Chapter Sixteen

It would be mortifying to the feelings of many ladies, could they be made to understand how little the heart of man is affected by what is costly or new in their attire.

—JANE AUSTEN, NORTHANGER ABBEY

It was the day of the opening. They’d decided on an afternoon party, so that the ladies who attended would then go on in the evening to their various social events and talk of Daisy’s shop—that was the plan anyway.

The moment Lady Beatrice had decided to approve the party, she’d taken over all the arrangements, having elegant invitations made and sent out, inviting people herself, rather than making Daisy the hostess. “More difficult for them to refuse if it’s me—besides, they’re dying to see the place and this’ll give them an excuse.”

Featherby had taken on the practical aspects of the arrangements and had waved Daisy away, telling her to leave it all to him. He was enjoying himself, she saw, so she didn’t argue. She had enough to do herself.

Abby, Damaris and Louisa Foster were all wearing Daisy-made outfits, and since it was ladies only, Louisa had talked Daisy into making a display of her gorgeous nightwear, not to be modeled in person—that would be too risqué—but on a dummy.

Daisy was reluctant at first; the nightwear was just a sideline. But Mrs. Foster had persisted, and when Abby and Damaris heard, they concurred.

“Remember how happy you made Lady Beatrice with that first lovely pink bed jacket you made her?” Abby prompted. “And how all her friends wanted one? They were your first orders, and helped get you started.”

“And before you say they were for old ladies, remember how we first met?” Louisa reminded her.

Damaris added her mite, saying, “I loved wearing the nightgown you made me on my wedding night,” and Abby nodded in agreement.

Daisy gave in.

When she came to arrange the nightwear, she couldn’t decide which ones to show—she had a few finished and ready—so she ended up making quite a display, using a number of different dummies draped in sheer pink silk, the better to display the flimsy, naughty nightgowns and sumptuous bed jackets.

The only one unimpressed with the party arrangements was Flynn, who was put out that it was ladies only. “Why can’t I come?” he asked for the umpteenth time.

“Because you’re a man,” Daisy retorted.

“Glad you finally noticed.” He gave her a slow grin that made her insides melt.

“You can come and have a look after it’s all over then,” Daisy said with a little shiver of anticipation. She had plans for later.

Flynn made his presence felt anyway, sending several large bunches of red roses, each one with a single daisy at the center. Daisy set them in vases around the shop. The sweet rose fragrance was wonderful.

This time she left the daisies in place, because they were her shop’s symbol. No one else knew who they were from, or the private meaning of the daisies. They were her own secret delight.

She’d given her employees the day off, and Featherby and his minions took over the upstairs rooms, laying out trays of delicious-looking cakes and savories, dozens of glasses and crates of champagne.

“French champagne?” Daisy exclaimed. “I can’t be wasting money on—”

“You don’t expect the old lady to offer her guests anything less than the best, now do you?” Featherby told her. “Besides, she’s paying. She insisted. ‘Tell that stiff-necked gel of mine not to argue,’ she said.”

So Daisy didn’t argue. She was thrilled. French champagne at an afternoon shop opening—that should get people talking about her shop all right.

Abby and Damaris arrived shortly afterwards. “It’s so exciting, Daisy!” Abby said. “Everything looks wonderful. I wish Jane were here, she will be so sorry to have missed this, but . . .” She shook her head. Jane was still in Wales. “We brought you a little gift. It’s from Damaris and me—and Jane too.”

Damaris handed Daisy a small box. “It’s just something small, but we hope it will be useful.”

Inside the box were visiting cards, elegantly engraved in silver on a pale green card, with a daisy embossed and painted white with a gold center—just like the daisy on the window of the shop. The lettering said Daisy Chance and gave the name and address of the shop underneath.

“They’re gorgeous,” Daisy said. “But . . . I don’t go visiting.”

“No, but if you leave these in a dish—or better still have Featherby hand them around—ladies will take them,” Damaris said.

