The Redemption (Charlotte Bloom Book 2) (11 page)

“How’d you sleep?” Alec spoke this time, and there was a twinkle in his eye. “I slept damn good last night,” he said boldly.

My face got even redder, if that was possible. It wasn’t like we did anything; we just slept. But it sounded bad.

“I slept OK,” I teased, walking over to the group.

“Little brother, aren’t you going to introduce us?” Stephen asked, smiling at me.

“Charlotte, this is my brother, Stephen, and his wife, Fiona.”

I shook their hands, and looked down at my purple wool socks.

“I’m still in my pajamas,” I explained bashfully. “I didn’t set an alarm and I desperately need coffee before getting ready.”

“Ah, American!” Stephen exclaimed. “Where are you from?” His eyes were lively and I realized he was the more outgoing of the two brothers.

“Originally Oregon, but most recently, Los Angeles.”

“My best friend lives just outside of Los Angeles,” Fiona piped up, and I was surprised to find that she was American, too. “I’m from Michigan.” She smiled knowingly at me.

I immediately knew what she was thinking. Here we were, two American girls who got swept up by these hot Irishmen.

“So, how do you know my mum and brother?” Stephen asked, and I assumed he didn’t know about my history with Alec. I saw Alec shift uncomfortably beside me.

“I used to work at Parc-Le-Bouveret with him,” I explained factually. “We’re friends.” It was all I could come up with at the moment.

“You’re a little more than friends,” Ennis quipped, joining us from the kitchen. She clutched a mug of coffee. I felt myself burning from embarrassment.

How did I sum up our relationship? I looked over at Alec, and he was smiling at his shoes, waiting for me to answer. Knowing he wouldn’t take the initiative, I continued.

“Well, I guess Ennis is right in a way. We dated for a while. But for the time being, we’re just friends.”

I looked over at Alec again to gauge his response. He nodded his head once while looking at me, satisfied. He still had a smug smile splattered across his beautiful face.

“Well, you seem like a nice girl,” Stephen said. “I’m sure you make my brother very happy in whatever capacity it happens to be.”

“Yeah, now that I think about it, I’ve never met any of Alec’s girlfriends,” Fiona said slyly, tapping her chin with her finger. “You’re the first one he’s brought home.”

“We’re not—” I held back. I couldn’t say it. It wasn’t true. In some weird, complicated way, we
were
dating. We were definitely more than friends. “That’s surprising,” I said playfully, answering Fiona. “I would’ve guessed I was one of a hundred.”

Everyone laughed.

We all sat around the dining room table together. Ennis cooked up some pancakes and fruit, but before I knew it, Stephen and Fiona were bidding farewell. I liked them. They were outgoing and friendly.

“It was so nice to meet you, Charlotte,” Fiona said, hugging me tight.

“Hopefully we’ll see you around,” Stephen said, raising his eyebrows at his brother. “Don’t let go of this one.” He hugged me before leaving.

I smirked at Alec and waved at Stephen and Fiona through the frosted front window.

It was officially time for a shower. I waved at Alec as I headed up the stairs.

“Where are you going?” He asked, genuinely curious.

“I’m going to go shower and put on some real clothes,” I said, pointing to my baggy pajamas. “Had I known that I’d be meeting your brother, I would’ve at least brushed my teeth,” I laughed.

“Come here,” he demanded, standing against a wall. My heart stopped. I slowly descended the stairs, making my way to him slowly. “Maybe we should decide what to tell people,” he suggested, referring to our relationship status.

“Friends. It’s simple,” I said, beginning to walk toward the stairs again.

He grabbed me and spun me around, bringing me close to him. Our bodies were touching. He had his right arm around my waist, and had grabbed my other hand with his.

“I like being your friend,” Alec whispered, bending down to my right ear.

“I think this is against the rules,” I quipped.

I pulled away and crossed my arms over my chest. I was acutely aware that I wasn’t wearing a bra right now.

