St. Patrick’s Day
“Slainte!” the formidable Margaret Ashland said to Shannon, lifting her glass of red wine and looking more like a giddy schoolgirl than a fifty-two-year-old Midwestern hotel-chain mogul. Although there wasn’t one drop of Irish blood in Margaret’s family tree, Shannon’s mentor celebrated the March holiday with enthusiasm. And at least half a bottle of Bordeaux’s finest.
“Slainte,” Shannon replied, clinking beverages. “And thank you for inviting me over for such a delicious dinner. There’s nothing that says ‘home cooking’ quite like your world famous Roasted Red Potato and Leek Soup.”
Margaret laughed. “It’s Ricardo’s potato soup, and you know it.” She waved her palm in the direction of The Ashland Hotel’s impeccably clean kitchen, where the talented Chef Ricardo worked his nightly magic. “He’s been delighting our guests with it all week.”
Ricardo’s ritzy, copper-pot-crammed workshop was an extension of the hotel’s aromatic-candlelit-glowing dining room, its spacious and sensuous guestrooms and its exotic flowering-plant reception area. The Ashland Hotel, just a few miles down the road from Holiday Quinn, was an example of supreme luxury and flair. In fact, everything about Shannon’s home away from the inn bespoke of high class and expensive tastes.
And why shouldn’t it?
Margaret Ashland demanded nothing but the best.
“Well, it was as fabulous as always,” Shannon said. “It rivals Grandma Quinn’s, and that’s saying something.”
The older woman looked pleased. “Glad to hear it, missy, but you know I always have ulterior motives for plying my top employees with ultra-rich food.” She paused and looked Shannon in the eye. “I’ve got a proposition for you. You ready?”
Shannon had a sneaking suspicion that the forthcoming proposition might involve longer hours along with a sizably increased paycheck, but she didn’t mind. She’d worked for Margaret since college, whenever her parents could spare her from Holiday Quinn and, once they were gone, during the weeks when the inn was closed. As a longtime family friend, Margaret had affectionately taken on the role of Shannon’s second mother and had made no secret that she was grooming Shannon for bigger and better things.
Shannon nodded. “Fire away.”
Her boss laughed. “Oh, there’s no firing involved, my dear. Just the opposite. I want you to be a manager.”
She squinted at the older woman. Maybe Margaret had imbibed a few too many glasses of that pricey wine. “Um, I already am a manager. You promoted me three years ago, remember?”
Margaret laughed again. “Sorry, sweetie. I know that! What I meant was, I want you to be the manager. The head manager. Of any one of the country’s twenty-three Ashland Hotels. You choose which.”
Shannon felt a foreign sensation of excitement bubbling up inside her, along with another emotion—one she couldn’t quite identify and didn’t have time to analyze. Okay. So this was a surprise after all. And a part of her wanted to jump at it. But…but…
“But…” she said aloud, her thoughts racing through all the hows and whys and wherefores.
“No buts necessary. We can take care of anything that needs taking care of—including Holiday Quinn.” Margaret looked at her kindly. “You don’t have to stay in this little corner of the state simply because the inn is here, Shannon. It’ll fetch a sizable price if you sell.” She grinned. “And I’m tempted to make the first offer myself. I love that place.”
All true words, Shannon had to admit. Margaret had visited the inn countless times when her parents were alive and had always admired it with a professional eye. And the land Holiday Quinn sat on was prime resort-quality real estate. She knew she could make a bundle in profits. But, even though she didn’t see herself retaining ownership of the place forever, she couldn’t bear to watch some overzealous housing developer tear it down in favor of a bunch of modern-looking bungalows for wealthy yuppies.
Not that wealthy yuppies didn’t frequent the inn now. Take Exhibit A: The too-hot-for-his-own-good Bram Hartwick. She sighed remembering the powerful man who still graced her nighttime fantasies and who she’d put on her inn’s mailing list in hopes that he’d return. Not that he’d taken the hint yet.
But regular folks like Darlene and Keith Baker could stay at Holiday Quinn, too, as they had just last weekend when Shannon hosted the St. Patrick’s Day celebrations at the inn—a few days in advance of the official holiday. There had also been families there and older couples who’d been guests for years. She couldn’t disappoint everyone by selling. Even if…even if…
She shut down that burgeoning thought before it could fully form in her mind. There were too many memories still housed at Holiday Quinn—of her parents and grandparents, and of years of celebrating special occasions like this particularly Irish holiday with them. Even when it fell on a Wednesday, as it had this year.