“They’re so pretty,” Abby added, “and it might remind some ladies to patronize your shop.”

Lady Beatrice was the next to arrive. Featherby had arranged a number of chairs to be brought in for the occasion, including the old lady’s favorite chair. She seated herself in it and said to Daisy, who was pacing around like a trapped cat, “Don’t look so anxious, gel—they’ll come. I’ve never yet held a party that wasn’t a crush and I don’t intend to start now. Have a glass of champagne if your nerves are getting to you.”

The words were barely out of the old lady’s mouth when the first carriages arrived, stopping to drop their aristocratic female passengers off in twos and threes, then moving on to make way for the next. The ground floor soon filled with ladies, exclaiming and admiring, chattering and sipping champagne.

Abby, Jane and Louisa Foster’s dresses were all admired, but the garments that got the most attention were the nightwear displayed in the back room. Daisy was flooded with enquiries.

“Cash only,” she told them bluntly, and then to soften the blow added, “They’re a very exclusive line and in short supply. French lace, you see.”

A few ladies primmed up their mouths and stalked away, offended, but the word exclusive did its job and a number of ladies gave her orders, promising to send their maids with the money the following day.

“What are you doing?” Louisa hissed when she found out what Daisy was telling people.

“Starting as I mean to go on,” Daisy said. “Nobs are famous for not paying their bills. So I’m lettin’ them know upfront that it’s pay or nothing.”

“They won’t put up with it.”

Daisy grinned. “Twenty-two orders so far, and their maids are bringin’ the money around tomorrow. I told ’em cash down or I won’t start.”

Louisa stared at her, then started to laugh. “You’re an original, all right.”

*   *   *

The last of the guests had left, Featherby and his minions had tidied away the party detritus, and Lady Beatrice, along with Abby and Damaris, was ready to leave.

“Are you coming, Daisy?”

“No, I’ve got things to do.”

The old lady raised her lorgnette. “What things?”

Daisy gestured to the workroom behind. “I need to take down this display and get things set up for me girls to start work again in the morning.”

“We’ll stay back and help,” Abby offered.

“You’ll do nothing of the sort,” Daisy told her. “You’re carryin’, and you’re dog tired, as anyone can see.”

“Then I will—” Damaris began.

“No, you all get along home—it’s easier to do it meself. And you know, it’s been such a grand day, I don’t want it to end. So I’ll just take me time and enjoy meself here a little bit longer. In me own little empire.”

Lady Beatrice frowned. “But how will you get home? Shall I send a carriage? And leave one of the footmen here?”

Daisy gave the old lady a dry look. “I got meself all around London—the worst parts of London at that—all me life without a footman or a carriage, and I can manage now, thanks all the same.” They’d had this argument a million times; Daisy wasn’t a sheltered society maiden and had no intention of becoming one. Might as well stick a London sparrow in a golden cage.

“But—”

“Stop fussin’ now.” She leaned forward and kissed the old lady on the cheek. “I’ll be home later, so don’t you worry. You’re going to the opera tonight, ain’t you?”

“Yes, but—”

“Then go home, have your nap and get all dressed up and gorgeous for Covent Garden. I’ll be tucked up in bed and snorin’ me head off before the second act even starts.”

Lady Beatrice sniffed, but consented to depart, muttering something about stubborn gels.

Daisy locked the front door after her and hurried around, tidying up. She’d just started to dismantle the nightwear display when the knock she was expecting came at the back door. She hurried to open it.

“How’d it go?” Flynn asked.

She gave him a triumphant grin. “Twenty-eight orders! And almost all the little cards Damaris and Abby gave me have gone—and there were a hundred there when we started. This is all that’s left—ain’t they pretty?” She showed him the cards.

“Well done then.” He watched as she dismantled the nightwear display. “You know, I reckon it was a mistake restricting the event to ladies only.”

“Why?”