“Well, as your friend, I like your pajamas,” he said, pointing to my red and green plaid pajamas. “And we weren’t breaking any rules,” he said, walking away. “We didn't hug, kiss, or fuck, so we’re good.” He winked and went up to the third floor, presumably to the library.

My heart was still thumping against my chest as I got to my room. I took a quick shower, washing and drying my hair. I changed into dark grey leggings and an oversized black sweater. I swiped some blush and mascara on, and then headed to the library.

When I got there, Alec was up on the balcony, scanning books. His back was to me. I admired his backside for a few seconds, trying to be quiet so I wouldn’t get caught. He was wearing a red flannel shirt, jeans, and work boots. I cleared my throat, and Alec jumped, a book flying into the air. He caught it.

“Hey. You scared me,” he said, coming down to my level. “I was thinking, instead of reading here today, we could take a little trip. It’s nice out, and I could show you some of my favorite spots in Northern Ireland.” He carried a copy of
Atonement
, by Ian McEwan. “This is the book I picked. Not the happiest of books—I know that’s what you wanted—but this is one of my favorites. I’ve come to realize, not a lot of classic literature ends on a happy note. At least the stories that I like.”

“Depressing is fine,” I said, absentmindedly. I looked down at what I was wearing. “I have a feeling that I’ll need more clothes for this excursion. Where are we going?”

“It’s a surprise. Put some more clothes on,” he said, walking past me. “Boots. A proper jacket. Meet me downstairs in ten.”

“OK.”

I quickly changed into jeans and grabbed my parka, the one that Alec had helped me pick out my first week in Wales. I threw on my leather knee-high boots and put my hair into a ponytail. When I walked downstairs, Alec stood waiting, a heavy parka in his hands. Ennis was nowhere to be found, but she was always off doing her own thing, so I wasn’t surprised. Alec opened the front door and cool winter air greeted us.

“Is that going to be warm enough?” He gestured to my parka.

“Well, we’ll be in the car part of the time, right?”

“Something like that,” he answered, and I had a feeling he was up to something.

We walked over to where the cars were parked, and he took a cover off of a smaller object; an object that looked suspiciously like a motorcycle. When the cover came off, a gleaming, black motorcycle sat in front of us and I stood there with my mouth hanging open. He handed me a helmet, put his parka and a helmet on, and waited for me to get on behind him. I wiggled my arms into my parka slowly and snapped my helmet closed tightly under my chin. I got on behind him as he pulled out a key, pushed some buttons, and soon, we blasted off.

We wove through small, Irish villages quickly, zipping past the rare car that met us on the main road. I gripped Alec tightly with both hands as we sped through what looked to be rural Ireland. Small cottages dotted the two-lane highway, and signs in both English and Gaelic rose up out of muddy meadows along the road. Farms and sheep seemed to be the main theme as we drove on, and I rested my head against Alec’s back, taking it all in. Ireland certainly was beautiful. It might’ve been the most beautiful place I’d ever seen. I was still so surprised at the greenness of it all. It was so bright green that it almost hurt my eyes to look at it.

In a way, its greenness and fresh, cool air reminded me of Oregon. It had the same dewy feeling, like it had just rained for a month straight, and the foliage was quite similar to Oregon’s. Sitting behind Alec on his motorcycle, I almost felt like I was home in Oregon, except everything was much older. We drove for a little more than an hour, and by the time Alec pulled off the road, I could see the ocean beyond the fields in front of us.

We went down the shore for a couple more miles, passing quaint little beach shacks and pubs that lined the road parallel to the beach. That led to a secluded hilly meadow, which felt like it went on forever. Alec guided the motorcycle up one of the hills and I realized we were at what seemed like the tallest point of the area. I gazed out and saw miles and miles of wild grass, ocean, and forest.

I smiled, thinking of the last time I had ridden behind Alec—the day that my horse, Bo, had been spooked by a low-flying hawk and Alec had rescued me. It had been only a week into my time in Wales. Alec had been so hot and cold those first few weeks, mixing it up between blatantly hitting on me and acting like he hated me. Later, he’d told me it was only because he didn’t know how to process his feelings for me, which was understandable, but I still laughed when I thought about how much of a jerk he’d been.

