Disturbing possibilities raced through Maura’s mind as she led Mick into her cottage. Top of the list was that he was going to tell her that Bridget was seriously ill or dying, which she refused to think about. Second was the he was quitting his job at Sullivan’s. She struggled to come up with more options. He was dying? He had killed John Byrne just to see what a murder felt like? The pub had burned down while she was sleeping? No, someone would have called if that had happened. She was out of ideas.

“Coffee?” Maura asked as Mick wandered around the room, kicking at a pair of old rubber boots she’d left on the floor. “Or something stronger?”

He turned to her then. “Fer God’s sake, Maura, it’s nine o’clock in the mornin’.”

She looked at him squarely, trying to keep her gaze calm. “I’ve known plenty of people who start that early, and I’m sure you have too. Come on. Whatever you want to say, spit it out. You’re scaring me.” She pointed to a chair on his side of the table, and he sat. She took a seat across from him.

Mick seemed willing to look anywhere but at Maura. “I, uh, don’t often talk about a lot of things. Personal things.”

Maura throttled her urge to give him a kick—anything to get him to talk.

Mick took a deep breath. “Bridget knows we’ve . . . been close. So she told me flat out if I’m even thinking about, well, being with you, yeh have to know what’s gone on in my life. She said if I didn’t do it, I didn’t deserve you. And then she’d tell yeh herself, so you wouldn’t think it was you who messed up.”

“Okay,” Maura said cautiously. She had no clue where this talk was going, but at least she knew now that Bridget thought it was important.

“I was married once,” he said abruptly. “And we had a child.”

It felt like a fist in her gut. It was the first time she’d ever heard anything about it, and she already could tell that things had ended badly. He’d never mentioned a wife, a lover, a girlfriend—or a child. And she flashed on the look that had crossed his face while he watched Gillian and her baby together. She didn’t know if she was ready for what he might say next, and she couldn’t think of anything to say that wouldn’t sound silly and shallow. She kept waiting silently, watching his face.

He glanced briefly at her before turning away. “I got a degree, had a good job in Cork. We got married, Caitlin and me, had Sean a year later. We were the perfect young couple. And we were happy.”

“What happened?” Maura asked softly.

“I started working too hard, spending too much time away. Sean was a fussy baby, and I left all the hard stuff of carin’ fer him to Caitlin all day. We had a nice home, enough money. She had friends. I thought we had a good life. Except I wasn’t there for more’n half of it.”

“And?”

“When Sean was about one, she took him off for an afternoon with her friends and their kids. They went to a park together. He was just walkin’, and he fell, hit his head. He seemed fine, she thought, but he wasn’t. After a couple hours, she couldn’t wake him from a nap, and when she got him to hospital, they told her his brain was bleeding, and there was nothing they could do for him. Just like that, he was gone. The doctors called me, but I was too late to see him—alive, anyway.”

“How awful. For both of you.” That went a long way toward explaining his silence about himself and his past. She couldn’t imagine losing a child that way, and it was clear that he blamed himself in part. But there must be more for him to cut himself off from family, give up his work, and hide himself away in a small pub in a small village. Let him tell you in his own way.

He must have guessed what she was thinking. “It got worse. I’d say we both shut down rather than comfortin’ each other. Caitlin was gutted, but she never said much. We went about our days like polite zombies—our talk was mostly ‘we need more juice’ or ‘have yeh paid the electric?’ I threw myself back into me work, never thinkin’ that she had nothin’ to distract her, leavin’ her in that small flat with all the baby things still scattered about. Leavin’ her alone because it was easier fer me. And one day I came home and found she’d killed herself.”

“Oh, God,” Maura whispered.

Mick wasn’t looking at her, lost in his memories. “I never saw it coming. I never guessed. I thought I loved her, but I never knew her, never really saw her, and then she died.”

“And you blamed yourself?”

“Who else? I’d been so wrapped up in meself that I never noticed anything, and then, boom, in a matter of months, it was all gone. So I walked away from me own life. The job, the place, the whole thing.”

“What about your family?”

“My sister had enough on her hands with the kids comin’ and all, and I didn’t want to see them, couldn’t hear a word about babies. I guess I was worried that in her heart she blamed me too. My parents tried to help, but after a while they gave up—I wouldn’t talk to them. I wouldn’t visit for holidays. I just shut them out. I needed work just to pay for the simplest costs, so I started at the pub. Old Mick never asked any questions. Maybe he knew what had happened, maybe he didn’t, but as long as I showed up and did the job, he was fine with it.”

Well, that explained a lot of things—Mick’s lack of ambition, his lack of connection with most people. His silence about his past. Like Old Mick, she’d never pried because she’d needed him to keep working for her, at least at first. “You said Bridget told you that you had to tell me. Why now?”

