☘️💚👬💚☘️👭☘️💚👬💚☘️
I wish I could say these are all St Patrick's Day themed stories but, unfortunately it's a holiday that isn't often showcased. If you know of any in the LGBTQ+ genre please feel free to share the titles in the comment section below or if you found yourself here through my Facebook shares, feel free to comment there too. So, onto St. Patrick's Day 2021, below you'll find 5 tales with strong Irish connections and/or Ireland settings. As with all my holiday-themed posts, if the book links don't currently work, check the author's website and/or social media to find the availability.
☘️💚👬💚☘️👭☘️💚👬💚☘️
Lessons in Love by Helena Stone
Summary:Mitch & Cian #2
Falling for each other was easy. Staying together comes with a learning curve.
Three months after they met in the miraculous library, Cian is nervously preparing for Mitch’s arrival in Dublin. As much as he’s looking forward to three long days with his boyfriend—without parental supervision—he can’t help worrying about the fact that they will have to share both his small room and his even smaller bed. He doesn’t even own pajamas.
Their relationship is new, and Cian may be two years older, but he has little more experience than Mitch when it comes to intimacy and boyfriends. He isn’t sure what he’s doing or what’s expected of him. As a result, Cian and Mitch are in for a whirlwind weekend, filled with shocks, surprises, fun, and deepening feelings.
Against the backdrop of Ireland celebrating its national holiday, Cian and Mitch learn their first Lessons in Love.
While a Miracle in the Library was a young adult story, Lessons in Love features two young men old enough to consume alcohol and be sexually active. This book is therefore meant for readers who are eighteen years or older and contains sexual acts between two consenting men.
Three months after they met in the miraculous library, Cian is nervously preparing for Mitch’s arrival in Dublin. As much as he’s looking forward to three long days with his boyfriend—without parental supervision—he can’t help worrying about the fact that they will have to share both his small room and his even smaller bed. He doesn’t even own pajamas.
Their relationship is new, and Cian may be two years older, but he has little more experience than Mitch when it comes to intimacy and boyfriends. He isn’t sure what he’s doing or what’s expected of him. As a result, Cian and Mitch are in for a whirlwind weekend, filled with shocks, surprises, fun, and deepening feelings.
Against the backdrop of Ireland celebrating its national holiday, Cian and Mitch learn their first Lessons in Love.
While a Miracle in the Library was a young adult story, Lessons in Love features two young men old enough to consume alcohol and be sexually active. This book is therefore meant for readers who are eighteen years or older and contains sexual acts between two consenting men.
Not a lot I can say about Lessons in Love that I didn't say in Miracle in the Library where we first met Mitch and Cian. Mitch is now an adult and visiting his boyfriend at college in Dublin for the first time. Now there is definitely more heat in Lessons than Miracle now that Mitch is of age and even though to them Cian is older, they really aren't that far apart.
The "age gap" brings me to what I think I loved most about this St. Patrick's Day gem: despite being older and a college man, Cian isn't that experienced in the ways of physical love. Helena Stone lets us see into the mind of Cian and all the insecurities he's having from hand holding to sleeping in the same bed to sex. This element really showcased how both parties are still discovering all that relationships and life entail. For me that point changed this story from a lovely read to an absolute must.
So, Lessons in Love may not have the "sweetness" factor that Miracle in the Library did since Mitch is of age but its no less full of heart. When I enjoy a couple as much as Mitch and Cian this is where I normally hint to the author that it would be lovely to see the boys pop up in a holiday novella but since their journey started in a Christmas story perhaps we'll get to see them enjoying all the freakiness and creepiness of Halloween😉😉.
RATING:
Summary:
Forever Wilde #4
Hudson:
Don't ever accidentally propose to your girlfriend. In front of her family. Especially if her dad is your boss. Because when you make it clear you've made a mistake, he's likely to send you out of the country to get you as far away from his broken-hearted daughter as possible. It happened to me. Now I'm stuck in Ireland trying to redeem myself so I can get promoted and have the life I've planned for: successful career, loving wife and kids, a comfortable, financially-secure home life in Texas.
But all of that seems to evaporate the moment I walk into the historic pub and see the most beautiful woman I've ever seen. Only, he's not a woman.
Charlie Murray is most definitely a man—the kind of man who causes me to take a second look for the first time in my life. And a third look, and fourth. I can't help but want to get to know him better... to get close to him, touch him, maybe even kiss him. But I'm straight. Or so I've always thought. Even if I'm not, how in the world could a feisty Irishman ever fit into the safe, predictable life I've always planned for?
Charlie:
Don't ever accidentally fall for the straight guy. Especially when he's trying to pry your family's business right out from under you. I should know. Because when Hudson Wilde walks into my family's pub and begins babbling so adorably, I can't help but fall just a little bit in love. But I'm looking for Forever Man, and the sexy American is certainly not him. He's so confused about what he wants, even choosing something from the dinner menu throws him into a fuddle. But those eyes... how can I resist?
So maybe I’ll give in. One steamy night before he heads home and I go back to life at the pub. We'll never see each other again.
Until, of course, his business deal sends me to Hobie, Texas, right into the middle of Hudson's steady life, more gay Wildes than can fit on a dance floor, and an ex-girlfriend who may or may not be content remaining an ex. But the more time I spend with Hudson, the more I think he might be my Forever Man after all. And I may be his. Is it possible we could both be so lucky?
Hudson's Luck is the fourth book in the Forever Wilde series but can be read on its own. Beware it includes 93k words of delicious man parts touching, grandfathers meddling, neighbors nosy-ing, dogs fornicating, cats being cats, horses... ah, crunching apples? or something... and one very flirty Stevie.
Summary:
Colors #2
When Siobhán Murray gets a call from a neighbor saying her estranged father, Patrick, has been admitted to a hospital after a serious heart attack, she’s desperate to get to Ireland. Her girlfriend, Annie Slocum, books the first possible flight to Dublin for both of them.
Despite their difficult relationship, Siobhán wants to help her father, so she and Annie move in with him during his recovery. Although Annie loves Siobhán and Ireland, and wants to be supportive, she feels out of place and disconnected from Siobhán.
Patrick hasn’t been the same since his wife’s death fifteen years ago, and it takes time and patience for Siobhán and him to work through their issues.
Things slowly begin to improve as Annie figures out a way to expand her Boston-based blog to include some Irish content, and Siobhán’s spark of creativity re-ignites after lying dormant for more than a year.
But there’s one more hurdle they must overcome, and that decision will shape their entire future.
Original Review June 2019:
RATING:
Despite their difficult relationship, Siobhán wants to help her father, so she and Annie move in with him during his recovery. Although Annie loves Siobhán and Ireland, and wants to be supportive, she feels out of place and disconnected from Siobhán.
Patrick hasn’t been the same since his wife’s death fifteen years ago, and it takes time and patience for Siobhán and him to work through their issues.
Things slowly begin to improve as Annie figures out a way to expand her Boston-based blog to include some Irish content, and Siobhán’s spark of creativity re-ignites after lying dormant for more than a year.
But there’s one more hurdle they must overcome, and that decision will shape their entire future.
I'm embarrassed to admit that I had no idea how close Brigham Vaughn was to releasing The Greenest Isle, her sequel to A Brighter Palette. Once I saw it was out(and luckily for me it was on release day that it came to my attention) I went and 1-clicked it and set down to read almost immediately. I wish I could say I read it in one sitting but life gets in the way and I was interrupted. HOWEVER, it kept pulling me back every free minute I found and though reading books like that isn't my way-of-choice I couldn't help it, I just couldn't wait till I had a free half hour. So at times it was a bit "choppy" for me but that was down to my only reading a couple pages at time occasionally and not the author's writing style.
I want to start off by saying for those looking for full-on heat and lots of it might be a bit disappointed. Don't get me wrong what's there is definitely WOW! but there isn't an overabundance of heat-ness but that's okay. For me, sometimes a story is even better written that way, as the saying goes "less is more" and in the case of Annie and Siobhan I found it to be just right. Considering everything that is being dealt with its understandable that Siobhan's passionate side has cooled a bit.
As someone who has been the primary 24/7 caregiver to a parent for the better part of the past 25 years, I completely understand how it can change a person's life as well as those close to them and I didn't have to travel to another country on top of it. Perhaps it is my role as my mother's caregiver that helped me bond with Siobhan and not so much with Annie in regards to her feeling, well I hate to use the term neglected but left out or shut out at times. Caregiving is a 24/7 job, it is all consuming and when you have the kind of focus that Siobhan has its completely understandable how she puts everything into helping her dad. Just because I relate more to Siobhan in The Greenest Isle doesn't mean I don't sympathize at times with Annie, after all her life has been flipped on its side, I just bonded more to Siobhan.
Watching these two navigate this newest leg of their journey is a real treat that isn't always easy. Caregiving is often used in fiction but more times than not its in small doses and not as life-changing or life-altering as Brigham Vaughn has done in Greenest, the whole moving to Ireland bit isn't exactly an everyday scenario. You can tell when an author has some degree of personal experience with caregiving because Miss Vaughn has tackled it and then managed to balance it with the ongoing romantic relationship that doesn't come from just research. As a caregiver, that part of the story is greatly appreciated.
Now you might think because I concentrated so much on Siobhan's caring for her dad that that is all the story is about but its not, there is so much more to Greenest its just that element really stuck with me. I don't think HEA is ever 100% guaranteed in life and that no matter how happy a couple is there is always work needed to be put into the relationship. This is one of those hurdles that requires patience and determination to further their HEA and Brigham Vaughn balances it all absolutely perfectly with realism that made The Greenest Isle a reading pleasure. If you loved A Brighter Palette than you'll enjoy this as well and if you haven't read Brighter yet, now is the perfect time to jump in.
I want to start off by saying for those looking for full-on heat and lots of it might be a bit disappointed. Don't get me wrong what's there is definitely WOW! but there isn't an overabundance of heat-ness but that's okay. For me, sometimes a story is even better written that way, as the saying goes "less is more" and in the case of Annie and Siobhan I found it to be just right. Considering everything that is being dealt with its understandable that Siobhan's passionate side has cooled a bit.