“How long are you planning on staying, then?” Alec inquired.

I looked at him and tried to gauge his tone. Was he being sincere? Or did he want to know when he would be rid of me? I couldn’t tell. I knew from last night that he apparently didn’t trust me. Luckily, Helen answered.

“Hopefully, for a while…” She looked over at me and smiled. I smiled back, and George gave me a thumbs up.

“A few weeks, maybe a few months. It just depends,” I explained, with no emotion.

“On what? Don’t you have some hot shot job back in L.A.?” Alec’s tone was definitely irritated. He wasn’t curious. He wanted to know how long he’d have to put up with me. He went from playful to annoyed so quickly. How was that possible?

“Alec, please! Be polite,” Helen scolded.

“I’m sorry, I just have a hard time believing that a beautiful woman would want to stay here voluntarily, when she probably has so much going for her back home. There has to be a reason.”

He was being feisty. I turned red at the word “beautiful”, but it was essentially used to insult me, so my blush quickly faded into slight anger. Well, if he wanted feisty, I would give him feisty. I turned to face him.

“For your information, I absolutely love it here, and I’ve loved it from the moment I arrived. I consider myself lucky to be here. And no, I don’t have a job to go back to in L.A., which is probably a good thing, because I’m now realizing it was a really shitty job to begin with. I’m glad to be done with it.”

I purposely left out the Harry situation; that could be explained later, if he was lucky enough to get to know me, that is. At this point, I wasn’t sure if he deserved to get to know me.

Alec slowed the motorcycle down and we rode along a trail paralleling the ocean. I couldn’t see the sand—we were too far up. Small, rocky hills hid the shore from our sight. Moss covered the rocks, and the ocean was a deep, royal blue. We followed one of the trails to the top of a cliff. All of a sudden we came to a clearing, and I gasped.

Below us and all around us were strange rock formations that looked like cities built into the hillside. Waves crashed at the feet of these monstrous rocks, and each rock had another behind it that was slightly taller, making it seem like a gigantic staircase, or hundreds of columns of varying heights right next to each other. The rocks were rounded, and they seemed so artificial and manmade, but I knew they weren’t. Green, linear cliffs painted the backdrop, and I felt like I was in some sort of fairytale.

“This is Giant’s Causeway,” Alec said, pointing to the rock formation. “We’re on the Shepherd’s Steps right now. Do you want to hear the scientific reason for why these rocks are here? Or the mythological reason?”

“Both.” I smiled, getting off of the motorcycle and flipping my windswept hair out of my helmet.

“Science says these rock formations were caused by lava that plateaued and cooled quickly, causing contractions, or cracks, much like how wet mud dries. Irish folktale says that these are the remains of a causeway built by giants. The story goes that an Irish giant built a causeway between Ireland and Scotland so that he could fight a giant in the neighboring country. What ensues next is debated, but everyone agrees to this day that Ireland won, and the Scottish giant fled back to Scotland in fright, destroying the causeway behind him so that the Irish giant could not come find him. It just so happens that there are identical basalt columns at Fingal’s Cave on the Scottish isle of Staffa. It’s made out of the same ancient lava.”

“I think I believe the Irish folktale. I mean, there are identical columns in Scotland. Surely, this is evidence enough.” I winked at Alec.

“I happen to think so, too. Us Irish folk are very superstitious. You’d laugh at some of our silly legends.”

“Like what?” I’d taken a seat at the edge of the cliff, overlooking the rocks and the sea. Alec came and sat next to me.

“Well, for example, a lot of us believe that faeries live all over Ireland in fairy mounds, and to disturb these mounds would mean a lifelong stream of bad luck. Major highways have been rerouted during construction so as not to disturb these so-called mounds. And if you find a mound or a fairy, you’re supposed to keep it secret, otherwise you’ll have bad luck for life. Also, fairy paths are sacred, so you are to never build on any fairy path.”