Heron's Cove (6 page)

“There are millions of Russians, Mike,” Kevin said, getting to his feet.

“Only one showed up at the Sisters of the Joyful Heart this afternoon. Forget it. I should go back to the woods.”

Andy rose, too. “I have an early start. See you all later.” He gave Colin a curt nod. “Good to have you back.” Then he smiled. “You can help Father Bracken dig bean holes for his first-ever bean-hole supper.”

“Better than getting the shit beat out of you by Russians,” Mike muttered, then exited with Andy and Kevin on his flanks.

With his brothers gone, Colin eyed the Bracken 15. “I could empty this bottle but I’m not going to.”

“All things in moderation,” Finian said, appreciating the long finish of the whiskey he had overseen from distillation to laying down in the cask. “It’s good to be back with your brothers, isn’t it?”

“It is,” Colin said with a heavy sigh.

Finian pushed back an unexpected memory of hiking in Ireland with his brother on a sparkling autumn morning. He and Declan had just turned twenty and were filled with hopes and dreams. They had paused to appreciate the view of the Atlantic and the surrounding countryside and decided then and there they would do it; they would find a way to start their own distillery.

“Brothers are to be cherished,” Finian said. “Mike especially has good instincts about people.”

“Mike hates people.”

“‘Hate’ is too strong. He’s a loner. An observer. That’s why he lives the way he does. Being here in Rock Point helping your parents with their inn, with their worries, has worn his patience.”

“Have you been out to the Bold Coast where he lives?”

“Not yet, no.”

“It’s way down east on the Bay of Fundy. Strong tides, huge rock cliffs. Remote. Stunning scenery. Mike deals with people just enough to make a living, then spends the rest of his time on his own. He’s always been like that, even before he joined the army.”

“He came home from the military a different man?”

Colin shook his head. “Same Mike, just more so. What’s going on with him and Emma?”

“My assessment? She looks at him and wonders if she can fit in among the Donovans. He looks at her and wonders if he really knows his brother, perhaps wonders if he’ll ever have a relationship in his own life such as the one you and Emma have.”

Colin frowned, then grinned suddenly. “I think I actually understand what you just said.”

“This Russian woman, Colin…”

“Not your problem. Worry about your bean-hole supper. I’ll worry about Emma’s Russian.”

“She’s making pies for the supper.”

“The Russian?”

Finian sighed. Colin, of course, knew better. “Emma.”

Colin hesitated, just for a fraction of a second, but it was enough. Finian could see that his friend wasn’t so sure about his new love inserting herself into his life in Rock Point, perhaps less sure than he had been a few weeks ago in the heat of their first days together. It was only natural, Finian thought.

“I’ll clean up here,” he said. “You’ve had very little to drink. You’ll be fine to drive.”

“I walked down here.”

“But you’ll be driving to Emma in Heron’s Cove.”

“So I will.” Colin rose, a spark in his gray eyes. “Thanks for the whiskey. It’s good to be back.”

Finian studied his friend, noted the clear pain he was in, the depth of his fatigue. “How bad was it, Colin?”

“I’m here drinking whiskey with you, so it could have been worse.”

“Your brothers know you didn’t get your cuts and bruises in Washington.”

Colin grinned. “You don’t think I can convince them I tripped on my way to a cocktail party?”

Finian gave up and smiled. “Go, my friend. Be with your woman.”

“An excellent plan.” But as Colin pulled on his jacket, he pointed a finger at Finian. “If this Russian jeweler shows up again, you call me. Got that, Father Bracken?”

Colin left without waiting for an answer, and Finian corked the Bracken 15 year old, then poured himself a glass of water. He had to remember to keep a clear head when dealing with a Donovan. He put the uncomfortable conversation out of his mind and looked around the quiet restaurant. An elderly couple was sharing a piece of wild blueberry pie—a local favorite—and two young sisters he recognized from the church were talking themselves out of ice-cream sundaes.

His previous life in Ireland seemed so long ago, so far away.

He shook off his melancholy before it could get him in its grip. A woman on Hurley’s staff edged over to his table with a plastic tray. She was slender and shapely, with deep gold-flecked hazel eyes and a thick golden-brown braid hanging down her back. “I’ll get these glasses, Father,” she said, anchoring the tray on one hip.

He thanked her. “What’s your name?”