As someone who has been the primary 24/7 caregiver to a parent for the better part of the past 25 years, I completely understand how it can change a person's life as well as those close to them and I didn't have to travel to another country on top of it. Perhaps it is my role as my mother's caregiver that helped me bond with Siobhan and not so much with Annie in regards to her feeling, well I hate to use the term neglected but left out or shut out at times. Caregiving is a 24/7 job, it is all consuming and when you have the kind of focus that Siobhan has its completely understandable how she puts everything into helping her dad. Just because I relate more to Siobhan in The Greenest Isle doesn't mean I don't sympathize at times with Annie, after all her life has been flipped on its side, I just bonded more to Siobhan.
Watching these two navigate this newest leg of their journey is a real treat that isn't always easy. Caregiving is often used in fiction but more times than not its in small doses and not as life-changing or life-altering as Brigham Vaughn has done in Greenest, the whole moving to Ireland bit isn't exactly an everyday scenario. You can tell when an author has some degree of personal experience with caregiving because Miss Vaughn has tackled it and then managed to balance it with the ongoing romantic relationship that doesn't come from just research. As a caregiver, that part of the story is greatly appreciated.
Now you might think because I concentrated so much on Siobhan's caring for her dad that that is all the story is about but its not, there is so much more to Greenest its just that element really stuck with me. I don't think HEA is ever 100% guaranteed in life and that no matter how happy a couple is there is always work needed to be put into the relationship. This is one of those hurdles that requires patience and determination to further their HEA and Brigham Vaughn balances it all absolutely perfectly with realism that made The Greenest Isle a reading pleasure. If you loved A Brighter Palette than you'll enjoy this as well and if you haven't read Brighter yet, now is the perfect time to jump in.
RATING:
Hide to Seek by CF White
Summary:London Lies #2
Lust fuelled attraction is easy to ignore.
An emotional connection is harder to deny.
Jackson Young has gone into hiding. Fighting to get his name cleared and his truth heard, he’s followed Fletcher Doherty to Ireland for a safe haven from those who want to silence his story.
As they work on Jackson's biography, their growing attraction gets harder resist. Fletcher's made it clear though—their professional boundary isn't to be crossed, especially with so many loose threads from each of their pasts left hanging.
But as he learns more about the once coveted celebrity's rise to fame, and the manipulation and control that came with it, Fletcher finds it increasingly difficult to distance himself from their intimate moments. Lust fuelled attraction is easy to ignore, but an emotional connection is harder to deny.
Surrounded by Fletcher's meddling family, and ex boyfriends who still harbour feelings of being jilted, Jackson has to play the part of his lifetime. Can he prove that he does have talent and win Fletcher's heart as well as his trust?
And can he do it all before their idyllic hideaway is compromised?
Hide to Seek is the second book in the London Lies trilogy and is a slow burn, hurt/comfort, romantic suspense series.
An emotional connection is harder to deny.
Jackson Young has gone into hiding. Fighting to get his name cleared and his truth heard, he’s followed Fletcher Doherty to Ireland for a safe haven from those who want to silence his story.
As they work on Jackson's biography, their growing attraction gets harder resist. Fletcher's made it clear though—their professional boundary isn't to be crossed, especially with so many loose threads from each of their pasts left hanging.
But as he learns more about the once coveted celebrity's rise to fame, and the manipulation and control that came with it, Fletcher finds it increasingly difficult to distance himself from their intimate moments. Lust fuelled attraction is easy to ignore, but an emotional connection is harder to deny.
Surrounded by Fletcher's meddling family, and ex boyfriends who still harbour feelings of being jilted, Jackson has to play the part of his lifetime. Can he prove that he does have talent and win Fletcher's heart as well as his trust?
And can he do it all before their idyllic hideaway is compromised?
Hide to Seek is the second book in the London Lies trilogy and is a slow burn, hurt/comfort, romantic suspense series.
Summary:
Victorian Gay Detective #2
Colm Kelly, a popular constable, is happy to be a big fish in his little pond of an Irish village—until his secret sin is revealed by his best friend. Overnight, his happy life is ruined. He loses his job, and even his family, and flees to England.
Colm might get another chance in London as an inquiry agent. His first job: watch the honorable Q.R. Marrill, the next heir apparent to a fortune, who lives under a cloud of family deaths. It’s unclear if Marrill is the perpetrator or the next victim of a killer who has struck before. Colm must discover the truth, and the best way to do that is to act as the man’s valet, a menial job Colm is ill-suited for. Worse, the young gentleman is nothing like Colm’s image of an aristocrat and more like his idea of perfection. He has no desire to ruin his life again with unwelcome passion.
The bookish Quade Marrill, fourth son of a wealthy landowner, has led a contented solitary life in London separate from his family. But as his family members die one by one, he becomes heir. Even as he mourns his dead brothers, uncle, and cousin, he wonders if the deaths were more than bad luck. Someone sinister might be on the hunt, and he would be the main suspect The only way to discover the truth is to allow the alarmingly intrusive Colm Kelly into his life.
Colm might get another chance in London as an inquiry agent. His first job: watch the honorable Q.R. Marrill, the next heir apparent to a fortune, who lives under a cloud of family deaths. It’s unclear if Marrill is the perpetrator or the next victim of a killer who has struck before. Colm must discover the truth, and the best way to do that is to act as the man’s valet, a menial job Colm is ill-suited for. Worse, the young gentleman is nothing like Colm’s image of an aristocrat and more like his idea of perfection. He has no desire to ruin his life again with unwelcome passion.
The bookish Quade Marrill, fourth son of a wealthy landowner, has led a contented solitary life in London separate from his family. But as his family members die one by one, he becomes heir. Even as he mourns his dead brothers, uncle, and cousin, he wonders if the deaths were more than bad luck. Someone sinister might be on the hunt, and he would be the main suspect The only way to discover the truth is to allow the alarmingly intrusive Colm Kelly into his life.
* * * * *
This book is the second in a series. Patrick Kelly, a hero in the first His American Detective, is Colm’s annoying cousin—and now his employer. Colm Kelly has fled to England after his life is torn apart when his best friend reveals his secret. His cousin has given him a job: watch and protect Quade Marrill. Quade's family has nearly been picked off one by one and unfortunately as he remains one of the few left he lingers between next victim or quilty party. Together they find an unlikely connection and while they search for the true guilty party will that connection blossom or will hearts be broken?
Now as this is a mystery I won't go into much detail of the plot but I will say that it completely hooked me in. As I often say, I have read/watched so many murder mysteries in my 44 years on this earth that very few mystery plots surprise me anymore. His Irish Detective, though it didn't completely surprise me it did keep me seesawing between a couple of possibilities right up to the reveal. I personally can't ask for more but whether you figure out the who done it, the journey getting from point A to point Z is anything but a straight line and will keep you reading to the very end.
Colm and Quade are such lovely characters that I just want to wrap them up in a massive bear hug to keep them safe and feel loved. That's not to say you won't want to whack them upside the head once in a while to get them to see sense, because you will but the author balances those feelings so well that you can't help but have a smile whenever you set the book down. Quade losing himself in his work, whether its out of love for what he does or to forget his family situation, is oddly endearing. Usually when a character is so immersed in what he's doing that he doesn't really see what or who is around him I want to shake the living daylights out of them but not so much with Quade. As for Colm, well I can't think of a better word than just plain lovely. He has his faults, his filter between his mind and his mouth doesn't always work but mostly he's just trying to do his job, keep his place in his cousin's company, and do right by Quade. These three things don't always mesh for Colm but he still tries to accomplish them.
Is His Irish Detective better than or as good as book one, His American Detective? Probably not, but it comes very close. Is Irish a standalone? Yes. Would I recommend reading American first? I would. Does American have to be read first? No. Having said all that, its just a personal preference to read a series in order even when each installment features a different duo at its core. The characters from book one are only in a dozen or so scenes and although they have their purpose to the plot their backstory is not a necessity to the case but as I said its just a personal preference of mine to read them in order, I just find knowing their journey enhances the reading experience but it is not a must. I don't know how many stories the author has planned for this series but any future installments will definitely be at the top of my reading list.
RATING:
Lessons in Love by Helena Stone
March 15
Cian looked from his empty shopping trolley to the packed shelves surrounding him and sighed. Getting a few groceries shouldn’t be this hard. In fairness, it usually took him all of five minutes to run into the supermarket, grab his usual few items, and rush out again.
Of course, when he shopped just for himself, it was easy. He knew what he liked, he knew what he was capable of preparing, and he never worried about what others might think of his choices. Not so today.
In only a few hours, Mitch would arrive to stay with Cian over the long St. Patrick’s Day weekend. They’d been planning the visit since mid-February, discussing what they would do, which places Mitch wanted to visit, and which of Cian’s favorite pastimes they really shouldn’t miss. Never once had they talked or messaged about what they would eat and drink while Mitch was in Dublin.
As he grabbed a bag of apples and put them into his cart, Cian reflected that his usual diet of frozen pizza and beans on toast probably wouldn’t cut it. Not that he thought for a minute that Mitch might expect culinary marvels from him, but Cian wanted to impress Mitch, make him feel welcome and treasured.
He slowly made his way through the shop, grabbing a few essentials as he went but still having no idea what to do about dinners. He’d made up his mind to eat out that evening. Mitch wouldn’t arrive until half past seven. Far too late to start cooking after they’d made their way to the apartment Cian shared with two other lads. But neither of them could afford multiple trips to restaurants, so he needed a plan for the other three evenings.
Ten minutes later, he was ready to give up. He’d added bread, biscuits, beer, eggs, Coke, and crisps to the apples. He chuckled softly. It was the perfect representation of a student’s larder, but until he’d talked to Mitch, he really didn’t know what else to add.
Mitch. A colony of butterflies took flight in his stomach. No matter how much he was looking forward to his boyfriend’s arrival, he couldn’t deny that the nerves swirling through his body got stronger with every passing minute. Adding both tissues and baby wipes to his groceries did nothing to settle his nerves. Their dietary preferences weren’t the only thing they’d neglected to talk about.
This was new. They’d only met three months earlier, and with Cian spending his weekdays in Dublin and Mitch preparing for his high school leaving exams, they didn’t get to spend much time together. Cian made it home most weekends, and they’d managed to spend Valentine’s Day together, but this would be the first time they’d be together twenty-four seven, without interruptions.
