoes would be sown directly, but the cut seedlings were set out in the cool dark of the shed, ready for their planting. Because he planted the potatoes in raised beds, they went in early, for there was no fear of frost nor of compacting overly wet, cool soil. For the last month, he had been eyeing the sky and feeling the soil, as well as consulting the Farmer’s Almanac for the precise phase of the moon under which to plant. When she had made a sarcastic comment about expecting to find him with his head down a well, shouting out questions and waiting for an oracular reply from its depths, he had merely raised an eyebrow at her and said she wouldn’t be complaining when she’d fresh fare in the pot and on the table before anyone else.

To one side of the garden, raised up on chunks of wood, Casey had piled hazel and willow wands. The stouter hazel would be used for heavier plants such as beans, while the willow would be woven around a wigwam support of hazel for the peas and sweetpeas to wind their fragile tendrils about. Already the rhubarb was sporting a soft pink blush at its base, the leaves a tender, crumply green, and the sea kale had been set out under buckets to force the shoots and retain their flavor. They would be the first greens on the table for it was only the shoots that were edible.

She took Conor in after they had their lunch, relishing the grubby warmth of his hand in hers. He would be two years old in a few more weeks. Like his father, he was an early riser, and was active from the moment he opened his eyes. Fortunately, this caused him to nap soundly for a good two hours in the afternoons, affording her some quiet time to start dinner, finish chores around the house or, of late, to sit down with a cup of tea and a book, though she rarely got past a page or two before nodding off herself. Today she hoped to make some progress on a sweater she was knitting for Casey. It was wine-colored and knit in a thick wool that would keep him warm on the chilliest days. Since her first few tangled and epithet-ridden projects, she had acquired some skill with the needles and had progressed from scarves to socks and then to a wee blue sweater that would fit Conor come the autumn. This was her first attempt at a full sized article for an adult, and despite ripping out a few rows each day, she was making steady progress on it, and the color looked beautiful against Casey’s dark hair and eyes.

The kitchen was peaceful when she sat down, the kettle starting to bubble on the Aga, and the spring sun lighting the floors and counters to a soft glow. She sighed and stretched her legs out in front of her, feeling sleepy but not truly tired. She rubbed an open hand over her belly, the occupant within quiet and tranquil. This baby seemed only to come to life when she herself lay down at night. So far it was only the soft movements, like tiny hops within that rippled outward, reassuring in their regularity.

She picked up her needles, the weight of the garment a satisfying heft. She had measured it against Casey the previous afternoon when he arrived home from work and it smelled still of his day, of his work, of him: the wood, stone and water; the oil he used to keep his tools in working order; the ink from the blueprints he handled daily and the darker, deeper and entirely subtle scent that was uniquely his own. It alternately soothed her and caused her pulse to run ragged, so that Casey, through what he assured her was no fault of his own, often found himself in bed before he was allowed his dinner. Today, the scent had the latter effect and she buried her face in the wool, breathing deeply and wondering if Conor might be an accommodating lad and sleep through his Daddy’s arrival home.

She shook her head and smiled. The second trimester of her pregnancies was often a time of erotic wool-gathering on her part. She knit a few stitches on the sweater and laid it back down. She took the wine-colored wool from the top of the basket and picked up what lay underneath, twelve balls of the most perfect, star-dusted pink imaginable. Softer than silk and spun fine as webbing. It had arrived in the post along with a wee lavender sweater set, complete with booties and bonnet and a pair of very fine needles. There was no letter nor card to accompany it, but she knew all the same from where it had come.

The wool lay in her hand, so light that it barely registered. She wanted to use it to knit into something perfect for a baby girl, but superstition held her back. Guilt too, if she were being honest with herself, because she wanted a daughter very badly. It had not mattered to her with Conor, girl or boy, all she had prayed for was a healthy baby who would survive. But this time was different. She had wondered, in part, if she was trying to recover something from her own youth, that somehow having and loving a daughter would heal the loneliness of her childhood and make up in some way for the lack of a mother in her own life. She had lost three daughters: one to abortion, for that pregnancy had been the product of a brutal rape; then wee Deirdre, lost when the pregnancy was five months along, and she had thought herself safe; and last, the baby they had named Grace, who had been lost when Casey was interned during the sweeps of Catholic males two summers past. In the matter of children one was never safe because love itself was fraught with all sorts of dangers. That was the risk one took with love.

As was now common any time she had five minutes to think, worries about Jamie’s companies crept in. With the introduction of Julian, everything had changed. Everything she had been certain of in this protracted struggle no longer made the same sort of sense, nor did it seem entirely just. She could not ask Jamie what role he wanted Julian to play, and what if, God forbid, something irrevocable happened to him? What should she do regarding his son—of whom, she was certain, he did not have the slightest knowledge. The last couple of months had consisted of a shell game where the stakes were very high and amounts were changing hands that made her feel more than a little nauseous. It felt like playing chess with a blindfold and pieces that could not be recognized by touch. The pattern of the board itself changed with every shift of the wind. Without Robert, she wasn’t sure she could continue. Giacomo Brandisi’s support had stiffened her spine, but the advent of a son of Jamie’s blood might change even his stance.

As for the son himself, there had been no further meetings and she could only assume he had gone back to Oxford for spring term. Philip had been rather conspicuous by his absence as well, though he was still making his presence felt through his solicitors. The very lack of threat made her feel extremely uneasy because she knew they would not desist until they had what they wanted, though what that was precisely was even less clear than it had been, previous to Julian. She sighed, shutting the thoughts off, as it was like being on a hamster wheel, never resulting in forward movement no matter how fast her thoughts might spin.

She eyed the sweater pattern, orienting herself to where she had left off, and began to loop the wool until her hands found the lovely purling rhythm of knitting that felt so peaceful. She was several rows in and had forgotten the tea when there was a knock at the door. She frowned and laid the sweater aside, not feeling up for company. It was likely only Gert, whom she loved dearly, but this afternoon what she wanted was quiet, not a long Germanic sermon on the care and feeding of the pregnant woman.

Finbar stood and padded behind her to the door, a low growl emanating from his deep chest. She took him by the collar, glad of the security of his presence but not wanting him to eat some unsuspecting salesman on the doorstep, either.

It was not Gert who stood on the other side of the door but two men she did not recognize. Her first instinct was to shut it firmly for their faces were not friendly. The smaller of the two must have sensed this for he pushed his way in immediately, taking her by the shoulder and shoving her deeper into the house. She stumbled slightly, then caught herself, her hand going instinctively to her belly, curving out in barely visible pregnancy. She took her hand off immediately, not wanting them to know that she was in one of the most vulnerable states a human could be in.

“Get the fockin’ dog away or I’ll kill him,” the small man said, his hand emerging from inside his coat with a snub-nosed pistol. She dragged Finbar, growling, teeth bared and feet planted in stubborn outrage, into Lawrence’s old bedroom. She felt terrible doing it for the dog had not gone into the boy’s room since his death and he began to whimper immediately, dark eyes filled with betrayal. But she had no doubt that the men would, if threatened, kill him.