In the Bible you said your constant love and truth will always guard me. I can’t believe parts of the Dun Aengus fortress still stand. It made me think how as crazy as it is, even though this has been on Inishmore Island over thousands of years, you’re always with me. You stay the same. Nothing wears you down.
—Travel Journal of Will Sinclair, Abbeyglen, Ireland
He kissed you?”
Erin stopped in her tracks right in front of the entrance to school, as if the shock had paralyzed her legs.
“I can’t believe you kept this from me. Finley, that’s awesome.”
“No, it’s not. It’s awful.”
“I’d take that kind of awful any day,” she said. “But be honest. Didn’t any part of you just . . . hope?”
“It’s not that I thought he liked me. I know that kiss was simply a diversion.” Just something Beckett did on a regular basis with any chick with lips. “But still. There might’ve been the tiniest sliver of my heart in that. Some part of me who wanted Beckett to say, ‘I’ve never felt anything like I did when I kissed you.’”
“It’s like Shakespeare.”
Then the fantasy continued with a few declarations of adoration, some proclamations of my intoxicating beauty. “Well, it’s not going to happen. So pretend like you know nothing about a kiss.”
Erin sighed. “Sadly, I don’t.”
I stepped through the doors of Sacred Heart and reality smacked me back to earth with the smell of disinfectant mixed with the perfume of a few hundred girls. My pulse scurried as I realized I’d forgotten two notebooks and a work sheet at home.
God, help me.
Erin and I walked into English class, and the temperature dropped a good thirty degrees.
I found the source of the cold as I took my seat in front of Beatrice.
My smile was friendly, as if I hadn’t a care in the world. “Good morning.”
“Is it?” She studied her notes for our quiz on Macbeth, not even bothering to look at me. “Taylor said you weren’t too happy about her and Beckett in the tabloids.”
“I really don’t care. Beckett and I are friends. That’s all.” And no longer that.
She turned a page of notes. “You throw yourself at him at every opportunity. It’s embarrassing really.”
I threw myself at him? Me? “That’s an . . . interesting perspective. But I think we both know it’s not true.”
“I know what I’ve seen.” Her lip curled into a snarl. “You know it’s best for both of their careers if they’re a couple—as long as they’re doing these movies.”
“And Taylor’s success means more roles for you?” Because this was more than Beatrice being protective of her cousin’s “boyfriend.” This was strictly about Beatrice.
“It’s public knowledge he’s with Taylor.”
Was he? I just didn’t know anymore. Nor did I understand why he wouldn’t come right out and tell me. “I’m his assistant. That’s it.” Or I was his assistant.
“And wasn’t that clever of you to get that job?” Bea sat back in her chair, her spine as straight as the wall behind her. “Watch yourself, Finley.” She snapped her binder shut. “I’d hate for you to do something you’d regret.”
“All right, class. Clear your desks.” Mrs. Campbell passed out the quiz, and I turned back to the front.
I was reading question number six when I felt the first poke.
I glanced behind me, but Beatrice was writing furiously on her paper.
When I got to question number ten, she jabbed me again.
“What?” I hissed.
I was going to rip that pencil out of her little manicured hand.
“Finley Sinclair,” Mrs. Campbell said, her accent as sharp as the gaze over her bifocals. “Is there a problem?”
I darted a look at Beatrice, then shook my head. “No, ma’am.”
After the quiz, Mrs. Campbell put us into groups to read the next act of Macbeth. Just as I was giving my best performance ever of Lady Macbeth, I saw Beatrice walk with Mrs. Campbell into the hall. I continued reading, though it was hard to totally throw myself into character when the role of my husband was played by a chick named Teresa Muldoon.
Mrs. Campbell stuck her head back into the room. “Finley, may I see you, please?”
Beatrice stepped back inside, and the hair on the back of my neck stood on end.
“Yes?” I said as I joined the teacher outside.
She held up my quiz. Then Beatrice’s. “Would you like to explain this?”
I squinted to see the red grade. “We both need to study better?”
“Miss Sinclair, twice I caught you turning around looking at Beatrice’s paper.”
“I wasn’t looking at her paper. She—”
“And then I see you two made the same exact grade. And not only that, but missed the same questions.”
“But she was—”
“And both put some of the same ridiculous guesses. Now what do you say?”
I took another glance at the quizzes. “My guesses were completely original. And it ticks me off that she obviously copied them.”
“Yes, your answer to the question of what makes Duncan a good king?” She read from my test. “He has a really cool crown.”
Her tone was dry as the pork chops Nora served for dinner last night. “Very impressive. You could’ve at least studied enough to know when you were copying a completely ridiculous answer.”
“But I didn’t copy. I came up with that ridiculous answer all by myself. Beatrice copied!” In all these things, I am more than victorious through Him who loves me . . .
“I saw you turned around myself.”
“Because she was jabbing me with her pencil.”
Mrs. Campbell regarded me as if I’d just told her the sky was purple. And even I heard how unbelievable it sounded. Because what eighteen-year-old girl purposely poked someone with a pencil as part of a diabolical scheme to get someone in trouble? Beatrice Plummer.
“I get how this looks. But I am telling you the truth.” Heat crept up my neck. Frustration pressed at my temples. Because Beatrice had been at this school forever. Her father was the principal, and she was the one with credibility. I was just the heiress with a bad reputation that seemed to have followed me from America.