He nodded towards the last dummy, draped in an enticing black silk-and-lace affair. “If men saw that they’d become your best customers. Only not perhaps if they were with their wives.”

Daisy gave him a thoughtful look. “You might have something there.” Perhaps another shop, in a different part of town. Under a different name . . .

“Now, what was it you wanted me for?” Flynn said. “To get me all hot and bothered looking at that?”

She hid a grin. He wasn’t so far off. “Come upstairs—there’s something I want to show you.” She almost laughed out loud, hearing herself say it. Gawd, she sounded like one of the girls at Mrs. B.’s. She was ridiculously nervous.

He followed her up to the attic, admiring the changes she’d made. “But why partition that end off? Isn’t that where the roof door is?”

She opened the door to the smaller of the rooms and stepped inside.

He stopped dead in the doorway. “A bed?”

She nodded. She’d had the old bed refurbished, the rope framework restrung and tightened, and bought two new mattresses, one stuffed with wool and the top one with feathers. It was all made up now, ready for them, a soft crimson blanket spread over crisp white sheets and downy pillows.

It was a cool afternoon and clouding over, so she’d shut the door onto the roof, and then as an afterthought, placed lighted candles all around the room. The room was bathed in warm, soft candlelight.

She swallowed, her mouth suddenly dry. “I know I said I wouldn’t be your mistress, Flynn, but . . . I’ve changed me mind.”

“About marryin’ me?”

She shook her head. “About bein’ your mistress. I know it’s risky, but this is as private as it can get, so if we’re careful . . .”

He gave her a hard look. “I want more from you than just bed, Daisy.”

“I know. But I ain’t any kind of a wife, so this is all I can offer you.” She drew back the bedclothes and was annoyed to realize her hands were shaking.

He didn’t move. His eyes were hard and unreadable. The angles and planes of his face were shadowy in the candlelight. His mouth, his beautiful, clever mouth was set in a firm, unmoving line, his lips pressed tight.

Oh lordy, he was goin’ to turn her down. She felt herself shriveling inside with the mortification of it, and made herself shrug and say in a careless, it-don’t-matter-to-me voice, “Of course, if you’re not interested . . .”

“I’m interested, dammit.” He pulled her hard against him, cupped her jaw in one big hand and kissed the living daylights out of her.

She thought she knew what to expect but each time with Flynn was different. His kiss was almost savage at first, his mouth possessing her, his tongue plundering, hard, almost angry. Her blood rose in response to the barely leashed violence in him and her body thrilled to each rough, feverish caress.

And then quite suddenly he broke off, and simply wrapped her in his arms, holding her close, breathing heavily, like a man who’d run a mile.

“God help me,” he muttered, and then he started kissing her again, this time lavishing her throat, jawline, her eyelids with feather soft caresses, as if she was some delicate piece of china or jade from one of his collections.

She melted.

It was the hardest thing of all to resist about Flynn, the way he could go from an almost out-of-control lust for her, to this, treating her so delicate and sweet, making her feel so special . . . cherished.

No one had ever cherished her.

She pushed open his coat and started to unbutton his waistcoat but he stopped her with a rough gesture, trapping her hands behind her. “No, not this time.” His blue eyes burned into her. “First I’m going to peel you naked as an egg, Daisy Chance. And then I’ll have my way with you. And then—maybe—I’ll let you near my buttons.”

True to his word he peeled each item of clothing from her, one by one, with agonizing slowness, her spencer, her dress, kneeling to remove her slippers, sliding his hands under her chemise to undo the ties that held her stockings, then rolling them down one by one, his big warm hands smoothing down her legs. After each stocking he planted a slow deliberate kiss in the arch of her foot, making her toes curl and sending shivers up and down her spine.

When she was down to her chemise, he sat back on his knees—her own had given way by then and she was sitting on the bed—and just looked at her. He bent forward and took one aching nipple delicately between his teeth, rolling his tongue against it, and then biting lightly, delicately. She gasped as a bolt of fire shot through her.