Mick shook his head as if reluctant to explain. “Because I’ve started to have feelin’s fer yeh. You show up out of nowhere with nobody behind yeh, and I felt sorry for yeh. You were like a lost puppy, and you snapped at most people who only wanted to help. And I’ve been workin’ alongside you fer a year now, and I’ve watched you change, open up—and I’ve felt what yeh might call jealous that you’ve been able to go on with yer life, make yerself a new one. When I couldn’t.”

“But you stayed on at Sullivan’s.”

“I didn’t know where else to go.”

“How long has it been?”

“Five years and some. Sure, I should have moved on by now, but it’s easier just to drift along. Folk around Leap don’t know the story, don’t ask questions. They just take me as I am—the guy behind the bar, handy with the tap.” He fell silent.

Maura felt lost. She sucked at heart-to-heart talks, not that she’d had many. She never knew what to say to people who were suffering. Bridget had given Mick his task: If he wanted to be with Maura, whatever that meant, he’d have to come clean about his past. And he had.

Bridget must have guessed that she might want the chance to think about what it might mean to have a future with Mick—she could end it now before anything even began. But it already had, hadn’t it?

Could Mick stop blaming himself for the awful things that had happened and move forward? With her? She was so not the best person to help him.

But . . . he could have blown off Bridget, could have said nothing, could have gone on as before. He hadn’t—he’d come straight to her, and here he was, clearly hurting. Which meant he did feel something for her, and he’d made an effort. Maura just wasn’t sure what she wanted, but she knew she couldn’t lie to herself or to Mick. She felt something for him too, something she’d tried not to look at too closely. He’d been kind to her from the beginning without expecting anything from her. He’d been there when she’d been totally upended by her mother’s appearance—he’d actually seen how upset she was, even though she’d thought she’d hidden it so well. That meant something. He wasn’t giving himself enough credit.

She’d be a fool to shut the door on him. But what could she say?

Oh, grow up, Maura. Mick’s actually opened up and you’re worried about yourself? Aren’t you a better person than that? Yeah, one who’s scared to death of screwing this up.

She took a breath to calm herself. “Mick, it’s not your fault. I’m pretty sure plenty of people have told you that, but you still don’t believe it. But you have to. Life can be crappy, and there’s no logic to it. Bad things happen. But you didn’t do this to your child or your wife. I think you’re right that you weren’t there for your wife, but guess what? You’ve gotten better at paying attention to people. Like me. When I first showed up with no money, no place to go, and no plan for that week or the rest of my life, you helped me. You didn’t know me, but you kept me from falling to pieces. I wouldn’t have made it this far without you being there for me.”

She paused; she’d startled herself. Where had that come from? Okay, Maura, it’s time to go all in. “You said you feel something for me. You don’t have to put a label on it. I feel something for you too, but I’ve been pretending there was nothing there because I didn’t want to deal with it. Stupid, I know. But that’s where we are. Two people with a load of problems that we don’t know how to fix. But, Mick? I’m willing to try.”

If this was a romance novel, Maura mused, waiting for an answer—any answer—this was when the music would surge and they’d fling themselves into each other’s arms. The scene would fade to black, and roses would bloom, and bluebirds would fly, and . . . that was such a load of crap. They were two messed up people trying to find their way to each other across a minefield of issues.

Finally, Mick managed to smile. “Bridget’s been after me fer a while to get on with me life, though she means it kindly. And I know yeh’re right too. I’ve been feelin’ sorry for meself, which serves no one. I loved Caitlin and I loved Sean. They’re gone. Talk about God or the hereafter all yeh want, but they’re still gone from my life. But I’ve got a life, and I’m not doing right by them by letting it just go by.”

“So,” Maura said. “What do we do now?”

“What do yeh mean?”

“I’ve shoved you onto the right path, so you’ll pick up the pieces and go on with your life. Hooray. What do I get?”

“Me, I guess. If yeh think yeh want me.”

“Do you want me?”

“Damned if we don’t sound like a pair of schoolchildren: ‘You go first.’ ‘No, you go first.’ I thought we’d decided we’re grown?”

“Okay, then kiss me.”

“Ah.” With great deliberation, Mick pushed his chair away from the table, stood, and walked slowly around it until he was face-to-face with Maura. “Yes?”

“Yes.”

He took her head in both hands and moved in for the kiss. Softly at first. Maura found herself wondering, Really? That’s it? But then things heated up, and all she could hear in her head was, Don’t stop. Please, don’t stop . . .

They pulled apart, their breath coming quickly. “Okay, good to know,” Maura said. “But we’re supposed to open the pub in fifteen minutes. Just remember where we left off, okay?”

“I will.”