“I am very disappointed in you. I will have to report this, and it will go on your record.” Mrs. Campbell lifted her chin and looked down her nose. “Let us assume it is your last disciplinary action.”
“But I didn’t do this. I promise I—”
“We’re done here.” Mrs. Campbell opened the door, and with my hands clenched, I walked inside the classroom.
Where all the girls watched me.
Including one who wore a telltale smirk.
“You’re going to love the Aran Islands.” Nora parked by the dock and smiled at me and Erin as we unbuckled. “Beckett’s such a busy thing, it’s no wonder he hasn’t been able to take you. I guess something got in the way.”
Erin elbowed me as we walked toward the ferry. “Like his lips on yours.”
“No matter.” Nora handed our tickets to a burly man in a coat as the wind pushed right through my jacket. “With Sean and Liam taking care of the house, it finally gives me a chance to take you about. I’ve been remiss in my duties, I have. This will be just the thing to get your mind off that terrible Beatrice. That principal father of hers is no better.” Nora continued to grumble as we climbed aboard the open ferry.
I had called her as soon as I’d gotten out of English, and she came and picked up me and Erin. After going nose to nose with Principal Plummer, which got us nowhere, Nora just checked us out and asked us what we wanted to do with the day.
I thought about my brother’s journal and the next spot on the agenda. Who needed Beckett and his truck? And his laughing eyes. Or his chiseled form, voice of honey, and a face that proclaimed him as God’s favored child.
Not me.
I pulled my hat farther down on my head as I stood at the railing between Nora and Erin. The wind on the water kicked up, as if it were mad that we were disturbing the ocean by traveling across. I knew exactly how it felt. I was ticked too. And if Beatrice had been on that boat, I’d have thrown her overboard.
God, help me to see what Will did. He had such unbelievable faith. Was he never shaken? Even in his last moments, did he not doubt, not wonder where you were?
Two hours later I stepped off the ferry onto the dock on rubbery legs, after being tossed about on the choppy Atlantic.
Nora rented us each a bicycle on the crowded quay at Inishmore, one of the three Aran Islands.
“Isn’t it beautiful?” Erin asked as she pedaled beside me, her red hair whipping behind her as wild as the land around us.
The island was small but busy, a mix of bare nature and booming modern commerce. Shops and pubs beckoned us to come in and sit all day, but it was the stone and grass beneath the sunny sky that sang to me.
“I think this day calls for ice cream,” Nora said.
“For lunch?” I asked.
“Sometimes a girl just needs to indulge.” Nora steered us toward Joe Fitzpatrick’s Cafe, where Celtic music blasted from the speakers overhead. Erin consumed a double scoop, filling us in on all the merits of calcium in dairy and antioxidants in chocolate. All I knew was the forty-five degree temperatures and the water-fed breezes made it much too cold to eat rocky road or vanilla bean. I took a few bites, then watched as it melted in the cup before I threw it away.
“On to Dun Aengus,” Nora said.
My legs tired as we pedaled toward the visitor center, where we left our bikes and I bought another ticket. From here we walked for twenty minutes uphill, and I pulled out the gloves I’d taken to carrying in my jacket.
“Look at that,” Erin said as we rounded the top.
My brother’s fortress stood in its stark beauty against the edge of the water. People sat on rocks on the ground around it, taking pictures and letting children play. Nora walked off to snap some photos herself.
“Come on.” Erin led as the two of us climbed on the ruins, the three remaining rings of stone slab walls.
Navigating loose rocks, she took me to the very edge where the land dropped off completely. “Another form of protection?” I asked.
“Hundreds of feet down.” She pointed to some large pieces of overhanging slate. “Best view there is.”
“We sit on it?” So close to the drop-off?
“No.” She laughed, and her voice carried in the wind. “We lie on it. You won’t fall.” I watched as she walked to the slate and lay on her stomach. “Come see the ocean.”
With gingered steps, I joined her. Though I was on solid ground and in no danger of falling, it was still a long way down. The ocean waves slammed into the rocks. “This island reminded my brother of God, his protection.”
“And what does it make you think of, then?”
“Mrs. Sweeney,” I said without thinking. “I get the feeling all she’s known are hard times. I believe every time she got back on her feet, another wave knocked her back until it just wore her down.” Kind of like me. But my audition was going to change everything. It had to. “Erin, do you know what happened to her husband?” It was past time to do some research.
“No. Have you asked Mrs. Sweeney?”
“She won’t talk about her past.”
Erin gave a small giggle. “I know just the ladies to ask. The MacNamara sisters. If there’s something to be known, they’ll have your information.”
“Would they talk to me?”
“They’d talk to a tree stump. If you can stand their plastic-covered couches and fifteen cats, it would be worth the visit, sure it would.”
“It’s really none of my business, I suppose.”
“Mrs. Sweeney is now your business, Finley. Don’t doubt that.”
We fell into a comfortable silence as we both watched the scene around us, painted by the strokes of God’s majestic brush.
Minutes passed before the cold of the wind and the damp in the air finally got to me. “You know, we’re surrounded by people, but it just feels so . . . lonely here.”
Erin lifted her head, giving me a faint, thoughtful smile. “Only if you let it.”