Haunting Embrace (30 page)

This morning she was made up to perfection, shadows and blushes applied with a skilled hand to make the most of what she had. But for all her beauty, she lacked grace. With her narrow shoulders and long neck, Meaghan had the impression of an ungainly giraffe. It wasn’t until the woman turned that Meaghan noted with surprise that she was pregnant—more pregnant, by the looks of it, than Colleen, but the baby bump was somehow lost in all the long angles.

“Marga,” Brion exclaimed angrily. “What in bleeding hell are you doing here?”

“Well, I’ve come to pay my respects, of course,” she said with a guileless smile that made Meaghan shiver. This woman was as ingenuous as a cobra, and there was nothing even close to sympathy in the emotions that wafted off her.

She moved smoothly to Brion’s side, snubbing the plump woman who greeted her effusively. Wrapping a possessive arm around Brion’s waist, she tilted her head back for a kiss. Face flushed with anger, he gave her a stingy peck on the cheek, but she slid a cold and triumphant look at Colleen after it was done. Suddenly Meaghan got the picture that had eluded her. This was Brion’s wife.

“Poor Mrs. Ballagh,” Marga said, facing Colleen. “My heart and prayers are with you.”

But Meaghan got a whiff of her emotions, and what Marga felt was vindication. She thought Colleen deserved any tragedy that might come her way.

“Thank you,” Colleen mumbled, not looking up.

Seeing the two women together, Meaghan had no trouble understanding what Brion had meant when he’d fervently whispered to Colleen as he’d pinned her body against the wall. His wife
was
cold as the fish in the depths of the sea. She looked like a spire of ice, all edges and towering height, her skin so white it had a tinge of blue, her eyes so dark they seemed cavernous in the chill of her face.

Her dispassionate gaze skimmed the occupants of the kitchen, widening when they reached Meaghan. “I don’t think we’ve met,” she said with a grimace that might have been a smile and might have been something else entirely.

“No, I don’t think we have,” Meaghan agreed with equal politeness but didn’t offer to introduce herself either. She was no stranger to the superiority game and knew that it irked the other woman to go first.

“I’m Mrs. Brion MacGrath,” she said in a tone that could have easily replaced the name
Brion
with the words
Your Highness.

For a moment, the devil inside Meaghan spurred her to say,
And I am the Druid Brandubh’s love slave,
but as soon as the thought formed, the humor left. Perhaps it was too close to the truth.

“Meaghan Ballagh,” she muttered.

“Relative of Mickey?” Marga asked.

“Colleen,” Meaghan answered.

Marga sniffed at that. Though Colleen and her husband came from very distant branches of the Ballagh tree, Meaghan all but heard the word
inbreds
forming in Marga’s head.

“I heard about this one last night,” the plump woman with the bad teeth offered about Meaghan while giving Marga a look that said,
And I don’t like her either.

Meaghan wondered just what she’d heard but couldn’t ask and wouldn’t even if she could.

Once again, Marga ignored the other woman. Feck, it was hard to decide who Meaghan liked the least in this crowd.

“I’ve brought some of my famous curry dumplings,” Marga said. “I know you’ll appreciate them.”

They sounded disgusting to Meaghan, but she held her tongue. Marga waited pointedly, as if expecting a servant to rush forward and relieve her of the dish. When none appeared, she looked around for an inch of open counter space and then set the dish rudely on top of another, squashing the contents of the first without apology.

When she moved, she did so with exaggerated care, as if the weight of the baby she carried in her womb were an overwhelming burden. Smiling, she rested her hand on her swollen belly and rubbed it fondly. And yet, once again the emotions did not match the action. Meaghan sensed no warmth directed to the life she carried. She might have been patting a basketball for all the feelings she put into the gesture.

“When are you due?” Meaghan asked.

“Three months,” Marga said with a grating smile. “We are very excited for little Cathán to be born, are we not, Brion?”

Cathán.

The baby Marga MacGrath carried would grow to become the man who terrorized Meaghan’s world. Meaghan had guessed that somewhere in this time an infant Cathán might be crawling around. She’d even surmised that Brion MacGrath was his father. But somehow that baby bump had not registered with Meaghan until she heard the name spoken.

Cathán.

“What if the baby’s a girl?” she asked with numb lips.