No.
She couldn’t just give it up yet. No matter what Margaret said. No matter how much Shannon’s spirit soared at the idea of having a grand adventure far away from home.
“Think about it, honey,” the wonderful woman sitting beside her said gently. “Keep the idea open.” Margaret shot her a speculative glance. “I know it’s hard to give up the past, but you’ve got a promising future ahead of you. Don’t sell yourself short, okay?”
“Okay,” Shannon whispered. “And thank you. I’ll mull this over for awhile.” And she’d try, if only out of respect for Margaret’s wishes.
“You do that.” Margaret refilled both of their wineglasses and pointed to the dessert menu. “How about some Shamrock Cake? It boasts five layers in different shades of green, and it’s topped with a candy four-leaf clover.” She leaned closer. “Ricardo has secretly dubbed it ‘The Shannon’ in your honor.”
Shannon laughed, loving that she had a family friend—heck, practically a family member—looking out for her when the twinges of loneliness crept into her soul and made it ache with longing. “How could I possibly resist?” she said.
Margaret Ashland’s philosophic words flowed out in a gush of whimsical wisdom, enhanced, no doubt, by the warm glow of candlelight and strong vino. “It’s my belief, my little Irish rose, that some temptations should never be resisted. This is merely one of them.”
***
Across the Wisconsin-Minnesota state line, Bram checked the voicemail on his cell phone for the sixty-seventh-quadrillionth time that day and stared at his frosted mug of unnaturally green beer, which O’Flannery’s Pub served only on this annual occasion.
He deleted a few stupid messages, amused himself by shredding an unwanted business card and regarded his two big brothers with detached curiosity.
His brother Alex, the middle child, was muttering to himself while composing what must have been a twenty-page manifesto on athletic shoes into his travel laptop. Alex, founder and CEO of his own company, HighTop Treads, had been at this task for a half hour already. He paused occasionally, but only to stroke the black plastic above the computer screen. Bram was pretty sure Alex slept with that thing.
Meanwhile, their eldest brother Grant had no fewer than two BlackBerrys on the table in front of them and another that he had clutched to his ear, in addition to a paper-filled briefcase, which he’d opened. Bram watched Grant page through a stack of nasty-looking invoices from his multimillion-dollar company—Eastern Treasures, Inc., of which he was president, of course—taking an occasional photo of a document and e-mailing it instantly to the unfortunate employee he had on the line in St. Petersburg. His brother took turns swearing…in Russian…at the man, at the papers and at the BlackBerrys, between slurps of his disgusting green beer.
And this was what they called A Night of Family Bonding.
Bram rolled his eyes. He and his brothers were exactly one-sixteenth Irish, but they used to milk that drop for all it was worth on St. Patrick’s Days of “olde.” They used to talk a “wee bit,” too. To each other, in fact, not just to their electronic equipment. When the hell had that changed?
He sighed and glanced a few more times between his two closest relatives. Deciding Grant was a lost cause, he focused his attention on Alex.
“Gonna be done with that script anytime soon, Shakespeare?” he said, aiming for eye contact and a jovial tone of voice.
Alex grunted something at him.
Bram took this as encouragement enough and tried again. “Hey, how’s it going with Carrie Ann? You two gonna do the Bahamas again this spring?”
Alex lifted his fingers off the keyboard and stared at him. “What?”
Bram laughed. “Your girlfriend? Vacation? Anything romantic happening there? Hey, I know a great little getaway in Door County, Wisconsin, if you two are interested.”
He thought of his visit to Holiday Quinn the previous month and the beautiful woman he’d met that weekend. Shannon. Mmm. He still had regrets about not following her down the hall that night or trying to win a private invitation up to her room.
He’d gotten a postcard from the inn a couple of weeks ago, though, listing the upcoming “holiday” dates. He’d already missed this past weekend’s St. Patrick’s Day celebration, but maybe Easter…
His brother grimaced and downed about a third of his green beer. “Carrie Ann moved out after Christmas, Bro. Thought I told you.”
Bram’s eyes widened. Alex damn well hadn’t told him. He had a million questions: What had gone wrong? Whose decision had it been to break things off after two years? And what kind of a family was this—keeping secrets for months on end?
He opened his mouth to ask his cagey brother a few things, but Alex had already resumed his typing.
Okay. End of conversation.
He stared again at Grant, who was currently spouting off to the man on the phone about shipping and how the poor guy would need to—translated loosely from the Russian—“settle things with the company’s Moscow distributor if it took him all freakin’ day and night.”
