CHAPTER FIVE

Eric knew the moment the jet touched down at Heathrow. Finn isn’t in jolly Olde England, either. Before the Jetway engaged with the British Airways Airbus, he had Mother on his phone.

“Oh, I’m so glad you called. Guess what?”

God, he hated that question.

“Finn isn’t in England anymore.”

“Where is he then?” Whatever else this Powers creep might be, he’d been nothing but a royal pain in the ass since this operation started. A genius maybe, but he was obviously one of those quirky guys without a lick of sense to back up their brilliance. The kind who never showered and didn’t know how to tie their own shoelaces. That kind.

Jordan hunched over the back of Eric’s airline seat. They’d travelled in typical military-style this flight, dead last in the rear of the aircraft with their seats against the galley wall, no option to recline or stretch their long legs. “You’re kidding me, right? He’s not here?”

Eric stilled so he could hear Mother over Jordan’s question. “He’s gone to Ireland to find his professor, Morell Grover, but I’ve got an address. Finn won’t run this time. He promised.”

Eric simmered. And I’m supposed to believe that why?

This continual game of cat and mouse had grown thin. He’d been awake for over thirty-five hours straight. No sleep. No decent food. And no Finn.

The forty-eight-hour window was blown. One more round of hide-and-go-seek, and Operation Find Finn could go to hell. He and Jordan would head back to Virginia where they belonged, and Finn could cover his own sorry ass.

“Where in Ireland?” he bit out more sharply than he intended.

Mother provided the address in southern Ireland, but before she could get another word in, he ended the call. He’d run out of patience for the idiot on the run. Her, too.

“Where next, Bro?” Jordan asked, his easy-going demeanor intact once more. Why not? He’d slept those fifteen hours over the Atlantic to Amsterdam, on this puddle-jumper flight, too.

Eric pushed back in his chair, bone-tired with nothing to show for the day but another flight he didn’t want to take. “Dungarvin, Ireland.”

Jordan took the seat across the aisle while the flight attendants assisted the last passengers. “Powers is in Ireland? Why the hell?”

“Mother thinks he’s hooking up with his professor, Morell Grover. Don’t ask why because I don’t know much more than you do.”

“Doesn’t sound very Irish to me. Morell Grover. Does it to you?”

Eric couldn’t answer. He stared, his brain starved for sleep he couldn’t allow. Not yet. Once he gave in to the overwhelming urge it’d be all she wrote. He drew in a deep breath, needing to move before he lost the battle. Summoning the image of those two dead young men did the trick. Berglund and Mikkelson deserved justice.

Mentally kicking his own butt, Eric heaved up and out of his seat. Operation Find Finn was back on. Fortunately, they had their pick of flights into Cork. They ended up in the back of the bus again. The Airbus. Touchdown went as smooth as silk, probably because Eric couldn’t have cared less by then. It was an interesting way to cure one’s fear of air travel: fly until jetlag numbed your brain.

While the other passengers disembarked, he dragged his backpack out of the overhead compartment one last time, prepared for another search, and hopefully a quick in-and-out extraction.

Jordan clapped his back, urging him on. They opted for a rental with GPS instead of a cab. Jordan drove. Might have been a mistake. A nap during the drive would’ve been nice, but Jordan needed a navigator to get them out of all those blasted Irish roundabouts and onto the correct exits. And to keep him on the left side of the road. For some reason, the guy from Alaska thought driving in Ireland would be a breeze. It wasn’t. Besides acclimating himself to the controls being on the wrong side of the car, he kept hanging a right when he should’ve been turning left.

After a circuitous ride through winding roads that resembled one-lane sheep trails and more roundabouts than Eric realized existed in the world, they arrived at the address Mother had relayed. Eric stepped out of the car, his jacket once again concealing two loaded firearms and one beat-to-hell body. The destination Powers gave Mother ended at a well-kept, white clapboard home with a green-shingled roof that lapped the drip line, creating a homey cottage effect. The matching green shutters, white picket fence instead of stone, with bushes and trees in bloom added to the courtyard. Roses. The flowery scent of roses—lots of roses—mingled with the fresh salt air lifting off the Irish Sea to the south.

The hour was late, well after twenty hundred, eight pm Ireland time. He’d already made reservations at a local hotel chain, in the event they actually caught up with Powers this time.