The cue for the till was long, which meant Cian’s wait started while he was still in one of the isles. He gazed at the shelves beside him, and his breath hitched.
Fuck. Right in front of him was a stark reminder of what they’d failed to discuss. Or rather, of something he’d avoided thinking about. Condoms. Lube. To stock up or not to stock up, that was the question. With the people ahead of him not moving at all, Cian had all the time in the world, all the time he didn’t really want, to think about that part of the upcoming few days.
Since he rented one room in an apartment with three bedrooms and the other two were occupied, Mitch would have to share with him, and not only that tiny space either. The one bed in his room fell somewhere between a single and a double in size, so their nights promised to be cozy.
At last one person paid for their truckload worth of shopping, and the line shuffled forward, but not far enough to take Cian away from the proof of how unprepared he was for the weekend.
He knew he was Mitch’s first boyfriend, that he had been the first person to kiss him, which meant that whatever intimacies he and Mitch might get up to over the next few days, they would be further firsts for Mitch.
His stomach tightened as Cian wondered whether or not Mitch expected him to be in charge, to have all the answers. The truth of the matter was that Cian wasn’t all that much more experienced. Sure, he’d indulged in a hookup or two, but even without having anything to compare it to, Cian had no doubt those rushed encounters bore no resemblance to what happened between two men who were in a relationship.
When the line moved again, Cian grabbed both condoms and two small bottles of lube. It wasn’t as if he had to put them out on display. This way he’d have them should the need arise, and Mitch would be none the wiser if it didn’t. The fact that Cian didn’t know what he was hoping for meant he had a rueful smile on his face by the time he paid for his few groceries. Who knew that it was easier to decide to stock up for the eventuality of sex than it was to decide what they would be eating?
An hour later, after he’d put away—or hidden, as the case might be—his shopping, Cian’s nerves still hadn’t settled. If anything, they’d gotten worse.
Am I mad? Until that morning, he’d looked forward to Mitch’s arrival with excited anticipation. Now he couldn’t help wondering whether or not his room was too small to accommodate both him and a guest. He couldn’t for the life of him remember if he’d even told Mitch they’d be sharing both a room and a bed. Then he shrugged. It was too late now. Mitch would have boarded the bus to Dublin about ninety minutes earlier and was scheduled to arrive in less than an hour. Whatever happened next, the moment to stop this visit—an option he’d never seriously considered— had come and gone. He’d have to console himself with the knowledge that his room was cleaner than it had been since he’d first moved in and the bed had been made with fresh sheets.
Hoping to distract himself, Cian made his way to the shared living room, studying the space for what was probably the first time in months. Also for the first time, he silently lamented the fact that the furniture they had was mismatched, old, practically decrepit really, and not all too fresh looking. He picked up a jumper one of his housemates had dropped on the floor and placed it over the back of a chair.
“What’s up with him?”
Cian turned and found himself face-to-face with Ray and John, his two housemates.
Ray grinned at John before answering. “Haven’t you heard? He’s all aflutter because his boyfriend is coming to stay.”
“Ooooooooh.” John placed a hand on his forehead with theatrical flourish and swayed from side to side. “Catch me. That’s like…sooooooo romantic.”
Blood rushed to Cian’s cheeks. He opened his mouth to tell them to shut the fuck up before remembering that only three months ago he’d played out more or less the same scenario when John’s girlfriend came to stay for the first time. “Very bleedin’ funny,” he muttered before laughing along with his friends. He couldn’t deny he’d gotten a bit too obsessive about the whole thing. He couldn’t blame John for getting his revenge when the opportunity arose, either.
“So, when’s he arriving?” John asked.
Cian glanced at his phone to check the time. “About twenty minutes from now.”
His housemates stared at him, obviously waiting for something.
Bollix. He’d been so preoccupied with his nerves he’d completely missed that he should already be out the door if he wanted to meet Mitch straight off the bus.
Ray and John snickered as he rushed to his room to retrieve his coat. “This Mitch must be something special,” Ray stated. “I’ve never known him to be flustered.”
“Yeah,” John added as Cian approached the front door. “Now I can’t wait to meet him; the man who managed to unsettle the unflappable.”
A loud burst of laughter was the last thing Cian heard as he closed the door behind him and rushed down the stairs. If he combined a power walk with the occasional sprint, he might just get there on time.
Cian looked from his empty shopping trolley to the packed shelves surrounding him and sighed. Getting a few groceries shouldn’t be this hard. In fairness, it usually took him all of five minutes to run into the supermarket, grab his usual few items, and rush out again.
Of course, when he shopped just for himself, it was easy. He knew what he liked, he knew what he was capable of preparing, and he never worried about what others might think of his choices. Not so today.
In only a few hours, Mitch would arrive to stay with Cian over the long St. Patrick’s Day weekend. They’d been planning the visit since mid-February, discussing what they would do, which places Mitch wanted to visit, and which of Cian’s favorite pastimes they really shouldn’t miss. Never once had they talked or messaged about what they would eat and drink while Mitch was in Dublin.
As he grabbed a bag of apples and put them into his cart, Cian reflected that his usual diet of frozen pizza and beans on toast probably wouldn’t cut it. Not that he thought for a minute that Mitch might expect culinary marvels from him, but Cian wanted to impress Mitch, make him feel welcome and treasured.
He slowly made his way through the shop, grabbing a few essentials as he went but still having no idea what to do about dinners. He’d made up his mind to eat out that evening. Mitch wouldn’t arrive until half past seven. Far too late to start cooking after they’d made their way to the apartment Cian shared with two other lads. But neither of them could afford multiple trips to restaurants, so he needed a plan for the other three evenings.
Ten minutes later, he was ready to give up. He’d added bread, biscuits, beer, eggs, Coke, and crisps to the apples. He chuckled softly. It was the perfect representation of a student’s larder, but until he’d talked to Mitch, he really didn’t know what else to add.
Mitch. A colony of butterflies took flight in his stomach. No matter how much he was looking forward to his boyfriend’s arrival, he couldn’t deny that the nerves swirling through his body got stronger with every passing minute. Adding both tissues and baby wipes to his groceries did nothing to settle his nerves. Their dietary preferences weren’t the only thing they’d neglected to talk about.
This was new. They’d only met three months earlier, and with Cian spending his weekdays in Dublin and Mitch preparing for his high school leaving exams, they didn’t get to spend much time together. Cian made it home most weekends, and they’d managed to spend Valentine’s Day together, but this would be the first time they’d be together twenty-four seven, without interruptions.
The cue for the till was long, which meant Cian’s wait started while he was still in one of the isles. He gazed at the shelves beside him, and his breath hitched.
Fuck. Right in front of him was a stark reminder of what they’d failed to discuss. Or rather, of something he’d avoided thinking about. Condoms. Lube. To stock up or not to stock up, that was the question. With the people ahead of him not moving at all, Cian had all the time in the world, all the time he didn’t really want, to think about that part of the upcoming few days.
Since he rented one room in an apartment with three bedrooms and the other two were occupied, Mitch would have to share with him, and not only that tiny space either. The one bed in his room fell somewhere between a single and a double in size, so their nights promised to be cozy.
At last one person paid for their truckload worth of shopping, and the line shuffled forward, but not far enough to take Cian away from the proof of how unprepared he was for the weekend.
He knew he was Mitch’s first boyfriend, that he had been the first person to kiss him, which meant that whatever intimacies he and Mitch might get up to over the next few days, they would be further firsts for Mitch.
His stomach tightened as Cian wondered whether or not Mitch expected him to be in charge, to have all the answers. The truth of the matter was that Cian wasn’t all that much more experienced. Sure, he’d indulged in a hookup or two, but even without having anything to compare it to, Cian had no doubt those rushed encounters bore no resemblance to what happened between two men who were in a relationship.
When the line moved again, Cian grabbed both condoms and two small bottles of lube. It wasn’t as if he had to put them out on display. This way he’d have them should the need arise, and Mitch would be none the wiser if it didn’t. The fact that Cian didn’t know what he was hoping for meant he had a rueful smile on his face by the time he paid for his few groceries. Who knew that it was easier to decide to stock up for the eventuality of sex than it was to decide what they would be eating?
An hour later, after he’d put away—or hidden, as the case might be—his shopping, Cian’s nerves still hadn’t settled. If anything, they’d gotten worse.
Am I mad? Until that morning, he’d looked forward to Mitch’s arrival with excited anticipation. Now he couldn’t help wondering whether or not his room was too small to accommodate both him and a guest. He couldn’t for the life of him remember if he’d even told Mitch they’d be sharing both a room and a bed. Then he shrugged. It was too late now. Mitch would have boarded the bus to Dublin about ninety minutes earlier and was scheduled to arrive in less than an hour. Whatever happened next, the moment to stop this visit—an option he’d never seriously considered— had come and gone. He’d have to console himself with the knowledge that his room was cleaner than it had been since he’d first moved in and the bed had been made with fresh sheets.
Hoping to distract himself, Cian made his way to the shared living room, studying the space for what was probably the first time in months. Also for the first time, he silently lamented the fact that the furniture they had was mismatched, old, practically decrepit really, and not all too fresh looking. He picked up a jumper one of his housemates had dropped on the floor and placed it over the back of a chair.
“What’s up with him?”
Cian turned and found himself face-to-face with Ray and John, his two housemates.
Ray grinned at John before answering. “Haven’t you heard? He’s all aflutter because his boyfriend is coming to stay.”
“Ooooooooh.” John placed a hand on his forehead with theatrical flourish and swayed from side to side. “Catch me. That’s like…sooooooo romantic.”
Blood rushed to Cian’s cheeks. He opened his mouth to tell them to shut the fuck up before remembering that only three months ago he’d played out more or less the same scenario when John’s girlfriend came to stay for the first time. “Very bleedin’ funny,” he muttered before laughing along with his friends. He couldn’t deny he’d gotten a bit too obsessive about the whole thing. He couldn’t blame John for getting his revenge when the opportunity arose, either.
“So, when’s he arriving?” John asked.
Cian glanced at his phone to check the time. “About twenty minutes from now.”
His housemates stared at him, obviously waiting for something.
Bollix. He’d been so preoccupied with his nerves he’d completely missed that he should already be out the door if he wanted to meet Mitch straight off the bus.
