The Gallaghers of Ardmore Trilogy

“You’re a darling girl, Mary Kate. I’d best be back to the kitchen.”
    He’d no more than let the door swing shut behind him when it burst open again and Brenna charged through. “I told you to stay away from my sister.”
    “What?”
    She planted herself in the stance he knew very well signaled a fight. “Didn’t I stand here a week ago and tell you what the situation was as regards my Mary Kate?”
    She had, of course. And, Shawn admitted as he shoved a hand through his hair, he hadn’t given it another thought. “I just had a conversation with her, Brenna, nothing more than that. It was as harmless as tickling a baby.”
    “She’s not a baby, and you kissed her.”
    “Oh, Jesus Christ on the Cross, I’d kiss my own mother in the same fashion.”
    “The Germans are hungry,” Darcy said brightly as she carted in a tray loaded with empty plates and bowls.“They’re after three servings of your stew and two of the fish. You’d think the lot of them hadn’t eaten since they left their homeland.”
    Dumping the dishes, she measured the weight in the pocket of her apron with a drum of her fingers. “But, bless them, they tip often and they tip well, and only once did one of them give my bum a pat.”
    When she started to deal with the dishes, Brenna took a steadying breath. “Darcy, would you mind seeing to those later? I need a word with Shawn, in private.”
    Darcy glanced around, lifted an eyebrow. She could see it now, the tension running in waves from one to the other. As far as she was concerned, the two of them weren’t happy unless they were spatting. But this seemed . . . different. “Is something the matter?”
    “The O’Toole thinks I’ve designs on Mary Kate and is warning me off.” He wrenched open the refrigerator to take out the fish he needed. But not before he saw Brenna flinch.
    “I don’t.” Because she spoke without heat, without her usual bite, Shawn looked back at her. “But she’s designs on you.”
    “Well, she’s a crush on him, to be sure,” Darcy confirmed. “Not that he’d ever notice.”
    “All I did was talk to her.” Uncomfortable with two pairs of female eyes staring at him with both pity and disgust, Shawn turned on the fire to heat the oil. “Next time I’ll just give her a shove out of my way and keep going. Will that do for you?”
    Darcy sighed. “You’re such a knucklehead, aren’t you, Shawn?” She gave Brenna’s arm a quick, supportive squeeze, then left them alone.
    “I’m sorry I came barreling in and snapped at you.” Apologies came rarely off Brenna’s tongue, and had that much more impact because of it. “Everything’s so new for Mary Kate just now, with university behind her and her just getting her feet wet in her career. She looks at Maureen, all flushed with being newly married, and our Patty so excited about her own wedding coming this spring. And she . . .”
    Helpless, she fluttered her hands. She was so bad at words when they mattered most. “She thinks she’s all grown up, you see, and ready for everything in her life to begin. Inside, her heart’s still a girl’s and romantic with it. And it’s tender, Shawn. You could bruise it.”
    “I won’t.”
    “You’d never mean to.” She smiled now, but it didn’t reach up into her eyes as it usually did. “You don’t have it in you.”
    “I’d rather you were mad at me than sad. I don’t like seeing you unhappy. Brenna . . .” But when he reached out to touch her hair, she shook her head and backed away.
    “No, now you’ll say something kind and sweet, and I’m too much in the mood for it. We’ve both work to do.”
    “I think about you in a way I didn’t,” he said, his voice soft and quiet as she turned to go. “And I think about you often.”
    She felt her heart shiver, and took a breath to steady herself. “Well, it’s a fine time you pick to bring up the subject. But then, you’ve never had the gift of timing except for your music.”
    “I think about you often,” he repeated. He walked toward her, pleased when her eyes went wary.
    “What are you about?” She was flustered, and she was never flustered by a man. Certainly not by Shawn. She could handle him, of course. She always had, always would. But she couldn’t seem to make her legs move.
    Now wasn’t this interesting? he mused as he closed in. She looked nervous, and color was rising in her cheeks. “I never used to think about doing this.” He slid a long-fingered hand