Eric forged ahead, his senses on high alert. Despite its genteel appearance, evil could still be afoot even at this quaint Irish cottage. His covert training came back to him as easy as turning a corner. Hyper-vigilance had its place in the world.

Knocking on the front door rewarded him with a prompt response by a plump, dark-haired, middle-aged woman, her tresses streaked with gray and twisted into a bun at the top of her head.

“May I help you?” she asked with a definite Irish lilt and an unabashedly cheery smile. The white apron covering her blue dress and the fuzzy strands dangling down her neck declared she’d been busy in her kitchen, and what did he want at this late hour?

“Excuse us, ma’am, but we were told to meet Finn Powers at this location. Is he here?”

She cast an appraising glance up and down Jordan. Then did the same with Eric. Her smile widened. “He did say visitors would be along the bye, but he didn’t say they’d be as charming as the likes of you two young men. Please come in.” She stood aside and beckoned them to enter.

A delightful sensory overload hit Eric’s nose and stomach the second he set foot inside. Fresh baked bread. Soup or stew, definitely beef stock. Onions for sure. The blend of aromas elicited a rumble from his empty stomach.

“Are you hungry?” she asked as if she already knew the answer.

“Yes,” Jordan answered with emphasis. When wasn’t he hungry?

“No,” Eric corrected instantly, intent on maintaining a professional distance from this kindly woman. “Thank you for your offer, ma’am, but we’re not here to bother you. We came for Powers, and we need to leave as soon as possible.”

Jordan’s grumble at his six didn’t go unnoticed by their pleasant hostess. She interlocked her fingers over her rounded stomach, a definite twinkle in her eye. “I’ll have you know I’m Rosie O’Banner, and this is the ‘Edge of O’Banner’, the finest bed and breakfast on the far side of the Isle. Your friend left the minute he arrived. He said you’re not to leave ’til he returns. And for your information, it’s no inconvenience to care for the weary and tired, nor the hungry, young man. You’re welcome to wait, and if you need a place to stay while you’re here, I have two empty rooms waiting for you. Meals are included, and there’s no charge for the hospitality nor the welcome.”

Damn. She’d pegged him dead on. Weary. Tired as hell. Hungry enough to eat airport fast food and tempted to accept her offer of a room with a bed. And dinner. How was a guy supposed to refuse all of that?  He tried. “That’s very kind, but no thank you, ma’am. We’ve already made arrangements in Dungarvin. We’ll be leaving as soon as Powers gets back.”

“But you’ll eat while you wait, will you not?” Rosie O’Banner had a delicious openness about her. When she cocked her head, her blue eyes twinkled with a dash of mischief, as if she dared him to turn her down one more time.

It didn’t help that Jordan elbowed him and said, “I can always cancel the hotel.”

“And I’ll just bet my last lamb in the meadow that you poor boys haven’t eaten all day now, have you, eh?” Mrs. O’Banner reinforced her argument.

Eric’s stomach growled at the temptation within reach. Perhaps this out-of-the-way B&B would suffice for dinner and the night, but no more. In the morning, he was out of there. With Finn. For sure. “Thank you. We have travelled far today. A meal would hit the spot.”

Oh, the smiling eyes this woman had been blessed with all but beamed at the chance to feed them. Like that was anything but more work for her. She reminded Eric of his mother out in Washington State and her willingness to serve others. There never was a crotchety child or a grumpy man she couldn’t get around with her endearing ways and lighthearted banter. Rosie had to be related, if not by blood, then by spirit.

“Well, good. That’s settled.” She nodded to the staircase at her left. “First room at the top is open. You take that one,” she said to Eric then turned to Jordan. “The one across the hall from it is available as well. ‘Tis yours. Now call that stuffy hotel with its scratchy bedding and boxed meals, and cancel those reservations. You’re to be my guests for the night, and I challenge either of you to argue.”

Eric relented. His charming host had quite a way about her. “One night will suffice. Thank you, ma’am.”

“Off with you and wash your hands then. I’ve just finished tomorrow’s stew and another batch of bread. I’ll have a table set with a hot meal and a hearty mug of Guinness for you before you’re back. Hurry along. Don’t dilly dally.”

He had to smile. She’d won him over with food and a cheerful welcome. Him. A stranger with a gun. All the more reason he and Jordan couldn’t stay more than one night.

