The Gallaghers of Ardmore Trilogy

around her so the flowers were under her chin and his mouth was at her ear.
    “You look so pretty sitting here, a ghra , working away into the night. What tale are you spinning out?”
    “Oh, I . . .” Her heart was in her throat. He was right that she hadn’t expected him. Not just so early, but at all. She knew she’d been abrupt and rude, and even cold, and had convinced herself that what had been between them was done. She’d even begun to mourn for it.
    Yet here he was, bringing her flowers and speaking softly in her ear.
    “It’s, ah, the story of the pooka and Paddy McNee thatMr. Riley told me. These are lovely, Aidan.” Since she was far from ready for anyone to see her work, she tipped the top of the computer down, then sniffed the roses.
    “I’m glad you like them as they’re stolen goods and the garda may come by at any moment to arrest me.”
    “I’ll pay your bail.” She turned in the chair to look at him. He wasn’t angry, she noted with puzzled relief. A man couldn’t smile like that if he was angry. “I’ll go put them in water, and make you some tea.”
    When she rose the pup turned over with a grumble and a groan and recurled himself.
    “As a guard dog he’s a pure failure,” Aidan commented.
    “He’s just a baby.” She took the flowers as they walked downstairs. “And I’ve nothing to guard anyway.”
    It was such a pleasure to slide back into routine, the friendliness and flirtation. Part of her wanted to bring up what happened the night before, but she tucked it away. Why mention something that put them at odds?
    He was probably regretting that he’d asked her, and relieved that she’d said no. For some reason that line of thinking had that dark, nasty brew bubbling inside her again. She ordered herself to settle down and tucked the pink roses into a pale blue bottle.
    As she did, she noticed the time and frowned. “It’s barely ten o’clock. Did you close the pub?”
    “No, I took a couple hours. I’m entitled now and then. And I missed you,” he added, laying his hands on her waist. “For you didn’t come see me.”
    “I was working.” I didn’t think you’d want to see me. Weren’t we angry with each other? she wondered even as he bent down to brush his lips over hers.
    “And I’ve interrupted. But since that deed is done . . .” He drew back. “Come walking with me, won’t you, Jude Frances?”
    “Walking? Now?”
    “Aye.” He was already circling her toward the back door. “A lovely night it is for walking.”
    “It’s dark,” she said, but she was out the door.
    “There’s light. Moon and stars. The best kind of light. I’ll tell you a story of the faerie queen who only came out from her palace at night, when there was a moon to guide her steps. For even faeries can have spells cast on them, and hers was that she was cursed to take the form of a white bird during the day.”
    As they walked, her hand linked with his, he spun it out for her, painting the picture of the lonely queen wandering by night and the black wolf she found wounded at the base of the cliffs.
    “He had eyes of emerald green that watched her warily, but her heart couldn’t resist and overcame any fear. She tended to him, using her art and her skill to heal his hurts. From that night he became her companion, walking the hills and the rock with her night after night until as dawn shimmered over the sea she left him with a flutter of white wings and a sorrowful call that came from her broken heart.”
    “Was there no way to break the spell?”
    “Oh, there’s always a way, isn’t there?” He lifted their joined hands to his lips, kissed her knuckles, then drew her along toward the cliff path where the sea began to roar and the wind fly.
    Moonlight splattered on the high, wild grass, and the path cut between it, turned pebbles into silver coins and weathered stone into hunched elves. She let Aidan guide her up while she waited for him to start the story again.
    “One morning, a young man was hunting in the fields, for he was hungry and had no more than his quiver ofarrows and his bow to feed him. Game had been scarce for many days, and that day, as others, the rabbits and deer eluded him until it came to afternoon and his hunger was great. It was then he saw the white bird soaring, and thinking only of his belly, he notched his arrow in his bow, loosed the arrow, and brought her down. Mind your step here, darling. That’s the way.”
    “But he can’t