Brion interrupted with a stony expression before Marga could respond. “It’s time for you to go, Marga. We’ve still business with Mrs. Ballagh.”

Marga’s smug smile faltered. “Business? I should think the only business would be to arrest Mr. Brady. The whole town is talking about him this morning.”

Just as they’d been talking about Meaghan yesterday, evidently.

“Talk should not determine a man’s fate,” Colleen said with a hint of steel in her voice.

“No?” Marga said, brows raised. “I suppose you’re right. But where there’s smoke, there’s often fire.”

A number of quick and cutting responses popped into Meaghan’s head at that, but sparring with Marga would accomplish nothing. An awkward silence engulfed them, and the too-crowded kitchen grew uncomfortably hot.

“Why don’t I make us all some tea?” Enid asked brightly.

Seeing that his wife had no intention of leaving, Brion angrily faced Colleen. “I’ll be looking for Mr. Brady,” he said. “And you will send word if he comes by.”

Colleen stiffened. “Was that a question, Mr. MacGrath?” she asked.

Meaghan hid a smile. Mickey had bullied the spirit out of Colleen, but with Brion MacGrath, it sparkled fiercely in Colleen’s eyes. Something sorrowful unfurled in Meaghan’s heart. Why couldn’t fate have dealt Colleen
this
man to love and cherish? For all the warts on his character—for all that he wasn’t such a knight in shining armor—Meaghan sensed devotion and adoration coming from him when he looked at Colleen. If Mickey had made Colleen a different woman with his violence and disgust, then perhaps Colleen would have made Brion a man as true as his emotions said he wanted to be. He certainly brought out the facets of her personality that Meaghan most loved.

“I only mean to say, we’d
appreciate it
, Francis and me, if you’d send word when Mr. Brady shows up.”

Colleen nodded, the stiffness draining from her. “Aye, I will do as you ask.”

“Áedán didn’t kill Mickey,” Meaghan said. “You won’t find blood leading back to him. I’m telling you the truth. He was with me all night.”

Brion scowled. “And yet I still wouldn’t call him innocent. Not by a long shot.”

“To my way of seeing,” Marga said sweetly, “your vouching for Mr. Brady doesn’t make him less of a murderer, but it does say a thing or two about you.”

“Shut up,” Brion snapped at her and she recoiled, blinking her big, painted eyes with surprise.

He gave Francis a sharp nod. “Doesn’t seem much else we can do here except be in the way. Let’s take our investigation elsewhere.”

“Aye. Good day to you, ladies.” Francis doffed an imaginary hat at Colleen. “Mrs. Ballagh.”

With a last, dark look at Colleen, Brion stormed out the back door, taking Francis with him like a leaf caught in a gust. As if by command, the others who’d crowded in the kitchen migrated to the door and said their farewells, too. Only Enid, Marga, and the plump woman with her buggy eyes and rotted teeth remained.

Marga made a great show of being amused by Brion’s words, as if his telling her to
shut up
in front of others were an endearing antic and not a mortifying verbal slap. But Meaghan felt her emotions, and she was plenty pissed and humiliated. For a moment, Meaghan almost felt sorry for her.

“Well,” Marga said with another superior sniff. “I should be going as well. Colleen, I’m sure we’ll talk soon. My sympathies to you and your . . .”

Marga let the unsaid hang with such studied skill that Meaghan wanted to shout,
Feck off with your fecking sympathies.
She thought she deserved a medal for keeping it inside.

With all the pomp of royalty, Marga whisked herself out the back door and left the rest of them in relieved silence.

“Curling up to that woman on a winter’s night must be like hugging a frozen shark,” Enid muttered, and Meaghan burst out laughing.

“Or a snake,” she said.

“Not enough teeth,” Enid disagreed. “Although the scales and venom are right enough.”

The bug-eyed woman gaped at them. “She’s as kind as the good Mary herself.”

“Why don’t you run along and tell her so,” Enid said. “I’m sure she’ll invite you to the big house for tea.”

With a huff, the other woman left, taking her downtrodden pastries with her. Even Colleen smiled at that. Alone at last, Enid said, “Our Niall looks ready for a lie down. So do you, Colleen. Sure and wouldn’t I wager you got no sleep to speak of last night. Go upstairs with the wee one and close your eyes. I’ll be putting my considerable talents to work here in the kitchen. When you come down, it will all be put to the right.”

