Page 12 of A New World for the Irish Daughter

He’d held her in his arms many times, and she’d savored his solid strength, his comfort and his kindness. But no matter how treasured or tempted he’d made her feel, she’d always wrenched herself away, had always felt she’d had to, for her own sake.

Now she simply stood there, and he did too, and then silently Maggie placed her hand against his cheek, his stubble rough against her palm, her thumb barely grazing his lips, as she reveled in the warmth of his skin, the softness of his mouth, the way the simple touch thrilled her right to her core and made her want more. So much more.

Briefly, Brendan closed his eyes. When he spoke, his voice sounded pained. “Maggie…”

“I miss you,” she whispered, the words catching in her throat. “I’ve missed you for so long, Brendan. Back in Chicago and… and here, too. I see you every day and yet I feel like we barely even speak anymore. As if we barely know each other now…”

He opened his eyes to stare at her, and with an icy jolt of shock, she saw a hardness reflected there that made her almost drop her hand and step back, but then she didn’t. She waited instead, hoping—although she didn’t even know for what. For him to tell her he missed her too? To take her in his arms as he once had, until, every time, she’d pushed him away? This time, she knew, she wouldn’t.

And then he was the one who stepped back smartly, so her hand fell away and a blush rose to her cheeks at what could only be described as a stinging rejection. She had, Maggie realized, been as shameless as one of the girls downstairs. But while those girls’ attentions were welcomed, clearly hers were not. Humiliation swept through her, a drenching, icy wave.

“What do you want?” Brendan asked, and now his voice sounded as hard as his expression, and tears of both mortification and hurt stung her eyes.

“I…” Maggie’s voice trembled, along with her body. She felt ashamed as well as stupid and… andwanton, and she had to blink back more tears. “I wanted to…” She licked her dry lips, her mind spinning. She didn’t know how to finish that sentence, how she dared.

“You made your choice a long time ago, Maggie,” Brendan told her firmly. He sounded resigned now rather than angry, which Maggie supposed should be better, yet somehow it felt worse. “And it wasn’t me.”

“I… I know that,” she whispered painfully.

She could hardly deny that bitter truth; she had rejected him more than once, determined to forge her own way, follow her own ambitions, wherever they led. She’d done so deliberately, determinedly, and it had left her with nothing.Lessthan nothing. And now she missed this man, this good, honorable, handsome man, desperately.

“Brendan, I know what I chose,” she told him, each word like a jagged shard that tore at her throat, “and how… how I chose it. And sometimes I… I feel like I might regret it.” Her blush deepened as he stared at her, expressionless and unmoved.

“Might?” he repeated scathingly. “Do you think you can change your mind as you please, Maggie, and when you decide in a low moment, or maybe just a dull one, to find me, that I’ll be here waiting, ready to take whatever scraps youmighthave to offer me?” he asked tonelessly. “Is that the kind of man you think I am? Is that what you think I’mworth?”

Maggie blinked, shocked by the thrumming anger she sensed underneath his flat tone. “N-n-no…” she stammered. “Of course I don’t think that?—”

“Well, it seems that way to me,” Brendan replied and then reeled around so his taut back was to her, his shoulders hunched.

She shouldn’t have come in here, Maggie realized, without a thought or a plan. Brendan was right; she’d been lonely, and she’d acted on it without truly thinking what it meant or what she wanted. He knew her wayward heart better than she knew it herself, and the knowledge was shaming.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered, and he nodded jerkily, his back still to her.

Maggie hesitated, wanting to say something more, but she didn’t know what it would be. Did she truly love him? Did she want to be his wife? Or was she just scared and sad and lonely, and she’d been looking for comfort? She realized she didn’t truly know the answers to those questions.

“I’m sorry,” she said again, and started to turn toward the door.

She was reaching for the knob when a sudden scream pierced the air, high and frightened, and then she heard the unmistakable sound of a body tumbling down the stairs, landing with a sickening and heavy thud.

Maggie wrenched open the door and ran to the third-floor landing. Downstairs, girls were poking their heads out of their bedrooms, some sleepy, some still in their dresses for entertaining.

“What’s happened?” Emma Mae, who was eighteen years old and from Kansas, her name for the parlor house Arabella, asked on a yawn.

“It’s… it’s Jenny!” someone else called, sounding scared, and with her heart feeling as if it were beating its way up her throat, Maggie raced down the stairs to the upstairs hall. There was Jenny, crumpled at the bottom of the main staircase by the front door, blood spreading out from her skirts.

CHAPTER 8

“OhJenny,” Maggie whispered as she hurried down the stairs to kneel at the girl’s side.

Jenny’s face was bloodless, her body seemingly lifeless, but at least she was breathing. Maggie saw the faint rise and fall of her chest and felt a thready pulse in her wrist. Thank God the poor girl hadn’t broken her neck.

“That old trick,” Elizabeth, the oldest of the group, said on a sorrowful sigh from the top of the stairs. “I know she was worried she was in the family way, and I guess maybe she thought she’d end it.”

“Wasshe?” another girl asked, sounding curious as well as sorrowful before dropping her voice to a frightened whisper. “Did… did Miss Jessie know she might be… you know… expectin’?”

No one answered, but looking up from Jenny, Maggie saw them all exchange uneasy glances, and she felt a frisson of alarm. Was Jessamine really someone to be so feared?

“We need to send for a doctor,” Maggie stated firmly, and was again met with anxious silence. “Does anyone know of a doctor?” she demanded.