"Well, for Christ's sake." With an ill-tempered jerk, Shannon freed herself. "Why shouldn't she?"
"She'd never come around music," Brianna murmured. "Not in all my memory." As Lottie swung by, dancing a Clare set in the arms of a neighbor, Brianna could only shake her head. "How did Lottie get her to come?"
But Shannon had forgotten Maeve. Across the room, Murphy stood, hip shot, a fiddle clamped between shoulder and chin. His eyes were half closed, so that she thought he was lost in the music his quick fingers and hands made. Then he smiled and winked.
"What are they playing?" Shannon asked. The fiddler was joined by a piper and another who played an accordion.
"That's Saint Steven's reel." Brianna smiled and felt her own feet grow restless. "Ah, look at them dance."
"Time to do more than look." Gray snatched her from behind and whirled her into the parlor.
"Why, she's wonderful," Shannon said after a moment.
"She'd have been a dancer, our Brie, if things had been different." Brows knit, Maggie shifted her gaze from her sister to her mother. "Maybe things were different then than they're beginning to be now."
After taking a long breath, Maggie stepped into the parlor. After a moment's hesitation, she made her way through the dancing and sat beside her mother.
"That's a sight I never thought to see." Alice stepped next to Shannon. "Maeve Concannon sitting with her daughter at a ceili, her grandson on her knee, her foot tapping away. And very close to smiling."
"I suppose you've known her a long time."
"Since girlhood. She made her life, and Tom's, a misery. And those girls suffered for it. It's a hard thing to fight for love. Now it seems she's found some contentment in the life she leads, and in her grandchildren. I'm glad for that."
Alice looked at Shannon with some amusement. "I should apologize for my own daughter for embarrassing you in the kitchen. She's always been one for speaking first and thinking last."
"No, it's all right. She was... misinformed." Alice pursed her lips at the term. "Well, if there's no harm done. There's my daughter Eileen, and her husband Jack. Will you come meet them?"
"Sure."
She met them, and Murphy's other sisters, his brother, his nieces and nephews and cousins. Her head reeled with names, and her heart staggered from the unquestioning welcome she received each time her hand was clasped.
She wa
s given a full plate, a fresh beer, and a seat near the music, where Kate chattered in her ear.
Time simply drifted, unimportant against the music and the warmth. Children toddled or raced, or fell to dreaming in someone's willing arms. She watched men and women flirt while they danced, and those too old to dance enjoy the ritual.
How would she paint it? Shannon wondered. In vivid and flashing colors, or in soft, misty pastels? Either would suit. There was excitement here, and energy, and there was quiet contentment and unbroken tradition.
You could hear it in the music, she thought. Murphy had been right about that. Every note, every lovely voice lifted in song, spoke of roots too deep to be broken.
It charmed her to hear old Mrs. Conroy sing a ballad of love unrequited in a reedy voice that nonetheless held true. She laughed along with others at the rollicking drinking song shouted out. In awe and amazement she saw Brianna and Kate execute a complex and lyrical step-toe that had more people crowding into the parlor.
She clapped her palms pink when the music stopped, then glanced over as Murphy passed off his fiddle.
"You're enjoying yourself?" he asked her.
"I'm loving every minute." She handed him her plate to share. "You haven't had a chance to eat anything. So do it quick." She grinned at him. "I don't want you to stop playing."
"There's always someone to fill in." But he picked up half her ham sandwich.
"What else can you play-besides the violin and concertina?"
"Oh, a little of this and that. I saw you met my family."
"There are so many of them. And they all think the sun rises in Murphy's eyes." She chuckled when he winced.
"I think we should dance."
She shook her head when he took her hand. "As I've explained to several lovely gentlemen, I'm very happy to watch. No, Murphy." She laughed again when he pulled her to her feet. "I can't do that stuff-jigs or reels or whatever."
"Sure you can." He was steadily drawing her out. "But they're going to play a waltz, like I asked them. The first time we dance should be a waltz."
It was his voice that had her hand going limp, the way it had softened over the words. "I've never waltzed in my life."
He started to laugh, then his eyes widened. "You're joking."
"No. It's not a popular dance in the clubs I go to, so I'll just sit this one out."
"I'll show you." He slipped an arm around her waist, changed his grip on her hand. "Put your other hand on my shoulder."
"I know the stance, it's the steps." It was too enchanting a night not to accommodate him. Lowering her head, she watched his feet.
"You know the count, surely." He smiled at the top of her head. "So you go one, and a quicker two and three. And if you slide the back foot a bit on the last count, you'd glide into it. Aye, that's it."
When he circled her, she looked up again, laughing. "Don't get fancy. I'm a fast study, but I like plenty of practice."
"You can have all you want. It's no hardship for me to hold you in my arms."
Something shifted inside her. "Don't look at me like that, Murphy."
"I have to, when I'm waltzing with you." He whirled her in three long circles, as fluid as wine. "The trick when you're waltzing is to look right into your partner's eyes. You won't get dizzy that way, when you're turning round."
The idea of spot focusing might have had its merits, but not, Shannon discovered, when the focus was those dark blue eyes. "You have lashes longer than your sisters," she murmured.
"It was always a bone of contention between us."