They obeyed their charming hostess like two sons might have obeyed their mother. Eric took the door to the right of the staircase. He set his backpack on the floor next to the bed, and his stomach growled in anticipation of its first meal in nearly two days. He’d gone without food or sleep longer on black ops, but it always ended the same. He’d be comatose for a day or two, then hungry enough to eat anything not tacked down.

The room was larger than he’d expected. Clean in a fresh breeze kind of way, the window was open and a gentle evening wind tossed the sheer white curtain panels. A patchwork quilt of all shades of blues and creamy whites covered the queen-sized bed. Braided rugs littered the polished wooden floor.

Eric closed the window and deliberated doffing his shoulder holster as well, but didn’t. Instead, he covered the weapon with a light jacket to keep it out of sight. What Rosie didn’t know wouldn’t hurt her.

Setting his backpack beside the bed, he opened the side pocket and tugged out a flat metal case. Opening the tablet-sized item, he pushed his thumb to the one sided-hinge to lock it in place before he set it on his nightstand. And there she was, a dark-haired little girl with adoration for him in her brown eyes. Cheyenne.

Eric pressed the pad of his thumb to his lips, then to hers. “I love you, Angel,” he whispered like he’d done every night since his world fell apart, “and I still remember.”

Along with his daughter, his parents, Lara and Rex Reynolds smiled back from their own photo. And like it or not, so did Shea on her wedding day. God, she’d been a radiant bride. So full of hope. Love. All good things.

The only other item in his portable shrine was the key to a Cape Cod style home on Vashon Island in the middle of Puget Sound, Washington. His and Shea’s first real home and their refuge until things got too tough. He hadn’t had the heart to sell it, so it waited—like him—for the day she came back. For now, a couple with seven kids rented it, which was good. It deserved to live.

Tugging the photo that he’d found in Mikkelson’s flat out of his pocket, Eric slid it between Cheyenne and Shea’s photos. “Keep her safe for me,” he told his daughter. “If she’s already up in heaven with you, please tell her I miss her. Tell her I never stopped loving her. Give her a kiss for me.” His prayer. Every night.

Brushing a quick hand under his eye, Eric let the silence between heaven and earth stretch. It had been so long since he’d seen or talked with Shea, maybe it was time to face the truth. She could very well be dead. He just wished he knew how and where or—if. A husband deserved to know something like that.

Ending his one-sided conversation the way he had for two years now, Eric whispered what he’d once said to his sleepy child, “Goodnight, Angel. Sweet dreams.”

Off he went to use the en-suite head. One glance in the mirror over the washbasin explained how his hostess had read him like a book. The man in the mirror stared back with definite black circles around his glassy eyes. The tired ass had hunger and exhaustion down to a fine art.

He turned the faucet on and lowered his head under the cold stream long enough to revive him. Eric towel dried his face and spruced his short black hair into a few spikes until he looked halfway decent. The grumpy man in the mirror didn’t appear to be quite so dead by the time he hit the top of the stairs.

Jordan’s cheerful voice could be heard below, bantering from one room to another with Rosie about the weather in Amsterdam. All conversation ceased when she hurried from her kitchen with a basket of steamy rolls in her hand.

Eric crossed the cozy dining area with its tablecloth covered tables and wooden captain’s chairs, to where Jordan sat in the corner with his face in a steaming bowl of beef stew. Rolls dripping with melted butter lined his plate. He had a half-finished pint of what looked like ale in one hand and a spoon in the other. “Come on,” he said with a mouthful. “This stuff’s good. Dig in.”

“You’d better hurry,” Rosie tossed over her shoulder on her way back to her kitchen. “There may not be anything left but crumbs and dirty dishes in another minute.”

Eric took a seat with his hungry buddy, but faced the doorway, an old habit from active duty days. Rose might know how to cook, but he doubted he’d relish the fare as much as his buddy did. He’d lost the zest for life over two years ago. Mostly, he ate take-out or order-in. Cheap food. Fast food. He never sat in the kitchen or at the dining room table when he ate. Wouldn’t think of it.

Oddly, one spoon full of the meaty broth encouraged another. His stomach calmed. He dipped his chin toward the aromatic aroma lifting from the bowl, and he settled down to all but inhale the tastiest and simplest fare he’d consumed in a long time. Chunks of tender, seasoned beef swam with carrots and baby red potatoes in a richly flavored broth. Yeast rolls, tender and warm. Creamy butter. A pint of Guinness that went down smooth and rich.