Ray and John snickered as he rushed to his room to retrieve his coat. “This Mitch must be something special,” Ray stated. “I’ve never known him to be flustered.”
“Yeah,” John added as Cian approached the front door. “Now I can’t wait to meet him; the man who managed to unsettle the unflappable.”
A loud burst of laughter was the last thing Cian heard as he closed the door behind him and rushed down the stairs. If he combined a power walk with the occasional sprint, he might just get there on time.
Hudson's Luck by Lucy Lennox
1
Hudson
Hudson’s Words To Live By:Don’t ever, ever give a woman a present in a tiny box unless it’s an engagement ring.And sure as hell don’t do it if the present is also a tiny metal hoop device that could be easily, horribly misconstrued as an engagement ring.Oh, and maybe also don’t give said present on your one-year dating anniversary.
I was doing that thing some people do where the coin flips through each of your fingers and back again, except instead of a coin, I was doing it with the small ring that had gotten me into this predicament in the first place. I’d named it the Wilde Ring, but it was technically a head constrictor. Which meant, of course, that my brothers had called it a cock ring.
It wasn’t a cock ring.
I was fifteen hours into a thirteen-hour trip from Dallas to Cork, Ireland, when I realized sleeping was just not something I was going to be lucky enough to experience on this flight. At least my company was big enough to spring for a first-class seat to accommodate my long legs. My legs went on for days, according to my girlfriend.
Correction. My ex-girlfriend.
The sigh that came out of me was enough to unsettle the older lady next to me. Okay, so maybe it hadn’t been my first put-upon sigh. I was annoyed as hell at how I’d let myself be lured by the promise of an executive position. I should never have mixed business with pleasure and gone to work for her dad’s company.
I sighed again.
“Something on your mind, hot stuff?” the woman asked. “Might help to talk about it.”
“Sorry. I didn’t mean to disturb you,” I said, shifting in my seat. Despite the nice wide space, I still couldn’t get comfortable. Every time I touched anything, I couldn’t help but think of all the bodies that had spent time in the same seat and touched the same surfaces. I wondered if my hand sanitizer was empty yet.
“You don’t seem like a regular flyer,” she began with narrowed eyes. “This your first time traveling overseas?”
“No, ma’am. My parents live in Singapore. I visited them there last year.”
“Oh, I could have sworn you were experiencing jitters like a newb.”
I gawped at her. Newb? She had to be ten thousand years old.
“Well, I guess it’s a little true. I tend to stay close to home. I’m not one for adventuring, if you want to know the truth,” I admitted. I didn’t tell her the trip to Singapore had been a disaster that had resulted in me swearing off travel for the rest of my life.
“Shame. Some of my fondest memories are from travel adventures,” she mused, snuggling under the navy-blue airline blanket and turning to face me. “You meet the most interesting characters.”
I laughed. “Ma’am, I’m the oldest of ten siblings. My life is full to overflowing with interesting characters already.”
She smiled at me. “So tell me what has your knickers in a twist if it’s not the travel.”
I took a deep breath before turning to face her and doing something very out of character—telling my personal story to a stranger.
“I dated this girl, Darci,” I began.
“You dated a little girl?” she gasped. Her reaction seemed a bit melodramatic.
“No. God no. She’s a grown woman,” I stammered.
The lady narrowed her eyes at me. “Then refer to her as such. Continue.”
An octogenarian teaching me about gender respect. Nice. I thought about escaping to the lavatory, but that would involve exposing myself to even more germs than I’d already come into contact with on this hellish trip. Even the thought had me putting the little metal ring in my lap and searching out the hand sanitizer in the seat pocket in front of me. I liberally doused my hands and, as expected, the bottle was nearly empty. Fortunately, I had a couple more stashed away in my checked bags. As I worked the gel into my skin, I began explaining the disastrous set of circumstances that had landed me in the seat next to the old bird.
“Ah… okay. So, I dated this grown woman named Darci.” I looked at her and saw a slight nod. “Who was a very nice… woman. Anyway, several months ago she suggested I spend some time learning how to brew craft beer with her father. Her family loves microbrews, so her hope was that it would be a good way for me to bond with them, I guess.”
“Mm, she was trying to get you in with Big Daddy. I see.”
“Right. So I learned all about it, and because I’m a bit of a tinkerer on the side, I thought what better way to impress her father than to improve upon the process? I invented this little doohickey that goes on the tap nozzle to control the amount of head, or foam, that comes out when you dispense a beer into a glass.”
“Woah, really? Impressive. Let me guess, Papa Bear felt threatened by the new cub’s ingenuity?” Her face looked eager for confirmation.
“Ah… no. That’s not exactly what happened,” I said, holding up the little metal piece. “You see, I made the mistake of presenting it to Darci as an anniversary gift… in a tiny little box. You know, like a ring box.”
“Oh shit.”
“Yep.”
Her eyes were wide, and her mouth was open in a little round “o” shape. “No kidding? Really? You didn’t. You’re pulling my leg.”
“No, ma’am,” I said. “I wish I was.”
Her laugh, when it came, was low-pitched and cackling. And absolutely did not end. I noticed two other little old ladies across the aisle craning their necks to see what was going on.
“Right,” I said in an attempt to quiet her down. “So it was a disaster. Her mother was screaming with excitement. Her sister had begun videotaping the scene. And her father was already going for the bottle of champagne.”
“What happened when she saw the doohickey?”
“Um, well… it looks like a ring so…” I felt the familiar heat of embarrassment crawl up my neck. “She put it on her finger and said yes.”
At this point, I realized my audience had grown. Instead of just my seatmate and the ladies across the aisle, I also now had two flight attendants and four additional first-class passengers craning their necks to hear. My humiliation was going to make for some rip-roaring good stories when everyone got where they were going later.
“Liar,” she laughed. “What happened next? Surely you went along with it and popped the question.”
I felt my eyes bug out. “Me? Marriage? That soon? What? No. Heck no. No. We’d only been going out a year. It wasn’t part of the plan yet.”
Ten pairs of eyes seemed to bore holes into me.
“So, what then? What did you say?” one of the flight attendants asked into the anxious hush.
“I…” I gulped and looked around, unsure if they deserved the actual truth. Oh, what the hell. “I stammered something like, ‘No, oh god no, you don’t understand. This is just so I can give your dad a little head.’”
At least someone could benefit from the damned experience. Because it certainly wasn’t me. The crowd around me went wild as I knew they would. I tried not to recall how my brothers had reacted.
“Go on, laugh it up,” I muttered. “Glad my humiliation is good for something.” I began twirling the ring in between my fingers to calm my jittery nerves as even more people began tuning into the humiliating conversation.
The young woman in the seat in front of me frowned from her spot facing backward toward me. “Och, sweetie. What happened after that?” Her Irish accent was lovely just like the rest of her, but it did absolutely nothing for me. I’d sworn off women and love.
Fuck ’em.
“It forced the big conversation about where the relationship was going. And that’s when I learned that saying, ‘It’s going fine,’ was not the right response.”
More giggles from the peanut gallery.
I sank lower in my seat.
The old lady next to me sounded disgusted. “So, what? Now you’re running away? Chickenshit?”
“No. Needless to say, she broke it off with me. And to make matters worse, before any of this happened, I’d let her father talk me into coming to work for him. Now I’m kind of stuck. He’s sending me to Ireland to assess a company for acquisition. He’s not happy with me.”
I’d taken the job with Darci’s father’s investment company after he’d implied I’d be quick to make vice president there. Getting to that level would help my career tremendously. I’d worked my ass off for over a decade at one of the largest mergers-and-acquisitions firms in Dallas, but when it had come time for me to be considered for the higher-level positions, they’d come with mandatory relocation to other parts of the country.
I was ambitious, but nothing was worth me leaving my family. With Ames International, I’d be able to have the VP title and stay in Dallas. But first I needed to prove to Bruce Ames I was damned good at my job despite being not as great at relationships.
“You let that man make you his bitch?” asked the tiny grandma from across the aisle.
I immediately went on the defensive. “I feel like I owe it to Darci. I don’t know… to prove I’m not a total loser. We finally worked things out as friends, and I care about her. I don’t want to let her or her family down. If only I’d been able to prove my commitment this way before the ring fiasco, maybe she wouldn’t have been so quick to dismiss me.”
I looked around, expecting nods of support and encouragement, but only found looks of sympathy.
“What?” I asked.
“Lovie,” the mother of the young lady in front of me said with a sigh. “The girl didn’t want your business commitment. She wanted romance. She wanted you to tell her she was the only one for you. She wanted you to tell her you couldn’t live without her. Sweep her off her feet and all that.”
I shook my head. “See, that’s where you’re wrong. She’s practical. I mean, she’s a nurse for god’s sake. So she’d have been way more interested in knowing I could provide financial security for her and a future family than some kind of big romantic gesture like flowers and a bunch of meaningless words.”
More tsks and head shakes.
“You don’t know her,” I said lamely. “It doesn’t matter now anyway. It’s over.”
The older lady next to me poked me in the side with a pointy finger. “Did it ever occur to you to bring her with you to Ireland?”
I thought about it. “No. Why would I? It’s a business trip. A quick in and out. Plus… she’s ah… moved on. I heard she’s already seeing someone else.” I’d been in denial about that last part, but it was true. I assumed she was doing it deliberately to prove she never cared about me much in the first place. It was working.
More head shakes all around.
My seatmate sighed like I’d disappointed her with my stupidity. “Forget it. One day you’ll meet someone you’ll want to show the world to. In the meantime, go ahead and kick ass on the work thingie and get a big promotion. That way, when the time comes, you’ll have enough money to live a big life with your true love.” She turned to say something to the ladies across the aisle, and I felt dismissed.
Everyone wandered away, seemingly disappointed in me, and all I could think was, Join the fucking club.
Because no one was more disappointed in me than I was.
After a few minutes of silence, my seatmate spoke up again. “Have you considered maybe you’re swimming in the wrong pond?”
I had no idea what she meant.
“Pardon?”
“Maybe you’d be more interested in sausage than tacos,” she tried explaining.
One of the ladies from across the aisle spoke up. “Can it, Tilly. Not every man likes the D.”
I almost choked on my tongue. My face ignited, and I sank lower in my seat.