“Julianne Maroney. My grandmother is helping with the bean-hole supper at the church this next weekend—that is, if she’s able.”

“Is she ill?”

Julianne grabbed Mike’s and Colin’s empty whiskey glasses. “I don’t know if you’d call it ill. More like thoroughly pissed off at God.” She blushed. “Sorry, Father.”

Finian leaned back in his chair. “I understand being pissed off at God. I was for a time myself.”

“Were you? Really? And you’re not now?”

“I’m not now. In fact, I never was. I just thought I was.”

“Misdirected anger,” Julianne said thoughtfully. “That’s Granny. She loves the bean-hole supper but she says she’s mad at God for taking Grandpa away from her. He died last year, before you arrived at St. Patrick’s. We all miss him, but it’s not good for her to be so mad all the time. I think it’s making her sick.”

“Physically sick?”

Her eyes shone with sudden tears. “I think she wants to die, too. Join Grandpa in the great beyond. Heaven. Whatever.” Julianne added the water pitcher to her tray. “Do you think you could talk to her?”

“Of course.”

“Don’t tell her I said anything. Her name is Fran. Franny Maroney. Her grandmother was from Ireland. Sligo, I think. Do you know where that is?”

Finian smiled. “I do, indeed.”

“Granny likes your Irish accent. I want to go to Ireland someday. Working on it, in fact.” Julianne snatched up Andy Donovan’s whiskey glass with more force than was necessary and banged it onto her tray. “It’s nice to see Colin back in town. He does come and go. He and Kevin are my favorite Donovans. I don’t know Mike that well.”

Given the way she grabbed Andy’s water glass and banged it onto the tray with the same force as she had his whiskey glass, Finian had an idea of her opinion of the third-born Donovan.

“Andy Donovan’s a rake,” Julianne said matter-of-factly. “You know that, right, Father?”

“I haven’t heard a man called a ‘rake’ in an age.”

“It’s fitting.” She glared out the window at the dark harbor where Andy had his lobster boat moored. “I’m working my way through school. I’m finishing my master’s in marine biology. I don’t know what I was thinking…Andy and I…” She sighed. “That son of a bitch broke my heart.” Her cheek color deepened. “Sorry, Father.”

“Not at all.”

She seemed to regret having said anything. “I told Granny I’d go with her to the supper. She says she doesn’t want to go without Grandpa, but I think it’d be good for her.”

“Thank you for letting me know,” Finian said.

Julianne spun back across the restaurant with her tray and through the swinging door into Hurley’s kitchen. Finian returned the Bracken 15 to the bar, where it would be safe until his next visit, said good-night and headed outside, the wood door creaking as it shut hard behind him.

He crossed the quiet parking lot, a sharpness in the air he hadn’t noticed earlier. He was just barely warm enough in his suit coat. He continued onto the narrow streets above the harbor, lined with modest homes lit up against the dark night. He passed a large shade tree, bright yellow leaves clinging to its sweeping branches and scattered on the pavement, a reminder that the long Maine winter was soon upon them. He had heard tales of brutal New England winters. This would be his first.

At least by winter the blasted bean-hole supper would be behind him.

A man in a black fleece jacket and baseball cap walked across the street from Hurley’s. Finian didn’t recognize him but the man approached him as if they knew each other. “Evening, Father. Nice night. Chilly.” The stranger hunched his shoulders. He looked fit, with fair skin and fine lines at the corners of his eyes. “Didn’t I just see you at Hurley’s with the Donovan brothers?”

Finian hadn’t noticed him. “Are you a friend of theirs?”

“Nah. I’ve never stepped foot in Rock Point until today. A kid sweeping the floors told me. Four brothers altogether. FBI, marine patrol, lobsterman, Maine guide. Tough guys. Their folks own an inn on the waterfront. The father’s a retired cop.”

“Are you asking me?”

“Just shooting the breeze. I needed to stretch my legs.” He ambled a few more steps up the street, his hands shoved deep into his jacket pockets. “Colin Donovan’s the FBI agent brother, right, Father?”

“If you’d like, I can give him a quick ring—”

“Thanks, but I’m on my way to Heron’s Cove. It’ll be my first time there, too. I should let you get back to your walk. You serve a church here in Rock Point?”

“St. Patrick’s. We’re having a bean-hole supper next weekend. You’re welcome to join us.”