Grant never thought twice about making those kinds of demands on his employees. He’d do all that work himself, and more, if necessary. He had done it. For years, in fact, which was why his first, second and third wives all divorced him, claiming Grant’s workaholism had progressed to an incurable illness.
Angie had dared to say the same about him, Bram remembered, which was a bunch of bull.
His cell phone vibrated in his palm.
He clenched his jaw and tried to ignore it. Well, maybe there was a sliver of truth to her words. He worked hard, sure, but he was nothing like his brothers.
Nothing.
He could sit here in this bar and relax, see? Being the CEO of a successful business didn’t mean he didn’t know how to turn off the daily onslaught of company chaos when he wanted to. It didn’t mean he didn’t have what it took to make a long-term relationship work. It just meant he and Angie weren’t well suited to being together, that was all.
Right?
The phone continued its relentless vibrating.
Damn. Maybe it really was something important this time.
He glared first at his brothers, who persisted in their benign neglect, and then at the stupid phone. Finally, he sighed and punched the green button.
“Hartwick,” he said into the receiver.
An hour and three phone calls later, Bram stalked out of O’Flannery’s with the start of a migraine and a vow to never waste another night this way again.
He wasn’t going to be like his brothers, no matter what lifestyle patterns had been set. No matter what performance expectations had been demanded by their competitive parents, whom they almost never saw because their mom and dad were even busier than they were. Bram was his own man, dammit, and he’d make his own choices.
Yeah, right.
His cell phone vibrated against his hip. He muttered a curse and checked the number. Work again. His secretary Miranda this time.
He clicked the button to answer, half listening as she recited the latest snafu at their Italian production center. The lightest snow had begun falling, and couples clad in green skipped past him on the sidewalk. Talking. Laughing. Connecting. In the soft glow of the streetlights, they made a picturesque scene. Like something from a romantic-comedy film set. Both worlds were equally foreign to him.
He sighed. “I’ll handle it, Miranda. Thanks for letting me know.”
“All right, Mr. Hartwick. There’s also a memo that was just faxed in from—”
“I’ll read it tomorrow,” he told her. “It’s almost eight o’clock. Go home.”
“Why, thank you, Mr. Hartwick,” she said, her voice indicating both surprise and delight. “But are you sure you don’t want to hear about—”
“I’m sure.” He needed to start doing more delegating in the office. He thought of something he did want to hear about, though. “One last thing. Any major trips already set during Easter?”
He could hear the flipping of calendars and the click of computer keys as she checked all possible sources of meetings, appointments, etc. He didn’t see anything listed on his iPhone for Easter weekend, but his schedule changed daily.
“I see a trip to London blocked in for the week prior, sir, but Easter weekend looks open at present. Do you want me to book something for you?”
“No, no. Thanks, Miranda. I’ll take care of it. Just keep it clear for me.”
If a journey of a thousand miles began with a single step, this one was his. He’d visit Holiday Quinn in April, see Little Miss Shannon again and make damn sure something happen between them this time.
And why the hell not? It was just one weekend. And, after all his hopping from one continent to the next, he figured the Easter Bunny had to be on his side.
***
Shannon slipped out of The Ashland Hotel and meandered down the quiet street. A few fat snowflakes fell and she caught them in her mittens.
So calm tonight. So peaceful. And so lonely.
St. Patrick’s Day used to be such a noisy family holiday, what with all the relatives, neighbors and friends showing up to share in it. She’d been too young then to realize how much she’d miss that later in life. How alone she’d be someday.
For maybe the three-millionth time she wished she’d had a sibling. Of any variety. A big brother. A kid sister. Even a step-sibling. Anyone she could count on to stay in her life. This only-child thing stank.
Her car sat conveniently parked across the street, but she couldn’t bring herself to return to the depressing, post-holiday silence of the inn just yet, not after such a spirited evening with Margaret. She needed to connect. With somebody. Then she remembered.
She dashed a block and a half down the snowy sidewalk and tapped on the window of Arpeggios, the secondhand music store Jake managed in between the big holiday weekends.
“Hey, Jake!”
The sign on the door read “Closed,” but she could see him through the glass pane, laughing with another guy.
He spotted her and motioned her in. “It’s not locked,” he called out.
“How are you?” Shannon said, brushing off a few remaining snowflakes and letting the friendly warmth of shop cover her like a winter’s coat. Bing was crooning “Danny Boy” from the in-store speakers, and Jake pointed to the younger man who stood across from him.