“Shit,” the lady next to me muttered as she eyed me and my reaction carefully. She’d clearly mistaken my embarrassment at the turn in conversation for something else because she added, “He’s a homophobe. And now I’m stuck next to him for the rest of the flight. Switch seats with me, Irene.”
“I’m not a homophobe,” I argued, taking major offense. “Practically every guy in my family is gay.”
“Practically?”
“Except me. Obviously,” I clarified.
“Maybe that’s your problem. Try batting for the other team and see if that doesn’t solve it.”
Clearly the woman had some fucked-up notions of sexuality. Did I dare correct her?
“Sexuality doesn’t work like that, ma’am. You can’t just ‘choose’ to be gay if being straight isn’t working out for you,” I said. I could feel the tension in my jaw. It was a familiar sensation I felt whenever I found myself defending my siblings from ignorant assholes.
“You think I don’t know that?” She pointed a thumb over her shoulder to the two ladies across the aisle. “My two besties are lesbos, and I have about a million gay grandsons. I volunteer at an LGBTQ youth shelter in San Francisco and lost my brother thanks to my homophobic parents kicking him out years and years ago, so don’t you go lecturing me on gay, young man.”
She’d gathered up a full head of steam, and I could tell I was in for a wild ride.
“Sorry,” I began, but she cut me off.
“No. You listen to me. If there’s one thing I’ve learned in all these years of living, it’s that love is love. What the hell does it matter what bits and pieces someone has on their body? If you can open yourself up to love, you might be surprised at the package it comes in. Ever thought of that?” Her finger poked me in the chest, punctuating each word as she spoke.
“But,” I said, intending to explain that I had no hang-ups about being open to attractions from all kinds of people.
“But nothing. Maybe your destiny isn’t some sweet ‘daddy’s girl’. Maybe your destiny is a motorcycle leather daddy in Ohio.”
“God, I hope not,” I blurted. “Motorcycles are dangerous. I’m always lecturing my brothers about them. Darci calls them donor—”
“Fuck Darci,” the woman growled. “Clearly she’s not the one. Stop going for the expected safe bet, and try something new, something adventurous. You need some passion in your life. I’m not sure the sweetie-pie nurse lit your fire. When was the last time you took a vacation?”
“Ah… you mean besides visiting my parents in Singapore?”
“Yes, besides that.”
“Um… I went camping with a couple of my brothers about four years ago.”
“More than two hours away from home?” she asked with narrowed eyes.
“No, ma’am.”
“Have you ever gotten lost on purpose?”
“No, ma’am. Why would I?” Even the thought of not having a plan or schedule to go by each day made my neck feel hot and itchy.
“Have you ever said yes to something crazy? Something you would normally have said no to?”
“I’m not really the crazy type,” I explained. “I’m more of a planner.”
“Have you ever had sex with a stranger?” Her eyes were twinkling, and I noticed her two friends leering at me.
“Certainly not.”
Since when did I sound like such a square?
“Maybe it’s time for you to live a little,” she said gently.
I thought about how settled my life had been this past year. How, with a steady girlfriend, I’d felt… good. Not perfect, of course, but steady. Like my life was following the path it was meant to. The high-level job, the modern high-rise apartment, the lovely and kind woman on my arm. It had been…
Nice.
“But Darci—”
“Fuck Darci. Do you hear what I’m saying? Fuck the ex-girlfriend. Tell her to take a long walk off a short pier. You deserve someone a hell of a lot better than a chick whose idea of fun is setting her boyfriend up with Big Daddy for macho male man shit.”
I stared wide-eyed at the woman, both for her language and her forthright assessment of my situation. She didn’t know me at all, so why the hell did she think she could make such bold proclamations about what I needed?
“She’s a nice gir—woman. Encouraging me to get along with her family was just practical.”
Her face softened as she reached across the space between us to squeeze my arm. “Life’s too short to settle for ‘practical’ and ‘safe.’ Have a fling. Do something crazy. Get lost somewhere and fly by the seat of your pants for once. Let someone else be in charge, and stop being responsible for a little while.”
I stared at her some more. “What makes you think I’m so boring and predictable?” Out of the corner of my eye, I spotted the tiny and now very empty bottle of hand sanitizer sticking out of the side pocket of my bag. I ignored it.
“You said you were the oldest of ten. That usually means you’re reliable, structured, cautious… am I right so far?”
“Maybe,” I admitted.
“And you’ve probably stayed fairly close to home in case someone needed you?”
I nodded, thinking of what it was like for the oldest of ten siblings when one of the parents was rarely around to help. I remembered nights of cooking boxed macaroni for everyone when I was seven, of helping clean up spills the babies made and doing the dishes when my mom was singing lullabies and bedtime stories to my younger siblings. I remembered changing disgusting diapers when I was as young as five and my brother Cal throwing up on me ten minutes before my high school graduation.
Even as recently as the previous year, I’d been called home to help my baby sister Sassy deal with a pregnancy scare. Had my mother not been half a world away, I was sure she would have been the one Sassy ran crying to. But the minute my parents had moved overseas, I’d become the default stand-in parent. I’d never known any different. And I loved my siblings with the ferocity of a thousand warriors. I couldn’t imagine it any other way.
“Maybe it’s time for you to figure out who you are without all that other stuff.”
“What other stuff?” I asked, though deep down I knew what she meant. How many times had I wondered myself what things would be like if I’d been allowed to be more like my younger siblings… if I’d been allowed to just be a kid?
“Rules. Responsibilities. Expectations… Labels.”
I closed my eyes and considered her words. Was I unhappy with my life the way it was? No. I had almost everything I’d ever imagined. A solid career as a financial analyst just like my father, a loyal and loving family in Texas, and a pretty, sweet girlfriend… well, until recently anyway.
“No. I think you’re wrong,” I told her. “My life is fine the way it is.” I hated that my voice sounded just a little too insistent. Like maybe she wasn’t the one I was trying to convince.
She studied me for a moment before shrugging. “Meh. Maybe it’s not your time yet. But I’ll bet fifty bucks you could use some spice in your life, and a powerful missile in your silo wouldn’t go amiss if you know what I mean.”
The tiny frail woman across from us snorted and reached a bony hand across the aisle to fist-bump my new friend.
“What are the three of you doing in Ireland?” I asked in an effort to get the focus off me.
“A tiny bit of family genealogy with a whole lotta whiskey drinking,” my seatmate said before all three of them howled with laughter and then began talking about the bedroom talents of someone named Harold.
I kept pretty much to myself for the remainder of the flight and tried to think of whether or not I should try to rekindle things with Darci. Maybe if I just explained to her about the plan…
By the time the plane landed in Cork, I’d already started to formulate a strategy to talk to Darci about the plan. But as soon as I turned my phone on, a text from my brother came dinging through.
West: Sorry to be the one to confirm it, but it’s true Darci is with someone else. Couple days ago, I saw her sneak into the on-call room with one of the pharmacy reps. The next night Otto and Seth saw them holding hands at the Pinecone. Sorry, brother.
I was surprised to feel something akin to relief, but I wondered what that would mean for my future at work. Would things be even more awkward between Bruce Ames and me or would it actually help the situation? Was he relieved his baby girl had gotten over me so quickly? And what did that mean for my love life? I was something of a serial monogamist. I’d always had a girlfriend.
What would my life be like now without someone to take care of? I’d always dreamed of the wife, the white picket fence, the two point five children. Was I really going to have to start all over? The thought had me absently reaching for the hand sanitizer again before I realized what I was doing. I glanced at the woman next to me and listened as she and her traveling companions talked excitedly about whiskey and Irish men. Their unabashed enthusiasm made something loosen in my chest just a little and I turned to stare out the window as I considered my seat mate’s earlier words.
Maybe she and the other two old ladies were right. Maybe I did need to do something wild for once.
The Greenest Isle by Brigham Vaughn
“Da?” Siobhán’s voice cracked. She rested her hand on her father’s. He blinked slowly, seeming to come out from a very deep sleep.
“Aileen?” He sounded hoarse as he squinted at her. It made the lines around his eyes deepen.
“No it’s me. Siobhán.”
His expression fell for a moment, but he studied her face intently. “It can’t be. You’re in Boston.”
She shook her head. “No, Mrs. O’Connor called yesterday to tell me you were in hospital. After she explained what happened, I flew to Dublin. With Annie.”
“Annie?” He turned piercing blue eyes on Annie and examined her critically. Annie fought the urge to fidget. Despite the freshening up she’d attempted to do in the airport bathroom, she knew she looked like a mess right now. Ahh, well, there was nothing she could do about it now.
“Annie’s my girlfriend, Da. We met a year and a half ago, and we’re living together.”
His gaze was accusing as he looked at his daughter. “You didn’t tell me you’d met someone.”
Ouch. It stung that in all the time they’d been together, Siobhán hadn’t told her father about Annie. But Annie tried to remind herself that Patrick and Siobhán’s relationship was strained at best. What did she expect?
“I love her, Da,” Siobhán said quietly.
“Come here then,” he gestured weakly toward Annie, but his voice was still commanding. “Let me have a look at you.”
Annie stepped forward. “It’s very nice to meet you, Mr. Murray.”
He reached out a hand, and she took it. His fingers were cool, but there was more strength in his grip than she’d have expected. “Call me Patrick. Mr. Murray was me da’s name.”
“Patrick,” she said. “I’m Annie Slocum.”
His gaze narrowed. “English name, but you’re from Boston, I take it? You sound like it anyway.”
She nodded. “Yes. I’ve lived in that area my whole life.”
“That’s good, so.” He looked away, and Annie had the sensation that she’d been dismissed. Annie walked over to the window, leaving Siobhán and her father to catch up.
“How are you feeling, Da?” Siobhán asked.
“Tired. Annoyed by all the fuss.”
“Mrs. O’Connor told me you had a heart attack. And the nurse said it was serious.”
“Well, I’m not dead.”
Annie glanced over to see Siobhán give her father a tremulous smile. “I’m glad of that. What did they tell you about the prognosis?”
“I don’t know. The doctor was spouting some gibberish. You’ll have to ask him. Maybe you’ll understand him better than I did.”
“I did speak with the nurse. She said you’re going to need to make some lifestyle changes.” Patrick let out an annoyed-sounding “hurrumph”. “And that your recovery will be slow. But Annie and I will help you with that.”