He smiled and moved his attentions to the other breast. With each caress, her breath hitched in a series of gasps. She leaned back, clutching the bedclothes in her fists as he laved and sucked and nibbled at her through the fine cambric of the chemise.

He rose and with a single sweep her chemise was gone and she was bare as an egg while he was fully clothed.

He sat back on his heels and simply looked at her, and she felt herself blush, because experienced woman or not, she’d never been stark naked before a man, not like this. She tensed. She wasn’t much to look at she knew, little as she was, with no curves to speak of, and slight, small breasts, but the way he was looking at her . . . as if he could eat her up. As if she was . . .

“Beautiful,” he murmured and bent and kissed her. Oh, those kisses . . .

Wherever his mouth touched, heat followed. Need built within her and she reached to pull off his coat, but was firmly restrained. He kissed her again, then moved to lavish attention on her breasts, teasing the nipples to aching, almost painful hardness, scraping lightly across them with teeth, and his whisker-roughened jaw.

His mouth closed over one and he soothed with his tongue and then sucked, and she almost screamed and came off the bed as a lightning flash shot straight from her breast to deep in her belly.

And then he was kissing her mouth again, his tongue tangling with hers, moving in a rhythm that was a promise of things to come. Drugging. Addictive. And all the time his hands moved over her, caressing, arousing, slow and sure and possessive.

She must have said something, because he murmured, “Like my kisses, do you?” and started to kiss his way down her body, along her throat, over her breasts, down over the softness of her belly and then he parted her thighs, and kissed the soft inner skin of her knees.

There was a pause as he simply looked at her there. She squeezed her eyes shut, trying not to feel self-conscious. He leaned slowly forward until his mouth was only a hairsbreadth away from her. His warm breath stirred the curls there, and she wanted to move, but didn’t dare.

And then—“Flynn!” Her eyes flew open wide.

He pressed his face between her thighs and just breathed her in. Thank God she’d bathed that morning. She’d heard of this, of course, but no man she’d ever heard of would do it. They wanted it the other way, the girl’s mouth on them.

She could hardly breathe for waiting.

He started on her . . . licking and tasting her like . . . like a cream-filled pastry, slow, luscious sweeps of his tongue, eating her up in small nibbles and nips, and ohhh . . .

Her world dissolved. There was just this moment, this bed, this man . . . and his beautiful, talented mouth.

*   *   *

She tasted of wine, the sea and a hint of roses, a musky sweet-salty taste that fired his blood and was Daisy, essence of Daisy. Wine and fire and spicy, salt-dark female.

He found the tiny nubbin between the creamy folds and circled it with his tongue, giving it the same treatment as he’d given her nipples earlier.

Her breath caught on a series of rising hitches. She arched beneath him and he felt her thighs begin to tremble. He slid a finger inside her and took her to climax, then as she lay, loose and soft and sleepy-sweet with passion well spent, he stripped off his clothing.

She watched him with appreciative eyes.

“I never knew a man could be so beautiful, Flynn,” she murmured and ran a lazy hand down his spine when he sat on the side of the bed to pull off his boots.

He turned and looked at her. “Beautiful?” He snorted. “Men aren’t beautiful. If you want to see beautiful, look in a mirror, girl.”

It was Daisy’s turn to snort.

He didn’t bother trying to argue. She didn’t see, didn’t understand how special, how precious, how beautiful she was. He could spin words with the best of them, but words would never convince her. A lifetime of experience, a lifetime of being unwanted and used and let down was more powerful than any words he could give her. He’d just have to show her, over and over. And hope that eventually she’d trust him—and herself—enough to say yes.

He’d almost lost his temper when she’d first shown him that little room, so carefully constructed to hide away an illicit affair. He didn’t want an affair, illicit or not—he wanted to build a life with her, raise a family. He wanted to have her walking openly on his arm, to show her off—this is my wife!—to stroll in the park, to sit down at the table, to be announced as they entered a ballroom, as Mr. and Mrs. Patrick Flynn.

