Mismatched (20 page)

I get into the car and clench my teeth together really hard to keep myself from crying. Stupid Guinness. It totally turns me into a blubbering, idiot, fool. I hate that I thought Donal was into me when he clearly isn’t. One-sided crushes suck worse than tequila hangovers.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

ERIN

MORNING LIGHT BEGINS TO TUG at my eyelids but I keep them closed, savoring instead those few moments of bliss when I can just daydream about
Micheál uninterrupted. I recall how he’d draped his arm casually round my shoulders as we walked along the cliff’s edge and how when I shrugged him off all faux offended he’d pulled me close and said gruffly that he wasn’t going to let me get away. I’d liked how that sounded, though of course I didn’t let him know that. I thought of the way he’d taken off his jacket and put it on me, holding it out for me like a real gentleman, one arm then the other. That had been followed by a ski hat he’d pulled out of his pocket, then gloves, then a huge scarf he’d wrapped around and around my neck and head, until all that could be seen of me was the tip of my nose.

“That’s better,” he’d said, kissing the cold tip.

I giggle at the memory and feel the flush of desire swim through my body. My hips grind into the mattress as I recall bits of that night we spent on the island.

“Good, you’re awake,” says Ridlee, shattering my salacious meanderings.

I frown and reluctantly open my eyes. “Good morning to you too.” I try to rub the sleep away.

“Yeah, yeah, rise and shine an all that,” she says folding clothes and placing them carefully in her suitcase. We haven’t actually booked our flight home, so this packing business is making me a tad nervous. She’s clearly pissed off about something. Time to needle her.

“Did someone get out of bed on the wrong side this morning?” I ask, half playfully, half defensively.

She doesn’t answer.

I can’t help myself, I have to pick the scab I know is forming over the Donal situation. It’s what we do for one another. We don’t let the bastards get us down; it’s kind of our motto. “What’s up? Wouldn’t Donny jump for you last night?” I yawn loudly.

“Put a sock in it, Erin. Let’s just get this bar business figured out and get back to Boston. I’ve got a life waiting for me, you know. And in case you’ve forgotten, you have a business deal to make.”

“Okay, okay, keep your hair on,” I say pushing back the cover and hauling myself out of bed. Ridlee continues to tidy up, barely looking at anything but her suitcase. She’s really upset.

Getting out of bed to go to the bathroom I swoop in and plant a kiss on her cheek. “You’re too good for him, ye know. He’s just some country hick. If he can’t see how awesome you are, fuck him.” I am trying to make her feel better, so I’m more than a little taken aback when she bursts into tears, plonking herself down on the corner of the bed.

“Rid, what is it?” I get down on my honkers and push the hair back from her face. I don’t think I’ve ever seen Ridlee cry in all the years I’ve known her. “What is it, honey? Did that fucker hurt you? ‘Cause if he so much as laid a finger…”

“No! It’s nothing like that. He didn’t. He wouldn’t.” She brushed away the tears with the back of her hand and sniffed, trying to smile. “It’s not him, it’s me. Hormones.”

I search her face for clues. I have known this girl a long time and she has been enviously impervious to the harrowing effects of hormones over the years. “Hormones?” I ask, my voice laced with skepticism.

“Yeah. Oh, and I broke the heel of my Jimmy Choos,” she hiccups.

I rub her back getting to my feet. “Can I get you a glass of water? Tea? Me?”

Ridlee smiles, brighter and wider, back on form. “Alright, Erin, panic over; no need to go all Florence Nightingale on me.”

She makes to get up, but I grab her in a bear hug and wrestle her down into the sheets and blankets of my bed. “You know I wuv u, Rid-leeeeee!” I’m hugging her with all my might. Only when I am convinced that she’s laughing with real abandon do I abandon her for the shower.

“Hurry up!” she yells after me, “we’ve got to see that lawyer guy at 9 am.”

“Solicitor!” I remind her.

“We’ll see if he’s cute first before we decide to solicit anything.”

I laugh and step into the shower in the adjoining bathroom, pouring Ridlee’s expensive shower gel all over me. Sure it does not harm to smell your best, I tell myself. Never know who you might meet in the course of a day in Lisdoonvarna. I smile allowing myself one last little indulgence about the amazing Micheál as I lather up.