“Aileen?” He sounded hoarse as he squinted at her. It made the lines around his eyes deepen.
“No it’s me. Siobhán.”
His expression fell for a moment, but he studied her face intently. “It can’t be. You’re in Boston.”
She shook her head. “No, Mrs. O’Connor called yesterday to tell me you were in hospital. After she explained what happened, I flew to Dublin. With Annie.”
“Annie?” He turned piercing blue eyes on Annie and examined her critically. Annie fought the urge to fidget. Despite the freshening up she’d attempted to do in the airport bathroom, she knew she looked like a mess right now. Ahh, well, there was nothing she could do about it now.
“Annie’s my girlfriend, Da. We met a year and a half ago, and we’re living together.”
His gaze was accusing as he looked at his daughter. “You didn’t tell me you’d met someone.”
Ouch. It stung that in all the time they’d been together, Siobhán hadn’t told her father about Annie. But Annie tried to remind herself that Patrick and Siobhán’s relationship was strained at best. What did she expect?
“I love her, Da,” Siobhán said quietly.
“Come here then,” he gestured weakly toward Annie, but his voice was still commanding. “Let me have a look at you.”
Annie stepped forward. “It’s very nice to meet you, Mr. Murray.”
He reached out a hand, and she took it. His fingers were cool, but there was more strength in his grip than she’d have expected. “Call me Patrick. Mr. Murray was me da’s name.”
“Patrick,” she said. “I’m Annie Slocum.”
His gaze narrowed. “English name, but you’re from Boston, I take it? You sound like it anyway.”
She nodded. “Yes. I’ve lived in that area my whole life.”
“That’s good, so.” He looked away, and Annie had the sensation that she’d been dismissed. Annie walked over to the window, leaving Siobhán and her father to catch up.
“How are you feeling, Da?” Siobhán asked.
“Tired. Annoyed by all the fuss.”
“Mrs. O’Connor told me you had a heart attack. And the nurse said it was serious.”
“Well, I’m not dead.”
Annie glanced over to see Siobhán give her father a tremulous smile. “I’m glad of that. What did they tell you about the prognosis?”
“I don’t know. The doctor was spouting some gibberish. You’ll have to ask him. Maybe you’ll understand him better than I did.”
“I did speak with the nurse. She said you’re going to need to make some lifestyle changes.” Patrick let out an annoyed-sounding “hurrumph”. “And that your recovery will be slow. But Annie and I will help you with that.”
Hide to Seek by CF White
Jackson joined him at the edge of the boat as the land disappeared into the murky water that sloshed up against the stern. He didn’t say anything. Neither did Fletcher. Their silence wasn’t awkward. It wasn’t comfortable either. It was a shared moment of reflection. Of knowing this could be the only peace they might have in a long while. A three-hour ferry ride from Holyhead to Dublin on international waters meant they couldn’t be found yet. They’d managed to get through ID control without any real problems. For how many times Fletcher had done this journey, he knew the ferry border control wasn’t as meticulous in checking details as the airlines would be. It was why across water was the only way. And they needed to breathe in this sanctuary while they still could. Fletcher wasn’t sure what awaited them in Ireland. He had apprehensions about going home, about bringing Jackson Young and all that came with him, to his family. But where else could they go?
So they shared a silent agreement to just stand, stare and be.
Until Jackson broke it with an intrepid inhale and a twist of his body to face him. “We should talk,” he said through the gust of howling wind.
“Should we?” Fletcher kept his gaze forward. Or backward as it were.
“This thing.” Jackson flapped a hand between them, his fingertips brushing Fletcher’s arm. “Us. We should probably acknowledge it.”
Fletcher breathed in, his chest rising, and slapped the railing to stand straighter. He closed his eyes, then opened them but kept his gaze on the distant horizon and not on the man beside him who was conjuring up feelings he didn’t want to concede to. Not then. Not when there was so much else left to learn between them.
“I know what you’re thinking.” Jackson slid his hand onto Fletcher’s cheek, demanding he look at him. A hand that stayed there a moment too long, with blue eyes delving into his soul and a soft thumb brushing along his yearning lips.
“You do, do ye?”
Jackson removed his hand and Fletcher’s cheek tinged with the heat left behind, but the flecks of ice cold seawater carried up by fierce winds slapped his skin and soon wiped the warmth away.
“You think this is too complicated to deal with now. That we need to focus on the book. On ourselves. On hiding. That’s why you left me down there, isn’t it? You can’t face me.”
“What did you think? This would be a romantic mini break?”
“I think we need to acknowledge there’s something going on. We can’t ignore it. I spent my life ignoring what was in front of me and look what happened.” Jackson threw his hands in the air, indicating their current situation.
“I’m not ignoring you, Jax. There’s no time for us. You want this truth out, then we’re gonna have to prioritise.”
Jackson hung his head, the disappointment and hurt seeping off his deflating body. But Fletcher couldn’t do this. He couldn’t rebound so quickly again. Time after time he’d done that, and each time had hurt worse than before to the point he couldn’t trust his feelings anymore. Nor could he trust that Jackson wasn’t clinging onto anything that would save him. How could this be real? How could either of them think that this could be something?
“I can be friends.” Fletcher made a concerted effort to keep his voice low, neutral, soothing. “Neither of us are ready for romance.”
Jackson breathed through a smile. “Are you an old romantic, Mr Doherty?”
“Aye. I am.” Fletcher wrapped his jacket around him, arms folding. It was to stave off the blustering wind chill but also, maybe, to act as the physical barrier to coincide with the one he built up with every wretched word he spoke. “I don’t jump into bed at the first sign of attraction. So when I said, let’s see what happens, I meant it.” He sniffed as the ferry dipped and swayed, aiming for the open arms of Dublin port. “But first things first, we have to get you off this ferry as Cameron Dale.”
So they shared a silent agreement to just stand, stare and be.
Until Jackson broke it with an intrepid inhale and a twist of his body to face him. “We should talk,” he said through the gust of howling wind.
“Should we?” Fletcher kept his gaze forward. Or backward as it were.
“This thing.” Jackson flapped a hand between them, his fingertips brushing Fletcher’s arm. “Us. We should probably acknowledge it.”
Fletcher breathed in, his chest rising, and slapped the railing to stand straighter. He closed his eyes, then opened them but kept his gaze on the distant horizon and not on the man beside him who was conjuring up feelings he didn’t want to concede to. Not then. Not when there was so much else left to learn between them.
“I know what you’re thinking.” Jackson slid his hand onto Fletcher’s cheek, demanding he look at him. A hand that stayed there a moment too long, with blue eyes delving into his soul and a soft thumb brushing along his yearning lips.
“You do, do ye?”
Jackson removed his hand and Fletcher’s cheek tinged with the heat left behind, but the flecks of ice cold seawater carried up by fierce winds slapped his skin and soon wiped the warmth away.
“You think this is too complicated to deal with now. That we need to focus on the book. On ourselves. On hiding. That’s why you left me down there, isn’t it? You can’t face me.”
“What did you think? This would be a romantic mini break?”
“I think we need to acknowledge there’s something going on. We can’t ignore it. I spent my life ignoring what was in front of me and look what happened.” Jackson threw his hands in the air, indicating their current situation.
“I’m not ignoring you, Jax. There’s no time for us. You want this truth out, then we’re gonna have to prioritise.”
Jackson hung his head, the disappointment and hurt seeping off his deflating body. But Fletcher couldn’t do this. He couldn’t rebound so quickly again. Time after time he’d done that, and each time had hurt worse than before to the point he couldn’t trust his feelings anymore. Nor could he trust that Jackson wasn’t clinging onto anything that would save him. How could this be real? How could either of them think that this could be something?
“I can be friends.” Fletcher made a concerted effort to keep his voice low, neutral, soothing. “Neither of us are ready for romance.”
Jackson breathed through a smile. “Are you an old romantic, Mr Doherty?”
“Aye. I am.” Fletcher wrapped his jacket around him, arms folding. It was to stave off the blustering wind chill but also, maybe, to act as the physical barrier to coincide with the one he built up with every wretched word he spoke. “I don’t jump into bed at the first sign of attraction. So when I said, let’s see what happens, I meant it.” He sniffed as the ferry dipped and swayed, aiming for the open arms of Dublin port. “But first things first, we have to get you off this ferry as Cameron Dale.”
His Irish Detective by Summer Devon
CHAPTER ONE
1885 Kent, England
“You’re looking well.” Quade, on a rare visit to the family estate, never knew what to say to his family members. A compliment seemed the sort of comment that would make his older brother happy. And to be sure, Jack did look glossy and self-satisfied. He was the only one of the Marrills who seemed unaffected by the cloud hanging over them. With his white-toothed smile, and fine wool sack coat open to display a new gold watch chain, he was the picture of health and wealth.
“Ha, I should. I’ve had a fine time in London last month. Without the wife.” Jack tipped him a wink.
“Is Mary here?”
Jack rolled his eyes—and Quade understood he’d been expected to give Jack a congratulatory slap on the back or make inquiries about that London visit. But Jack remained good-natured. “I left the dear thing back at the River. She’s feeling poorly.” The River House was his home, ten miles off—a gift from his in-laws.
The three Marrill men sat in the drawing room, waiting for the butler to bring refreshments. Quade, just arrived from London, would rather retreat to read or perhaps take a walk than eat tea with his glowering father.
“You’re better, Father?” Jack asked.
“I’m perfectly well,” Mr. Marrill gave him a reproachful glance.
“You’ve been ill?” Quade supposed that would account for his father’s weight loss and new halting gait.
“Nothing of the sort.” Mr. Marrill picked up a pile of letters and flipped through them.
Jack caught Quade’s eye, wrinkled his nose, and drew his bottom lip over his top, a perfect exaggeration of their father’s sternest expression. Quade stifled a laugh.
“What’s so amusing?” Mr. Marrill demanded.
Jack winked at Quade, then jerked a thumb in his direction. “Quade made a funny face.”
Quade couldn’t help smiling at his idiot brother, though he half agreed with their father, who muttered, “Juvenile nonsense.”
Jack pulled out a cigar, and their father waved a hand. “Not in here,” he said, so Jack sauntered out the French windows to the garden, into the cool, cloudy day.