“You’re a good friend, Enid,” Meaghan said.

“Oh
pish
, I’m nothing special.”

Colleen hugged her friend tightly and then did as she was told. With a huge yawn and a sad smile, she took the baby upstairs. Meaghan turned to Enid after Colleen left and began to help.

“I reckon you have things you should be doing as well,” Enid said, nonchalantly. “Like hunting down that man of yours.”

Meaghan almost said, “He’s not my man,” but stopped herself. She’d just confessed to spending the night with him, having sex in a storage room. It would hardly do to confess all of her uncertainties about Áedán Brady now.

“I would like to see if I can find him,” she answered instead.

“Sure and don’t I think that’s a good idea. Fix up a bit first, if you don’t mind me saying so. You’ll want to look good for him.”

Meaghan gave her a chagrined smile. “I’ll do that.”

With a quick hug that surprised but obviously delighted the other woman, Meaghan searched out her jeans and T-shirt, which were now clean and dry, and used the bathroom for a quick shower. After brushing her teeth and restraining the wild mess of her hair, she felt as ready to face Áedán as she ever would.

When she came out again, Enid eyed her clothes with a scandalized look but merely wished Meaghan luck. Borrowing the coat she’d used yesterday, Meaghan stuffed the silver comb in her pocket, donned her runners, and left in search of Áedán.

She intended to find him, ask him point-blank why he wanted the pendant, and hope her instincts about him ran true. With a cautious look around, she moved to the side of the house, retrieved the pendant, and put it in her other pocket, and then set out for the bay.

Chapter Twenty

Á
EDÁN moved about the deck of
The Angel
while around him others pretended to go about their business aboard their boats. They were late to cast off this morning—the sun had already breached the horizon and burned through the dawn mists. But with all the excitement of a murder, no one had wanted to answer the call of duty that their ships and the sea represented and miss a moment of the glorious drama unfolding on their shores.

He’d expected Brion MacGrath to appear by now to question him, but apparently Meaghan had convinced him that Áedán had nothing to do with Mickey’s murder. That didn’t mean the man didn’t still have his suspicions, though. Áedán was certain he hadn’t seen the last of him.

Áedán planned to take
The Angel
out to check the traps he and Mickey had set yesterday, but only because he needed something to do to keep his mind off everything else. Once he would have taken chisel and hammer to a piece of granite and worked the stone until his mind had cleared. People would have come to watch, keeping a respectful distance, admiring without interrupting.

But those days were gone.

That life was gone.

He rubbed his arm, staring at the spirals that had appeared under his skin, wondering when they’d begun to take shape. When he’d made love to Meaghan? Or when he’d heard that voice in his head? He didn’t know why it mattered—the Book had marked him on the inside centuries ago. And yet this physical reminder disturbed him. The spirals had been so pale they’d looked like a shadow when he’d first seen them. But now they’d darkened and it seemed they’d moved closer to the surface. It distressed him more than he would admit.

He’d never been so uncertain. Each step made him feel like he stumbled through time, today merging with yesterday, overlaying history with the present, the present with a millennium past. Before he’d become a prisoner to the Book of Fennore, the people who’d revered him, pandered to his favor,
worshiped
him like a god, had turned against him. He’d been wounded and infuriated by their fickle loyalties. He’d wanted to punish them, felt the darkness that he’d ultimately instilled into the Book taunting him, demanding he acknowledge the rightness of the mayhem that his creation inflicted on the people.

Áedán let out a breath as he reached for the net he’d been working just yesterday when his world had turned upside down again with the arrival of Meaghan. Methodically he spread it on the deck of the small ship that had been the link between survival and starvation for the Ballaghs. The softly swaying ship had the effect of anchoring him in the here and now. This boat had been Mickey’s family’s livelihood. Now what would happen to sweet Colleen and her babies?

Not his problem, an angry voice spoke inside him. He had enough to concern himself over without worrying for her. He was in the fight of his life. Cathán had grown in power. Mickey’s murder was proof of that. Áedán didn’t know who exactly had done the killing, but he had no doubt that Cathán had manipulated whoever it was.