By the time he finished, he’d polished off three bowls of stew and hadn’t spoken a word. There wasn’t time. As long as he’d kept eating, Rosie kept serving.

At last, sated and comfortably full, he tipped back in his chair to watch Jordan sop a bread roll to the last speck of stew in the bottom of what had to be his third bowl, not that Eric counted.

Dessert appeared in the form of a hearty spoonful of apple cobbler topped off with thick vanilla custard and a drizzle of cream. Eric eyed the tantalizing dish, not certain he had room for more, but that aroma...

Maybe just one bite.

Jordan made swift work of his, moaning and groaning that the dessert was too good to pass up. The guy had to have been born with a hollow leg. After smacking his lips, he stuck his elbows to the table and eyed Eric’s plate. “You gonna eat that?”

Eric lifted his fork, daring his buddy to make another move. “What do you think?”

Decision made. Just like the stew and biscuits, after the first savory bite, Eric polished off the dessert. The apples retained a bit of crispness, and the custard added a hint of cinnamon mingled with another flavor he couldn’t identify. Rum? Irish whiskey? It was good, whatever it was. For a change, he’d enjoyed eating. His stomach didn’t complain, either.

Rosie spied him licking his bottom lip after the last delicious morsel. “I have more if you’re still hungry.”

He chuckled. “No, thank you, ma’am. I haven’t eaten this much home-cooked food in years.” Two years, one month and seventeen days to be precise. Shake-n-Bake chicken. Wild rice and buttered asparagus. Razzleberry pie with a dollop of vanilla bean ice cream. The night before we flew to Amsterdam. The last day of my life. And then they both left me…

“You’re a mighty fine cook, Mrs. O’Banner,” Jordan declared, his chair tilted back and one hand on his full stomach, the other on the edge of the table. “Mr. O’Banner must be one happy man. Where’s he off to?”

She blushed to the roots of her pleasantly graying hair. “I’m afraid he’s singing with the angels. I planted him over at Saint Peter’s twelve years back.”

“I’m sorry.” Now it was Jordan’s turn to blush. “I didn’t mean to—”

“Never you mind.” She brushed his apology off. “’Twas the day before Easter he got it in his head to row out for a bucket of oysters all the way at Galway. Should’ve gone to Holy Saturday Mass like I told him to, but no. Tsk, tsk. He liked his chowder, and me? Well, I liked to make it for him, so off he went. When he didn’t come back, I took me car and went to find him. Poor Paddy. He’d had a heart attack. Hadn’t shucked a single oyster. Hadn’t even gotten into his dinghy. Just dropped dead on the shore under a clear, blue sky.”

Eric took over for Jordan who’d gone redder than Rosie and looked to be ten times more uncomfortable. “That had to have been hard for you.”

She dabbed at her eyes with a corner of her apron. “Yes and no. Life is made up of a long line of comings and goings, like people in a queue at the church buffet. ’Tis the way of things, is all ’tis. Paddy went a tad earlier than I expected, but one day ’twill be my turn at the table. How about you? You’ve had your share of bad times. It was difficult, but you survived, didn’t you?”

Her piercing question shot a spear straight to Eric’s heart. This woman seemed able to see inside him. He chose not to engage in her charming, but probing way. Some things were better left unshared. “When did Finn say he’d be back?”

Rosie offered a sly wink as if she knew he’d dodged her inquiry, when she knew absolutely nothing at all and never would. “Whenever you’re ready, I’m here to listen. Just remember. We can nah share a sorrow we have nah finished grieving. Nor can we share joy ‘til we’ve learned the real cost of a smile. Life is hard, but ’tis the hardness of it that makes the goodness of it shine like a glimmer of sun breaking through a cloudy day. As for Finn, he didn’t give me a definite time. ’Tis dark now and another storm cloud has rolled in, so maybe soon.”

Eric averted his gaze. Rosie had an uncanny insight and a glib tongue. He needed to avoid her.

“What do you think?” Jordan asked. “Go looking for him?”

“Stay.” Eric glanced at the rain hitting the window, typical for southern Ireland in spring. “Let him come to us for a change.”