Their father, now alone in the room with Quade, rose to his feet, and so, of course, Quade did too.
His father scowled. “What’s that bulging in your jacket pocket?”
Quade hadn’t hidden the partial manuscript properly. He considered lying because he knew his father would disapprove, but was unable to invent anything interesting. He said, “It’s from a book about medieval law. I’m compiling the index.”
“Sounds dry and dull as…” His father’s voice trailed off.
Was he going to say as dry and dull as the grave? As Quade’s life? But his father only shook his head. He seemed even more unhappy being alone with his youngest son than usual.
“I’m going to the library. Pray do not forget that we change for dinner,” his father said and walked quickly toward the door, though he had that new limp and seemed to be nursing a pain in his side.
“What is wrong, Father?”
A slender man, Mr. Marrill was almost gaunt now, though his graying hair was still thick and his dark eyes as he glanced back at Quade were sharp as always. He muttered something about rheumatism.
“I’m sorry,” Quade said. “It’s only a recent problem, I expect?”
His father gave a choked sound, an imitation of laughter, but didn’t speak again before he left, slamming the door behind him.
Quade went out to see Jack. “Why didn’t Father tell me he’s been ill?”
“Best ask him about it,” drawled Jack.
“I doubt he’d tell me. He seems even less communicative than ever.”
“Does he?” Jack still played with the unlit cigar. “He’s always been a suspicious old fogey. This and that has made him worse of late.”
“What does ‘this and that’ mean? Is there some new disaster looming over Father or you?”
Jack gave a short laugh, much like their father’s. “I’m not sure it’s your business.” He didn’t sneer, merely stated a fact. “You are so removed from our daily lives, d’you see? Neither my confidant nor Father’s.”
“No,” Quade agreed. He didn’t often feel the lack of such intimacy with his family. “But I do worry about the old man.”
“No need. He doesn’t worry about us at all.” Jack walked away toward the large garden.
“You seem on edge as well,” Quade called after him.
Jack merely waved his cigar in the air. “I shall see you inside.”
Quade considered following, but he’d enough of his early years as an unwanted extra trailing after his brothers. And though Jack’s thoughtless comment about Quade’s place in their family held no malice, it had stung. How childish to allow these snubs or his father’s dislike of him to make him sulky. He watched his brother make his way to the hedge bordering the formal garden and wondered again how soon he might return to London.
With a sense of relief at being left to his own devices, Quade returned to the drawing room, where he settled into an overstuff chair and pulled out the loose pages to check over. He clenched a pencil between his teeth as he read through dense, handwritten passages, looking for words that would appear in the index. A notebook lay on his knee, held open with his elbow as he read.
The manuscript, written by a professor, was exactly as his father had described: dry, dull, filled with dates and facts that would put a normal man to sleep. Quade thought the whole thing fascinating. He loved his work and was grateful to be able to drag it along anywhere he went.
A few minutes later, the glass doors to the garden smashed open, and Jack staggered in. His handsome face was flushed and grossly swollen. His hands clawed at his throat, and he emitted a horrible high-pitched wheeze over and over.
Quade dropped the papers and rushed to Jack, who fell to his knees, still making the dreadful noise.
“Help! I need help,” Quade shouted over his shoulder at the closed door. “We need help, damnation.”
When a servant rushed in at last, Quade ordered, “Fetch a doctor.”
Cursing, he knelt next to Jack, undoing his neck cloth and popping the now too tight collar stud with shaking fingers. He pushed aside the flailing hands and begged Jack to try to relax, for surely breathing would come easier if he could only stop moving about so violently.
Suddenly, the room filled with people, pushing Quade to the side and carrying Jack away and up to his room.
Quade followed behind, telling the doctor’s assistant all he knew. Even as they rushed up the stairs, the whistling wail issuing from Jack faltered, then ceased. At that moment, Quade understood the only thing worse than that awful noise was silence.
He lurked in the corridor, frozen in horror, until a harsh whisper behind him startled him into taking a step backward. “What have you done?” his father growled.
“Nothing.” Quade turned to face him.
“I saw you out there with him.”
“Only for a few moments. Then I returned inside. Father, what do you think happened with Jack? I don’t know.”
His father stared down the dark corridor—no one had bothered to turn on the gaslights yet—then back at Quade, who understood that his father didn’t believe him.
The nightmare of a moment was too familiar. Another death? And in this variation of the bad dream, no one believed him. “Truly, I have no notion what happened.”
His father shook his head and whispered. “It will be fine. This isn’t like the other times. Not at all. The doctor is excellent.” He was speaking to himself, so Quade didn’t answer. He wanted to agree, but feared agitating Mr. Marrill again.
At last his father made his slow, limping way back down the stairs, and Quade soon followed. An hour—or perhaps years—later, the doctor slowly descended the stairs to the family gathered to wait in the larger sitting room.
Even before he made the announcement, Quade’s mother let out a single muffled sob, only one, and sat up straighter.
The words were but a faraway echo of what they all knew. Jack was gone. The doctor said that Jack’s heart had failed and the culprit had been an insect bite or sting, though they couldn’t find a mark on the body, only a pronounced swollen area on his wrist.
Reverend Peeler, the vicar, had just arrived at the house to offer kind words and prayers to the family. He sidled up to the physician. “Are you quite sure? It’s rather cold for insects, don’t you think?”
The doctor murmured something Quade couldn’t hear, so he inched closer. He could see the skepticism on the faces of the listening gentlemen, his father’s friends. Quade’s own heart grew heavy with the same suspicion no matter how much he tried to ignore it.
Murder.
Jack was dead. Murdered perhaps? Dead. Murder. Those two words thumped through his head without cessation, but not distracting enough he couldn’t hear Reverend Peeler continue in a carrying whisper. “And then there’s the other matter. The other brothers, you know, and the cousin. All those deaths… Most peculiar.”
Quade’s father must not have heard the vicar’s gossip, because he didn’t order Reverend Peeler from the house.
“An insect sting. No contagion,” the doctor announced to the room at large. “He can rest in peace in the chapel.”
He was a good man, and a fine doctor. Yet Quade’s troubling thoughts refused to be vanquished, and, he suspected, neither would the gossip.
He slipped away from the crowd, went outside, and by the light of a single candle, searched the garden. The cigar lay in the grass, damp from dew and Jack’s saliva. Quade gingerly picked it up with a handkerchief. Upstairs in his room, he wrapped it in more layers of cloth, placed it in a box, and pushed the box far into the bottom of his valise.
Jack was laid out on a bier in the chapel, surrounded by pale flowers and candles. Above them, the passing bell tolled in the tower.
When Quade walked down the center aisle between pews to pay his respects, the clack of his boots on the flagstones echoed through the vault of the church. He longed to run, to escape the staring congregation. He considered singing. If he bellowed out a good tavern ditty, it would prove he was a madman, and perhaps they’d say the word outright instead of in whispers. Murderer.
Along with the shock, sorrow —the more standard collection of emotions—the single selfish question nagged. Why did he have to be at the hall when Jack died? He was the only person close enough to have helped. He should have done something different, taken some action that might have saved his brother. And now Quade was acutely aware that everyone knew the truth: he was the only one who had been near when the illness seized Jack.
“Jack, are you at peace? Any advice?” he muttered to the gray figure of his brother in an open coffin nearly blanketed in roses to cover the smell. “No, no. You’re gone, and my worry is all for me. I apologize. Give my best to the others.”
He didn’t know what else to say to Jack, nearly nine years his elder and practically a stranger. That cocky smile Jack had flashed only minutes before he’d died seemed to have come from another world, one that had vanished forever with a bee sting. He couldn’t lose everything about his brother. Quade fished through sparse memories and landed on the day Jack had pulled out a pocketknife to repair a toy for him. “Thank you for fixing the top. I wish I’d known you better.”
Quade’s eyes and nose prickled, but he wouldn’t reach for the black-edged handkerchief and make that sort of a show in front of the eager spectators in the pews.
He couldn’t imagine what Jack would have done if he’d caught Quade in tears. Maybe grin at him, ruffle his hair, then saunter away. Jack hadn’t been sour, not like their oldest brother. He’d been the one to laugh, the trickster brother with the lightest heart. A plodder like Quade could never keep up with him, and only recently understood that he hadn’t wished to try.
He stared at Jack’s white face, and the usual phrases filled his mind. Thirty-three was too damned young to die. That wasn’t lively Jack in that coffin, just a badly made imitation.
Quade resisted the urge to pull out his watch to see if he’d stood there too long or not long enough. Time didn’t seem to pass the way it had before Jack’s death.
Might he turn and make his way to the front row of benches without anyone remarking about his time spent with the corpse of his brother?
They’d whisper no matter what he did or said. Jack was the fourth brother to die.
Quade barely recalled his youngest brother, who’d drowned years ago. The second died in an accident while Quade was home on holiday from the university. The carriage had apparently gone over a narrow bridge during a storm. Another had been found in the woods with a broken neck after his saddle horse returned home without him. Now here lay Jack…and only Quade remained alive.
In the last six years, other male relations had met unfortunate ends. Quade’s uncle and cousin died—and the cousin dead after a mysterious assault late at night in a London alley. The only remaining cousin, a small child, lived with Quade’s mother and father.
Much of the dead uncle’s estate had gone to Quade’s father, joining money and lands again, an ever-increasing pile of wealth. And the last son would inherit it all.
Quade could almost hear the thoughts behind the dozens of faces that watched him. No doubt it’s a temptation to put even your own family out of the way for such rich gains, eh?
He wanted to turn and shout at the lines of people sitting in their finest mourning, insist they speak to his face, say their suspicions out loud. But as he walked to the front, he caught sight of his parents’ blank, pale faces, and he recalled again that his indignation or fear of the truth was hardly the point. Jack’s widow was still in bed, overcome and doused with laudanum, days after the tragedy.
He took his seat next to his mother, who was ramrod stiff and dry-eyed. Her favorite son dead, yet only that unblinking stare and her set mouth and face displayed the depth of her pain. She wouldn’t welcome any touch that might bring emotion to the surface, especially in public, so Quade faced forward, straightened his own back, and raged in silence until it was time to follow his brother’s body to the graveyard.
