kissed Maggie's cheek. "Tell me, how does it feel having the president buy your work?"
"As long as his money's good." Then Maggie threw back her head and laughed. "It's like going to the moon and back. I can't help it. We Concannons just aren't sophisticated enough to take such things in stride. Oh, I wish Da..."
"I know."
"Well." Maggie took a deep breath. "I should tell you that the detective Rogan hired hasn't found Amanda Dougherty as yet. He's following leads, whatever that may mean."
"So many weeks, Maggie, the expense."
"Don't start nagging me about taking your housekeeping money. I married a rich man."
"And everyone knows you wanted only his wealth."
"No, I wanted his body." She winked and hooked her arm through Brianna's. "And your friend Grayson Thane has one a woman wouldn't sneeze at, I've noticed."
"I've noticed myself."
"Good, shows you haven't forgotten how to look. I had a card from Lottie."
"So did I. Do you mind if they stay the third week?"
"For myself Mother could stay in that villa for the rest of her natural life." She sighed at Brianna's expression. "All right, all right. It's happy I am that she's enjoying herself, though she won't admit to it."
"She's grateful to you, Maggie. It's just not in her to say so."
"I don't need her to say so anymore." Maggie laid a hand on her belly. "I have my own, and it makes all the difference. I never knew I could feel so strongly about anyone. Then there was Rogan. After that, I thought I could never feel so strongly about anything or anyone else. And now, I do. So maybe I understand a little how if you didn't love, and didn't want the child growing in you, it could blight your life as much as loving and wanting it can brighten it."
"She didn't want me, either."
"What makes you say such a thing?"
"She told me." It was a load lifted, Brianna discovered, to say it aloud. "Duty. Twas only duty, not even to Da, but to the Church. It's a cold way to be brought into the world."
It wasn't anger Brianna needed now, Maggie knew, and bit back on it. Instead, she cupped Brianna's face. "It's her loss, Brie. Not yours. Never yours. And for myself, if the duty hadn't been done, I'd have been lost."
"He loved us. Da loved us."
"Yes, he did. And that's been enough. Come, don't worry on it. I'll take you upstairs and show you what we've been up to."
From the back of the hallway, Gray let out a long breath. The acoustics in the building were much too good for secrets to be told. He thought he understood now some of the sadness that haunted Brianna's eyes. Odd that they should have the lack of a mother's care in common.
Not that the lack haunted him, he assured himself. He'd gotten over that long ago. He'd left the scared, lonely child behind in the cheerless rooms of the Simon Brent Memorial Home for Children.
But who, he wondered, was Rory? And why had Rogan hired detectives to look for a woman named Amanda Dougherty?
Gray had always found the very best way to find the answers was to ask the questions.
"Who's Rory?"
The question snapped Brianna out from her quiet daydream as Gray drove easily down narrow winding roads away from Ennistymon. "What?"
"Not what, who?" He nipped the car closer to the edge as a loaded VW rounded a curve on his side of the road.
Probably an inexperienced Yank, he thought with a superior degree of smugness. "Who's Rory?" he repeated.
"You've been listening to pub gossip, have you?"
Rather than warn him off, the coolness in her voice merely egged him on. "Sure, but that's not where I heard the name. You mentioned him to Maggie back at the gallery."
"Then you were eavesdropping on a private conversation."
"That's redundant. It's not eavesdropping unless it's a private conversation."
She straightened in her seat. "There's no need to correct my grammar, thank you."
"That wasn't grammar, it was... never mind." He let it, and her, stew a moment. "So, who was he?"
"And why would it be your business?"
"You're only making me more curious."
"He was a boy I knew. You're taking the wrong road."
"There is no wrong road in Ireland. Read the guidebooks. Is he the one who hurt you?" He flicked a glance in her direction, nodded. "Well, that answers that. What happened?"
"Are you after putting it in one of your books?"
"Maybe. But it's personal first. Did you love him?"
"I loved him. I was going to marry him."
He caught himself scowling over that and tapping a finger against the steering wheel. "Why didn't you?"
"Because he jilted me two paces from the altar. Does that satisfy your curiosity?"
"No. It only tells me that Rory was obviously an idiot." He couldn't stop the next question, was surprised he wanted to. "Do you still love him?"
"That would be remarkably idiotic of me as it was ten years ago."