When she’d first shown him the room, so carefully and lovingly prepared, her eyes glowing with shyness and uncertainty in the candlelight, the frustration had almost boiled over. He’d wanted to seize her, throw her over his shoulder in the most primitive fashion and drag her off to some . . . some cave where he’d make love to her until she understood finally where she belonged. Who she belonged to.

But she was so sweet and brave, tough on the outside and yet so vulnerable, and true—she hadn’t led him on, hadn’t promised him anything, but was offering him a priceless gift—herself, and at some risk—and he’d managed to leash the wild man within him.

Now she lay watching him with eyes soft and dark with the remnants of spent passion and a hint of growing arousal. She was giving him all she thought she had to give. It was up to him to show her she was wrong, that there was so much more—for both of them.

He made love to her then, intent, focused. She was ready, more than ready for him. He entered her with one smooth, slow thrust. Her hips rose eagerly to meet him. She held him tight, like a slick hot glove, her legs locked around him.

He paused, buried deep within her, his senses flooded with her scent, her taste, the silken soft heat of her, then loosened the wild man within him, taking her a little bit rough and a little bit wild.

She clutched at his shoulders, thrusting her hips with each movement, tightening her grip to bring him deeper, pulling him in, holding him hard, scratching, biting, bucking, kissing. The muffled noises she made fired his blood as the age-old rhythm caught them both.

He took her fast and hard, sweaty and slick and glorious.

His blood thundering and roaring for release, he felt her climax begin and heard himself give a triumphant shout as he shattered deep within her. And slid into oblivion.

He came to himself some time later. Daisy still slept, pale, sweet and vulnerable, her cheek pressed against his chest, her palm loosely curled over his heart, her legs still twined around him. He pulled the bedcovers over them and tucked her more closely against his body.

He wanted to spend the whole night with her here, where the outside world didn’t intrude. But she would stir soon, muttering about getting back to work, or having to get home to Lady Bea or dinner or some other damned thing.

Above them the slanted roof window let in the last of the cool grey evening light. A spatter of tiny raindrops heralded the change of weather. But inside their tiny attic room all was golden, warm, cozy. Daisy slept on, her breath warm little huffs against his skin, her small, soft body curled trustfully against him.

Half a loaf was better than no loaf at all, his mother used to say.

But sometimes all it did was make you realize how hungry you really were.

*   *   *

In the following weeks Daisy’s life passed in a flurry of activity. Dream-of-a-lifetime or not, it wasn’t all beer and skittles. It was harder than she’d expected, forming a group of women into a team.

In the first week she had to sack one girl for nicking things, and another smelled so bad the rest of the girls complained. It turned out that she and her family lived in one room in a slum dwelling and the poor girl had only one dress to her name, and no place to wash, let alone money to buy soap. But she could sew like a dream.

Daisy immediately provided her with some lovely rose-scented soap, hot water, privacy and two complete changes of clothes and the problem was solved. Though of course then all the other girls wanted rose-scented soap as well.

Still, she now had the best-smelling seamstresses in London.

Then there were the accounts. Bartlett’s nephew, Edgar, came three days a week to do the books, pay bills and write out invoices—he had an elegant hand, much nicer than Daisy’s—but there was still a lot of paperwork, and Daisy struggled.

“Would you like me to do that?” Louisa Foster said one day when she visited and found Daisy swearing over an account. “I used to keep the books for my husband in his later years. I quite enjoyed it.”

“Enjoyed it?” Daisy stared at her. “You want to do this? Are you sure?”

“Positive. I’m rather bored, if you want to know the truth. The Season is all very interesting and enjoyable, but time does hang heavy on my hands, I confess. So if you don’t mind . . .”