After they returned home, his father summoned Quade to the library. He sat at his desk, folded his bony hands, and proceeded to lay out the details of Jack’s will, namely that the money their grandfather had left Jack would revert to the estate since it was still in a trust and Jack had left no male heirs. Quade, standing in front of the desk, his hands at his back, was grateful the conversation was apparently simple and short, with no overflow of emotion. But then his father said, “We’re hiring someone to watch you.”
Quade didn’t understand. His hands dropped to his sides. “Watch me do what?”
“We need someone to keep an eye on you day and night.” It sounded like a threat.
“Why? Do you think I’m in danger?”
His father’s gaze, usually steady and unflinching, shifted from his face to something in a far corner, and at last Quade understood. The anger filled him like poison and his blood felt thick. “Are you saying I had something to do with Jack’s death? Or any of the others? And now you want to make sure I don’t go after another victim? You, for instance? My cousin? Is that why you won’t allow the boy to be alone with me?”
“Don’t be an ass,” his father snapped.
He’s also furious about all this, Quade realized, and felt an unaccustomed surge of fellowship with his father. This was his father, who couldn’t be guilty of murdering his own children or his brother. Quade’s father and uncle had been closer than Quade had been to any of his brothers. “I beg your pardon, sir,” he said. “That remark was not called for. But Father, please, there must be something happening to us. To Jack and—”
“Jack’s passing was due to natural causes.” His father rested his hands together, fingers laced, a sign of calm until it grew clear his grip on himself was so tight, his fingernails went white. “As for the rest of it, I have too much on my plate as it is to entertain such nonsense—”
“These deaths of the men in our family. Men and boys,” Quade said, thinking of his youngest brother. “I want to understand what is happening. Don’t you?”
“You have no reason to fear.” His father’s nostrils flared as if he smelled something unpleasant. “Did I not just tell you that I’ve hired someone to watch over you?”
The way he said that initial “you” was almost vicious.
Quade heard an accusation in his tone and responded without thinking. “I swear to you, I have no hand in this.” He could have been speaking at a wall for all the good it did.
His father shuffled the papers on his desk and seemed to examine them. “This conversation is over.”
“That’s absurd,” Quade said. “The conversation hasn’t even begun.”
“Do stop enacting a drama for once,” his father said. “You have expressed your feelings far more strongly than necessary recently.”
What the devil did that mean? When had he ever expressed his feelings to his father or anyone else in the family? At the moment, he was too confused to understand how he felt, much less speak of his emotions.
“I don’t understand what you think I might have done. You know I’m not a violent man.” Quade took a step closer to the desk. He stopped when his father held up a hand.
The older man began to rub at his temples. “Get out, if you please. I must compose a letter to Jack’s lawyer.” He apparently couldn’t meet Quade’s gaze. He hadn’t been able to for several years. It wasn’t merely to do with the deaths haunting their family. They hadn’t had an easy moment since the day his father had gone into Quade’s room and discovered a scandalous book by the bed, Short Essays on Sodomy and Tribadism. His benign jokes about Quade as a monk also ceased that day.
Quade knew his father well enough to know that the discussion was at an end. But he couldn’t simply walk away now.
What was this business about hiring a guard? Or was it a guard? Would his father actually hire a killer to dispatch Quade? Such a bizarre notion, but Quade had no idea what was real and what was invented at this point.
Far better to believe it wasn’t malicious action by his father, who’d perhaps hired someone to ferret out the truth. That would be a relief.
But all those deaths…Quade, who didn’t usually have leaps of imagination, wondered if his father blamed him and looked for a quiet way to end the matter? He couldn’t ignore the possibility he had a target on his own back and anyone might hold the weapon.
“Shall I arrange the person to watch over me?” Quade asked. “I could ask some of the barristers with whom I’m acquainted if they can find a suitable candidate.”
“No. I will.”
“Do you have someone in mind?”
For a moment, he thought his father would refuse to answer until Mr. Marrill said, “I have the name from our London solicitor, a gentleman named Mr. Sloan.”
“That’s familiar. Isn’t he some variety of wealthy philanthropist?”
His father ignored him. “Mr. Sloan has a business partner, a Mr. Kelly, who has an agency that provides services such as this.”
“Protecting victims, or tracking down criminals?”
His father stared down at his hands and didn’t answer. Quade wanted to protest his own innocence again. But then again, he was hardly sure if his father was innocent himself.
He longed to believe it was just a series of terrible accidents. Nothing more.
“Perhaps there is only horrible coincidence at work,” Quade picked his words carefully, and watched his father. “It could be that there are only victims of fate and not some dreadful scheme. But whether it be men’s plans or God’s will, I should think you’d want answers as well.”
His father looked up and met his eyes. For a moment, he thought his father might agree. Instead he only said, “Enough. Go, please.”
Quade wanted to run away and escape his family’s woes. No, he wanted to stay as long as it took to discover the truth. At least he had that box in his bag.
He’d send the cigar off to Hemner, an expert who’d written a treatise on subtle poisons that Quade had translated from German. Best not to send from the village post office however. Quade had no desire to rouse any more curiosity or suspicion.
Quade left the Marrill estate less than a week later, unable to bear his father’s dislike and suspicions, or, worse, the devastated stare of his mother that he couldn’t shift no matter what he said or did. He returned to London and hoped the matter was over. It would never be over, of course, not while his parents and he still breathed and knew the others did not. But that was far too dramatic to say aloud.
A few days after that, he received a letter that a “valet” would be coming to him, and he must hire the man. The man was both obsequious and obtrusive and snooped through Quade’s possessions—confirming Quade’s suspicions he was under surveillance—but at least he didn’t try to push Quade down the stairs or smash him over the head with the heavy umbrella stand.
Quade had done his own snooping and discovered that Patrick Kelly’s agency was well regarded. But when he tried to talk to his new “valet,” hoping to engage his help in discovering anything about the Marrill family misfortune, the idiot pretended he had no notion what Quade was talking about.
“I’m a servant, sir,” he’d said. “Nothing more.”
Quade wrote a note to Kelly, demanding to know what the fool Whitmore was up to.
Kelly’s answer was polite and said nothing more than that he hoped Whitmore was professional but that he couldn’t discuss the matter with anyone other than his client—and he assumed Mr. Marrill knew who had retained his services. Next, Quade wrote to his father, who didn’t answer. He considered telling his father what he’d done with the cigar, but wanted to get an answer from Hemner first.
Soon after that, Quade had managed to behave obnoxiously enough to drive off Whitmore, and Quade thought he was safe from anyone else invading his space.
And then the Irishman appeared.
Helena Stone can’t remember a life before words and reading. After growing up in a household where no holiday or festivity was complete without at least one new book, it’s hardly surprising she now owns more books than shelf space while her Kindle is about to explode.
The urge to write came as a surprise. The realisation that people might enjoy her words was a shock to say the least. Now that the writing bug has well and truly taken hold, Helena can no longer imagine not sharing the characters in her head and heart with the rest of the world.
Having left the hustle and bustle of Amsterdam for the peace and quiet of the Irish Country side she divides her time between reading, writing, long and often wet walks with the dog, her part-time job in a library, a grown-up daughter and her ever loving and patient husband.
After enjoying creative writing as a child, Lucy didn’t write her first novel until she was over 40 years old. Her debut novel, Borrowing Blue, was published in the autumn of 2016. Lucy has an English Literature degree from Vanderbilt University, but that doesn’t hold a candle to the years and years of staying up all night reading tantalizing novels on her own. She has three children, plays tennis, and hates folding laundry. While her husband is no shmoopy romance hero, he is very good at math, cooks a mean lasagne, has gorgeous eyes, looks hot in his business clothes, and makes her laugh every single day.
Lucy hopes you enjoy sexy heroes as much as she does. Happy reading!
Lucy hopes you enjoy sexy heroes as much as she does. Happy reading!
Brigham Vaughn
Brigham Vaughn is on the adventure of a lifetime as a full-time writer. She devours books at an alarming rate and hasn’t let her short arms and long torso stop her from doing yoga. She makes a killer key lime pie, hates green peppers, and loves wine tasting tours. A collector of vintage Nancy Drew books and green glassware, she enjoys poking around in antique shops and refinishing thrift store furniture. An avid photographer, she dreams of traveling the world and she can’t wait to discover everything else life has to offer her.Her books range from short stories to novellas. They explore gay, lesbian, and polyamorous romance in contemporary settings.
To stay up to date on her latest releases, sign up for the Coles & Vaughn Newsletter.
CF White
Brought up in a relatively small town in Hertfordshire, C F White managed to do what most other residents try to do and fail—leave.
Studying at a West London university, she realised there was a whole city out there waiting to be discovered, so, much like Dick Whittington before her, she never made it back home and still endlessly search for the streets paved with gold, slowly coming to the realisation they’re mostly paved with chewing gum. And the odd bit of graffiti. And those little circles of yellow spray paint where the council point out the pot holes to someone who is supposedly meant to fix them instead of staring at them vacantly whilst holding a polystyrene cup of watered-down coffee.
She eventually moved West to East along that vast District Line and settled for pie and mash, cockles and winkles and a bit of Knees Up Mother Brown to live in the East End of London; securing a job and creating a life, a home and a family.
After her second son was born with a rare disability, C F White’s life changed and brought pen back to paper having written stories as a child but never the confidence to show them to the world. Now, having embarked on this writing journey, she can’t stop. So strap in, it’s going to be a bumpy ride.
Summer Devon is the pen name writer Kate Rothwell often uses. Whether the characters are male or female, human or dragon, her books are always romance.
You can visit her facebook page, where there's a sign up form for a newsletter (she'll only send out newsletters when there's a new Summer Devon or Kate Rothwell release and she will never ever sell your name to anyone).
Helena Stone
EMAIL: helenastoneauthor@gmail.com
Lucy Lennox
EMAIL: lucy@lucylennox.com
Brigham Vaughn
SMASHWORDS / PINTEREST / SCRIBd / B&N
EMAIL: brighamvaughn@gmail.com
CF White
Summer Devon
katerothwell@gmail.com
Lessons in Love by Helena Stone
Hudson's Luck by Lucy Lennox
The Greenest Isle by Brigham Vaughn
Hide to Seek by CF White
His Irish Detective by Summer Devon
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