After a hearty breakfast, we’re back in the Bambino and on our way to see Mr. Cathal O’ Mooney.
With a bit of luck we can get the bar business sorted out with this Padraig O’Flanagan and I might even have time to catch up with Micheál for lunch
, I think to myself with a smile.
It’s just a fling, just a fling
, I chant silently. Throwing the Bambino round s-bends like a rally racecar driver, I glance at Ridlee who is gazing forlornly at the cows and sheep we pass in the fields. I have never seen her moon over a guy like this before. Obviously, I didn’t buy the broken boot story. She has got the hots
bad
for Donal, no doubt about it. Poor, Rid; she’s in over her head.

My mind settles on Micheál for a moment. What the hell am I doing? Chasing a guy who lives thousands of miles away, and an Irish guy at that! I should have known that something like this would happen. I should never have brought Rid here. What has happened to us? We pride ourselves on being modern women. We don’t go cuckoo over guys and lose sight of our goals. We rely on each other and the boys are, well,
toys
for the most part. Neither of us has been in a serious relationship; Ridlee was seeing Jeremy for over a month, but I don’t think that constitutes a serious relationship, does it? Especially when it was clear even to the casual observer that she was just using him for sex.

I catch a glimpse of myself in the rearview mirror, brow furrowed, and immediately relax my face.
No way am I getting early wrinkles for a guy.
I look at Ridlee who has her hand resting in her chin and is staring longingly at the passing landscape. “Forty shades of green,” she murmurs.

“Huh?”

“That’s what they say about the greenery of Ireland. Forty shades of green. Because of the rain.” She doesn’t even look at me while she’s talking.

“Who told you that?” I enquire, looking from the road to her and back to the road again.

“Donal,” she says sadly.

My mind kicks into gear.
Time for an intervention!

I swerve the car into a lay-by with a grotto cut into the wall. We skid to a stop, throwing gravel round us. I cut the engine and turn to my friend.

Ridlee looks at me, shocked. “What the hell, Erin?!”

“This has got to stop.”

“What?”

“All this mooning over men! This is not
us,
Rid. We’re not like those pathetic girls who give up their dreams the minute Mr. Dreamy comes along. Lookit … I like Micheál and you like Donal…”

“No I don’t… ” she tries to interrupt me.

“Yes.
You do
. A lot. And I can see why. He’s cute and nice an’ all. But he and Micheál are just cute guys with cute accents, living in this gorgeous place. It’s classic holiday romance stuff. We have hot, exciting lives back in Boston. We have bright futures. I have a five-year plan. Let’s just get this inheritance business sorted, see the lads one more time for kicks, and get the flock outta here. Agreed?” I put out my pinky for a pinky promise.

“Agreed!” she says smiling again and wrapping her finger round mine.

“Who’s that?” she asks nodding toward a statue of the Virgin Mary in the grotto.

“That’s Mary.” I say, starting the engine again.

“What’s her story?”

“She gave up her dreams for the ultimate Mr. Dreamy and remained a virgin forever,” I pull out onto the road and high tail it into Lisdoonvarna.

Ten minutes later, we are sitting opposite Cathal O’Mooney and Ridlee has her lawyer hat on.

“Good morning. And what can I do for you fine lassies on this fine morning?” asks Mr. O’Mooney, indicating that we should take a seat. His office is small and old fashioned and smells a bit musty.

This should be straightforward enough
. I sit down, smile in his general direction, and let Ridlee do her thing.

She too sits and places in front of her on the desk a leather binder holding all the facts of the inheritance and Margaret’s will. She does not open it, but instead, takes out her ipad and starts working from that.

“Aha!” exclaims Mr. O’Mooney. “You’ve got one of those new fangled tablet things. Sure, isn’t it funny how we’re all so backward in coming forward; sure, they used to use tablets in Moses’ time.” He laughs uproariously at his own joke.

Ridlee gives me a look that says,
Craaazy…
before addressing him. “Now, Mr. O’Money…”

“Moon.”