“Mind? I’d love you to do the rotten things.” And within the week, Louisa had taken over all the paper administration, leaving Daisy to handle the staff, design the clothes, and deal with customers.

Customers were the hardest. Daisy was perfectly comfortable doing fittings and discussing designs with clients, and she was good at selling. But there were times when she was “less than tactful” as Louisa put it—not takin’ shit from snooty bitches was Daisy’s version—and after a couple of weeks, Daisy realized she needed an assistant.

She interviewed a few and tried out several women, but none of them suited—they either put on false airs and the kind of pseudo-gentility that made Daisy want to strangle them, or groveled to the customers in a way that made her want to smack them.

Louisa Foster would be perfect—she’d helped out a couple of times—but she didn’t want to work full-time. And besides, it would be awkward, waiting on ladies she knew socially.

In the end, Daisy found the solution right under her nose.

Polly the maid, back from Wales with Jane, was so interested in the shop she couldn’t keep away—even visiting on her afternoon off. Daisy was frantic that day—there were several customers waiting, getting impatient.

Polly took in the situation at a glance and stepped in, soothing and placating and showing the ladies some of the new designs, quite as if she’d worked there forever. Her handling of the rich difficult ladies couldn’t be bettered—she’d spent a lifetime doing it, after all—and at the end of the afternoon Daisy offered her a job, much to Lady Beatrice’s disgust.

“Poaching my maids now are you, missie? Next you’ll want Featherby and the clothes off my back.”

“I made that dress of yours for you, and no, I don’t want it back,” Daisy retorted. “And I couldn’t pinch Featherby from you if I tried. He’s already turned down handsome offers from half the nobs in London!”

Lady Beatrice’s eyes almost popped. “He has? Good heavens! And he refused? Well, well . . . I must increase his wages.”

The launching of her business was endlessly exciting and challenging, but the thing Daisy most looked forward to in her week was making love with Flynn in stolen moments after all her workers had gone home.

He was completely discreet, making the arrangements by dint of a handwritten message delivered by a servant. Needed, best quality gentleman’s glove. Do you stock?

And she would send a reply, depending on her situation, quoting a price that was code for a time. He would wait until her girls had left and the shop locked up, enter by the back door and go quietly up the back stairs.

She claimed pressure of work as the excuse for her lateness in returning to Berkeley Square, and Lady Beatrice, though clearly not happy with the situation, said nothing about it. Thankfully, planning Jane’s wedding was taking up most of the old lady’s attention.

The evenings were getting longer and warmer, and it was heavenly to lie in bed after making blissful love with Flynn, looking out over the rooftops of London, and talking. They never ran out of things to talk about.

She was learning more about her big Irishman—not just the things he could do with his hands and mouth and tongue, and what he liked her to do to him—but about his life before he came to London.

He was a born storyteller and was happy to tell endless tales of the Far East, exotic islands, strange and fascinating—and sometimes horrifying—peoples that existed in far-flung lands, though she wasn’t sure whether the story of his narrow escape from the cannibals was real or made up.

He talked of how he first met Max—they were shipmates, and didn’t like each other initially—and how their friendship developed into something that changed both their lives. Max taught him how to read and write and do sums on paper—Flynn had always done them in his head—and Flynn taught Max the ways of the sea, and about the foreign places they visited. They were new to Max, but not to Flynn. The two men were much the same age, but Flynn had been at sea since he was twelve, whereas Max sailed for the first time at eighteen. “We taught each other the necessities of life—’tis a grand thing indeed to be able to read and write—and I taught him how to fight like a pirate, not like a gentleman.”

“Did you fight pirates?” Daisy was wide-eyed, imagining it all.

He laughed. “We fought lots of people, but it depends what you mean by pirates. Some of the worst pirates I’ve met look like respectable gentlemen.”

She snorted. “And some wear earrings to prove it.” She eyed his earring sourly. She’d never liked him wearing it, made him look common, she reckoned, but Lady Bea liked it, and so did Flynn, so the blooming earring stayed.

