Page 99 of Bargaining with the Devil

“I was burned recently. When . . . Ciarán was in Scotland. My cottage caught fire, and I was—trapped inside.” True enough. “Ciarán helped me get free, at considerable risk to himself. He broke out a window and—” She swallowed; the recall still had the power to shorten her breath. “He cut his arm rather badly,” she finished. “But we both made it out safely, as you see.”

“’Tis fortunate for the both of ye.” Mrs. Ó Cuinn’s gaze was shrewd. “’Tis good to have him back, and back to stay, he says. ’Twas hard on me, havin’ me only son gone so far away for a dozen years, but I understood it. He was home only twice in all those years. Once, two years ago⁠—”

So after Paris? He must have gone home after escorting her and Issy to London.

“—and once afore that, another two years. ’Twas when we lost Mairéad, that earlier time.”

“He’s told me about her. About Mairéad.”

“He took her death hard. We all did, but it tore him up somethin’ awful. Close as children, they were, bein’ closest in age. And he was the last to talk to her of any of us.”

He hadn’t mentioned that. Just that his final conversation with Mairéad was when she’d told him she’d been abandoned by the father of her unborn child.

“Mayhap worse was him findin’ her. He was tireless, walkin’ the shore, searchin’. And he did find her after a few days. Brought her home to be buried.”

Her heart stopped a moment, comprehending precisely what Mrs. Ó Cuinn meant, and then it started beating again, painfully.

She sought Quinn with her eyes. He caught her looking at him. Smiled his devil’s smile again, distracting her from the ache in her chest.

He had little Órla in his arms. Her throat squeezed. He was a natural with his niece, just as he’d been with Rachel. Not surprising, really, given the tenderness she herself knew him capable of. Still, not something she’d have predicted of him until she’d gotten to know him better—truly gotten to know him, beyond that journey out of France.

But if she stayed here—stayed with him—he’d be giving up the chance for his own children. Old fear tried clogging her throat, but she quickly collected herself with Mrs. Ó Cuinn smiling at her.

“He’s been enjoyin’ time with them,” Mrs. Ó Cuinn remarked. “Órla and Daire. Me first grandchildren but not, God be willin’, the last.”

“I can’t have children.” She’d not meant to blurt that out; it was a very personal detail. “Or, it’s almost certain I can’t,” she amended. “I was very sick as a small child, and although I got over the illness . . .” She’d shared more than she’d meant already. She’d never reveal the rest about why she was nearly certain her childhood doctor had been proved correct.

Mrs. Ó Cuinn tsked, not quite noncommittal but not unkind. “I’m sure ye’ve told Ciarán.”

It wasn’t really a question but she nodded anyway.

“Always has had a mind of his own, has Ciarán. Always has had his own particular way of seein’ the world. Dancin’ to his own tune, ye might say.” Mrs. Ó Cuinn smiled. “’Tis not a thing that will ever change about him.”

“I’ve noticed that about him.”

Mrs. Ó Cuinn laughed at her dry tone. “I imagine ye have. If he’s chosen ye, ’tis nothin’ much on this earth could ever sway him from it.”

Quinn handed off Órla to . . . Aisling, possibly? and came towards her. Prowling, almost. “I’ll be stealing Miss Muir away from you, Mam, for a dance,” he said when he reached them. “If you’ll come with me?”

She’d come to Ireland for him. She’d certainly follow him out for a dance.

And they did dance, several slightly mad jigs and reels that had her laughing and breathless and clutching his shoulders to stay upright.

And then in the midst of the excitement as the bonfire was lit, dusk having fallen, he whisked her off into the shadows behind the inn. He set her back against a brick wall.

She touched his face. “Are you going to kiss me, Mr. Quinn? I’m not sure it’s proper.”

He leaned in closer. “Do you want me to kiss you, Miss Muir?”

That inflection invited more than just kissing. “What do you think?”

He smiled. “You have to say it, a mhuirnín.”

She grabbed his shirt to pull him in but unbent enough to whisper, “Yes,” just before she took his mouth with hers. And then he was finally, finally, kissing her for the first time in six long months.

No rushing though because Quinn was designed by the Devil expressly to drive her mad.

Eventually, after they’d both needed to come up for air, he brushed the wisps of hair off her forehead and tilted his head. “I liked it, what you played tonight, that first song especially. ’Twas sprightly.”