“I’m sorry?” Ridlee cocks her head like a swimmer trying to get water out of her ear.

“It’s ‘Oh-Moon-Eee,” he explains congenially, “not money.”

“Right. Okay, so, in any case, we, that is, my client, Ms. O’Neill, is looking for a certain Padraig Flanagan on a matter of some urgency. We were hoping that you might be able to help us track him down.”

Mr. O’Mooney rubs his chin, apparently thinking. “That’s a mighty common name round these parts, Miss. Do you have any other information about this fella?”

Ridlee turns to me, eyebrows arched.

It’s my turn. We’ve rehearsed what we’re willing to divulge and what we’re not. “Eh, he was a friend of my grandmother’s, Margaret Daly. They both lived here in Lisdoonvarna before the war.”

“The Civil War?” he asks, leaning forward in his seat.

“No, the Second World War,” I say somewhat perplexed.

“Ah, sure, that was the English an’ all. That wasn’t our war a t’all a t’all.” He stares at the floor as though lost in some old memory. He can’t be more than fifty or sixty at most himself. There was no way he was even around back then. I am starting to get the idea that this guy knows more then he’s letting on.

“To return to the matter at hand, Mr. Oh-Moon-Eee,” interjects Ridlee, “do you happen to know of
any
Padraig Flanagan or maybe some of his descendants living in the Lisdoonvarna area who might have known my client’s grandmother?”

“I do.”

Ridlee looks at me, her eyes narrowed as if to say,
what’s this guy’s game?
She turns back to him and says, somewhat sarcastically, “Do you think maybe you could
share
that information with us?”

“Well now,” he says, shifting in his seat, his large belly straining against his suit pants, “I think I’d like to know a little bit more about the nature of your enquiry before I go givin’ out confidential information willy, nilly.”

“Are you representing Padraig Flanagan, Mr. Moon-Eee?” asks Ridlee, getting pissed.

“O,” he says, lacing his fingers together and settling them on the desk.

“Oh, you are representing him, or Oh you’re not?” asks Ridlee, on fire now.

“O-Moon-Eee,” he says, the corners of his mouth twitching almost imperceptibly.

“Are you playing with me, Mr. Oh- Moon - Eee?” she asks, clearly annoyed. “Because if you are, I’ll find another lawyer to help in this matter and you can say goodbye to any fee that might have been coming your way.” She pops her iPad in her handbag and goes to stand up.

I look up uncertainly. As far as I know this is the only solicitor in Lisdoonvarna.

“Ah now, Miss? Sorry, what was your last name?”

“Taylor. And it’s Ms., not Miss.”

“Ms. Taylor, I apologise, please have a seat. Would you ladies like a cup of tea? Or maybe a coffee?”

“No, thank you,” says Ridlee, sitting down slowly, “we’d rather just get this matter settled.”

“Of course," he says, then turns to me. ”You spoke of your grandmother in the past tense, Ms. O’Neill. Has she passed recently?”

“Yes, a little over a month ago. In Boston, where she lived most of her life.”

“My condolences. I didn’t know her personally, but I have heard good things about her. Lisdoonvarna is a small town; everybody knows everybody else and their business too, if you know what I mean.” He raises an eyebrow, all business now. “Unfortunately, Padraig Flanagan has also passed away.”

“Oh,” I say, perhaps a bit too brightly.

He puts on a pair of glasses and flips open a laptop I hadn’t noticed on the desk. The bumbling solicitor act is all over and he taps on the keypad, quick as lightning. “He does, however, have one grandson living.” He looks at Ridlee over the top of his reading glasses. “Does the matter now concern him?”

“Yes,” says Ridlee. “My client was left a bar — a pub — in her grandmother’s will, but it was also left to Padraig Flanagan, or his descendants should he no longer be living.” She opens the leather folder and takes out a document with photos of the bar as it was before the renovations. “This is the bar here.” She hands him the paper. “It’s called the Pot O’Gold and while it’s not much, my client has worked and lived there for a significant part of her life and would like to remain, running the pub. To that end, she would like to offer Padraig Flanagan what we consider a fair price for his half of the pub.” She passes the solicitor another piece of paper with the offer on it.