“I know why you wear that thing,” she said. “It’s to get up their noses.”

“Whose noses?”

“The toffs. You dress like a toff but you wear that”—she jerked her chin towards his earring—“to let them know you’re nobody’s tame tabby cat, to let them know you don’t give a toss whether they accept you or not. That you play by your own rules.”

He fingered his earring fondly and grinned down at her. “Clever little puss, aren’t you? Come to think of it, Miss Daisy Chance, you’re somewhat of a pirate yourself, the price you charge me for those waistcoats. Don’t I even get a discount now you have a shop and workers?”

“Nobody’s makin’ you pay me prices—go elsewhere if you like. But it’s worth it at half the price—I mean double—”

“My point exactly.”

They both laughed and that led to another round of making love, this time filled with teasing and banter and laughter. Nothing was ever routine with Flynn. She wasn’t just becoming addicted to his lovemaking, she craved his company almost as much, and his stories.

He told her how he first became a trader and later taught Max how to bargain, and how to spot unusual items that would resell well elsewhere. “You’re a magpie, you’ll understand,” he told her one evening.

She stiffened. “Who are you callin’ a magpie? Noisy rotten birds. And they swoop.”

He laughed. “Settle down, hedgehog, it wasn’t an insult. I’m one too.”

“Oh?” She waited, unconvinced.

“When I first went to sea, whenever we landed, the other seamen headed for the whorehouses and spent what they had on women and drink and gambling. Not me. I liked to pick through the markets and little shops in the Orient, collectin’ anything that took me fancy. Later I’d sell them on in some place where people had never seen such things. Turned out I was good at buyin’ and sellin’—and the rest is history.” He smiled. “See, we’re magpies, you and me—we have an eye for the unusual. Makes us a good match.”

She avoided that one. She usually changed the subject when he brought up marriage. But she loved hearing his stories, learning about his life, picturing him as a young seaman, poking through the markets. And showing young Max the ropes.

Rarely if ever did he mention Ireland, or why he left it, only that he was never going back there. “There’s nothing for me there,” he’d say whenever she pushed to know more, and then he’d change the subject, usually with some funny story.

Then one evening when the air was soft and warm with the promise of summer and they were sitting on the roof, Daisy snuggled up against him, his arm around her, watching the sights below, Flynn stiffened.

She followed his gaze to a woman pushing a cart containing a man who looked to have lost both legs. Behind came five ragged little children, following like a string of bedraggled ducklings, each one smaller than the last. The littlest one was being carried by a girl not much bigger.

Flynn stared for a moment, then with a muttered oath, put Daisy aside and abruptly stood.

“What is it?” she asked, but he left without a word.

She saw him a few minutes later, crossing the road and talking to the man and woman. He passed them something and the woman started weeping.

He left them as abruptly as he arrived and a moment later he returned, seized Daisy, pulled her onto the bed and made love to her with a focused intensity—all without a word—giving her climax after climax before pouring himself into her with a groan that sounded so pain-filled it tore at her heart.

Afterwards he lay with his head pillowed on her breast, silent and withdrawn. She lay stroking the thick dark hair from his face—he needed a haircut—listening to him breathe, hearing the distant sounds of the city coming in through the open door.

It caught him like that sometimes, afterwards, left him bleak and silent and withdrawn. Lost. She felt at the same time closer to him and more distant. He never would talk about it, and most of the time she was content to accept it.

Not this time. “Who were they?” she asked finally.

For a long time she thought he wasn’t going to answer—nothing new there—but then he sighed. “No one—just one of the many poor bastards tossed on the scrap heap, and their whole family with them.”

“Did you know them?”

“No. But in a way, I did . . .” And then he told her about his father, who worked with horses when Flynn was a boy. He’d had a real way with them, like magic, it was, until the day he was kicked in the spine and never walked again. He told her how his mam had slaved to keep them all—five kids there were—fed and warm, and how it was always a losing battle.