“My cousin,” he said. “Evan, meet Shannon. Shannon, Evan.”
As they said their hellos, Jake’s college-aged cousin eyed her curiously. “Shannon Quinn?” he asked. “THE Shannon?”
“Umm…” She glanced at Jake, who was smirking from behind a Sinaid O’Connor CD. What the heck was she supposed to say to that? “I imagine so. Why?”
Evan, whose fair complexion seemed capable of showing every change of emotion, turned pinkish. “I’ve heard about you,” he informed her. “Jake calls you The Babe behind your back.”
“Shut up, Evan!” Jake said, swatting him with the CD. “That’s not true.” Then he speared her with one of his most flirtatious grins. “I call her that to her face sometimes, too. Right, Shannon?”
She laughed. “That’s right, but your aptitude for flattery is legendary at the inn. No one believes anything you say.”
He waggled his brows. “Well, they ought to, babe.”
She rolled her eyes. The guy never knew when to stop. “Oh, cut it out. So, what are you two up to tonight?”
Jake shrugged. “Just closing up here then heading down to Green Bay for a little Irish revelry. Wanna join us?”
Shannon looked between the two men and shook her head. “Tempting, but no thanks. I’ve got to work at The Ashland in the morning. But,” she turned to Evan, “have boatloads of fun. And try to keep that wild older cousin of yours in line.”
Evan’s complexion turned a darker pink this time. “Oh, I don’t think that’s on the agenda, Shannon. But it was nice to finally meet you.”
She smiled at him. “Likewise.”
Jake chuckled and walked her to the door. “Drive home safe, babe.” Then, lowering his voice so his cousin wouldn’t overhear, he whispered, “Just say the word, Shannon, and I’ll go to Holiday Quinn with you instead.”
For a split second he looked every one of his twenty-six years and fully serious. And for a split second she actually considered his offer. But Jake was a friend and an occasional employee. And, though he was attractive, he wasn’t the man who’d been gracing her dreams at night.
So, instead, she shook her index finger at him and said in her most scolding tone, “Try not to break too many hearts tonight, Jake Marcolis. I need you to help me prepare for Easter at the inn in a few weeks, and I don’t want to have to identify your body after some angry Irish babe in Green Bay gets through with you.”
This made him laugh, as she’d hoped, and she escaped the shop without any further suggestiveness on his part. Jake was easy to brush off that way, which only proved there was little real feeling behind his proclamations of attraction.
Too bad, really. That he couldn’t act more sincerely toward her. That she couldn’t feel more affectionately toward him. Why wasn’t romance more convenient?
Shannon hopped into her car and drove the few miles back to the stretch of land nearby that she’d always called home.
But, even once she’d turned up the heat in her private room at the inn and made herself a hot cup of tea to combat the cold, she couldn’t quite shake the chill of loneliness, and she found herself on the verge of regretting her inability to take Jake up on his offer of nighttime companionship.
Yes, she wanted something more for her life, but she was starting to suspect she wouldn’t find it here. Not in Holiday Quinn. Not in Door County. Maybe not even in Wisconsin. She’d been living her life in this place, to a large degree, in honor of a family that had either died or moved away. If the situation were right, she’d be open to taking some kind of a risk now…finally.
Perhaps Margaret’s offer of letting her manage another hotel in another state would be the answer after all.
Only, there were impulses inside of her—communiqués from deep within her subconscious—that were trying to bubble up. She could feel them dancing just below the surface. Daring her to acknowledge them. She didn’t quite have the energy to excavate just yet, but she knew the day would come when they’d burst out of her. It was a toss up as to whether this prospect made her more excited or more anxious.
She flicked on her computer to scan messages of a different sort, and one in particular caught her eye.
Sender: Bram Hartwick.
He’d formally requested a room reservation for Easter weekend! King-sized bed. No smoking. Fully stocked fridge, please. Yada, yada, yada.
Her gaze followed his typed words down the screen, looking for the one extra detail she needed to know—not only for professional accommodation purposes, but for personal peace of mind.
Number of guests staying in the room: One.
She’d promised herself she’d take just one step. One small step toward adventure. And she’d vowed if ever Bram returned…
Shannon grinned and, for the first time in an hour, felt the tingling of heat all the way to her toenails. Seemed that Holiday Quinn, Door County and the fine state of Wisconsin had joined together to provide all of their risks in one single, dark-haired, six-foot-two package.
And, whether it turned out to be “oh, hell” or “hallelujah” for the holiday weekend ahead, that risky package was headed her way.