The man grinned. “I can’t remember the last time I was at a church supper.”

He said good-night, turned and walked back toward the harbor. Finian stood still, watching the man cross the street back to Hurley’s.

At least he hadn’t spoken with a Russian accent.

It was a fair guess that Colin’s secret work with the FBI involved Russians, Finian thought as he navigated the maze of now-familiar streets to the simple, stone-faced church and rectory that would be his home for at least a year. St. Patrick’s Church was a small parish, struggling more than some and less than others. A gnarled maple in front of the church had dropped all its leaves, but a river birch by the back steps—or what Colin had told Finian was a river birch—held on to its vibrant yellow leaves. The New England fall foliage season was as spectacular and festive as he had hoped and anticipated. St. Patrick’s bean-hole supper marked the last of the popular autumn suppers among the local churches.

Finian had no illusions that Rock Point and the people of St. Patrick’s had fully embraced him since his arrival in June. That was all right. His presence was deliberately temporary, and he was Irish and a different sort of priest—a widower who had lost his wife and two young daughters before turning to the priesthood.

He entered the rectory kitchen and pulled off his clerical garb, then slipped into a hand-knit Irish sweater. He went still, his pulse quickening as he noticed several envelopes on the floor by the old stove. All the windows were closed. Had he brushed them with his arm before he had left and simply hadn’t noticed?

He thought of the man who had intercepted him. Could he have sneaked in here before heading to the waterfront?

Why would anyone sneak into a rectory?

Finian started for the telephone to call Colin but stopped himself. The poor man was just back home after what had obviously been a difficult ordeal. Finian shook off his uneasiness. He hadn’t observed any sign of a break-in at the back door.

To further reassure himself, he checked the threadbare living room and dining room, but nothing was out of place, broken or disturbed. He had let his imagination run wild.

His gaze rested on a framed photograph on the china cupboard of his beautiful wife, Sally, and their sweet daughters, Kathleen and Mary, together on a sunlit Irish morning at their home above Kenmare Bay. They were smiling, and he could hear their laughter as he took the picture, only a few weeks before he lost them forever.

He didn’t come into this room every day, but when he did, he would see them. The pain of his grief was still there and he recognized—accepted—that it always would be.

But he hadn’t lost his girls forever. He’d lost them in this life.

They had gone to God and were at peace.

He left the dining room and checked the front door, discovering to his surprise that it was unlocked. Perhaps that oversight explained his sense of intrusion. With no evidence of a break-in, he had no reason to call Colin or the local police. He would feel ridiculous.

He returned to the kitchen and made tea as he opened St. Patrick’s well-worn file on the bean-hole supper. The menu was tried-and-true, unchanged in decades. Homemade baked beans, roast pork, coleslaw, applesauce, pickles, rolls and pies. The folder included handwritten recipes and instructions on digging the bean holes, building the fire inside them and burying the pots for the slow baking of the beans.

Well. Why not?

Finian settled back in his chair, reading the recipes and dismissing his stubborn sense of uneasiness as the result of having just enjoyed a bit of Irish whiskey with four intense Donovans.

5

EMMA WAS SURPRISED to find a rolling pin in one of Colin’s kitchen drawers. It had a worn, broken-in feel that suggested he had inherited it from someone else’s kitchen. She didn’t find a pastry cutter, but she used her fingers to work in the shortening and flour that a cupboard had yielded, another surprise. She managed to put together a respectable pie while Colin was drinking whiskey with his brothers and Father Bracken.

She leaned back against the sink and forced herself to focus on her surroundings and practice the kind of mindfulness she had during her days with the Sisters of the Joyful Heart. They had shared all the routine chores of convent life, hiring out only what they couldn’t do themselves. She had discovered purpose and comfort in preparing meals, cleaning, doing laundry, gardening—daily work that didn’t directly involve the sisters’ mission in art conservation, education and history.

A different life, and yet she still could draw on what she had learned during her time as Sister Brigid.

She smelled the apples bubbling in the oven and felt the warmth of the kitchen, noticed the reflection of the overhead lights in the windows. Colin didn’t have drapes or curtains, only natural-fiber shades. There were no plants or knickknacks on the windowsills, although he had left a small, rounded gray stone on the sill above the sink. He must have picked it up on a Maine beach. It was smooth, polished by the sea.