The rich man who his dad had worked for was sorry about the accident, but said it was God’s will, and nothing he could do. He’d given Mam a few pounds one day and the next day his agent came with the news they had to leave the cottage they’d lived in all their lives. The cottage was for able-bodied workers and their families, not useless cripples.

“Me mam found us a couple of rooms in a hovel, and after a bit I left home to look for work in Dublin.”

“How old were you?”

“Twelve. I was the eldest, so it was down to me. No jobs in Dublin for a skinny kid, so I became a wharf rat, sent home whatever I could every week through the parish priest—just a few coppers here and there. Not enough. Never enough.”

Daisy smoothed his hair back. “You did your best.”

He shook his head. “After about a year I went home—something wasn’t right, I felt it in me bones, even though the messages came through from Mam the same as ever.” His voice was bitter. “Neither me mam nor I could read or write, you see, so it was the priest writin’ the messages . . . They didn’t sound like Mam at all.”

She waited, holding him, stroking him, feeling the tension, the anguish in him.

“Turned out they’d all perished of the cholera—every last one of them, Mam, Da, Moira, Mary-Kate, Paul, Rory and wee Caitlin. They’d been dead and buried for months.”

The raw pain in his voice shattered her. “And no one had told you?”

He shook his head. “The priest had kept taking me money and making up the messages from Mam—he said he was using it for the good of others but I could smell the drink on his breath.” He swore again. “So I hit him. A mortal sin that is, I reckon.”

There was a long silence. He wasn’t finished yet, she could feel from the tightness in his body.

“I couldn’t even find a grave—they were all tossed in a pit—buried with strangers, dozens of people all together. ‘A cholera outbreak in the slums, you see, boy. Nothing else to do.’”

“Oh, Flynn.” She hugged him tight, wishing she could ease his pain. No wonder he said there was nothing for him in Ireland. Just bitterness and grief. And the unreasonable guilt of a thirteen-year-old boy who blamed himself for failing to save his family.

“So I left, walked back to Dublin, down to the docks and sailed away on the first ship that would take me.”

“And you never went back?”

“Never. There’s nothing for me there. I’ll make meself a new life, a good life here, and you’ll be part of it, won’t you, Daisy-girl?”

He meant a new family. Daisy felt the guilt twist inside her. He’d get no family from her. She ought to cut him loose to find a nice girl who’d give him one, but she couldn’t give him up. Not yet. Not when she’d just found him. Selfish she was, she knew it.

“What did you give those people in the street?” She gestured to the window.

“Nothin’ much, just a bit of money to feed the wee ones—that little girl carrying the tiny one—our Mary-Kate used to carry wee Caitlin just like that, and her no bigger than a flea herself.” His eyes had a faraway expression that told her he was seeing his little sisters in his mind. “And I told them to see Bartlett. I gave them a note for him. He’ll find something for the man to do. Just because his legs are gone doesn’t make him any less of a man.”

“You’re a good man, Patrick Flynn,” she whispered, feeling tears prickling at the back of her eyes. She tightened her hold on him.

He turned in her arms and proceeded to make slow, intense, tender love to her, and Daisy found herself tearing up again with the feelings that swelled within her, too full to be contained.

“What’s this?” he said, wiping away a tear with one finger.

“Nothing, just . . . sometimes the feelings get . . . too much.”

“Then marry me and we’ll have a bunch of little feelings together.”

She almost burst out howling at the tender way he said it. Instead she forced herself to say, “Ah, Flynn, why keep asking me? You know I won’t marry you. This is lovely but it’s not going to last. You got to start looking for a nice girl to wed.”

“I know. I’ve found one.”

“What?” Her eyes widened. Not already, surely? She wasn’t ready to lose him yet.

“Jealous are we?” He gave a soft laugh. “No need, me girl’s right here.” He kissed her. And the sweetness of that nearly broke her heart too.