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Niall followed the priest into Tí Joe Watty’s and took Tomas with him as backup. In searching for answers regarding the veil he’d discovered a force that was strong enough to lift it emanating from the pub. He couldn’t tell if the priest had anything to do with it, but he followed the instinct of his stallion and took a seat at the bar. Niall knew the bartender. Her family had taken care of their property and kept the O’Leary secret for generations. She made her way over to him and Tomas.
“What can I get you, Niall?” she asked.
“I’ll take a whiskey,” Niall replied.
“What about you?” she asked Tomas with a smile that offered more than just a drink.
But Tomas either didn’t notice or didn’t care. He was hooked on his mate. Man, he had it bad. Niall wanted no part of it, but he had a duty to fulfil and an obligation to save his sister. First, though, he needed to find out why the veil had lifted despite it still being summer on the island.
“Aye, a whiskey,” Tomas said.
The bartender stepped away to get their drinks.
“I think the lass likes you,” Niall said, nodding toward the buxom bartender.
“What of it?”
Niall grinned. “Just an observation is all.”
The priest had found an empty table across the bar, but no one was with him. Niall honed in on his stallion as he watched the priest. If his stallion didn’t trust the man, then he wouldn’t either. Strangely, as he watched the priest his stallion didn’t have much to say on the matter. The bartender came back with their drinks. Her eyes lingered on Tomas a little longer than they should have before she moved down the bar to wait on someone else.
“Doesn’t matter,” Tomas said. “I have a mate and I wish you the same happiness I’ve found when you meet yours.”
Niall sighed. After all he was pretty certain his father had sent Tomas to make sure he followed through, but they had no need to worry. Niall was a man of his word and he loved his sister something fierce. Strong-willed pain in his hole that she was, he still loved her. Family meant everything to him, and clan came before anything else. “Aye, you needn’t go reminding me. Don’t worry... I’ll find one, for the sake of duty. Nothing more.”
“Then you’re promising her the same fate that you’re rescuing your sister from,” Tomas said, his voice harsh, and he took a slug of his whiskey.
Tomas was his best mate, but he had a way of getting under his skin, needling him with the truth. He was right and perhaps that was the part that irked Niall the most. The whiskey’s heat slid down his throat in single gulp and Niall glared at Tomas as he slid the glass toward the edge of the bar to signal that he wanted another. A gust of cool air brushed against his back as the door to the pub pushed open, and two women entered along with the evening breeze. Niall turned as they entered the pub. They seemed to be looking for someone, and he noticed that they’d captured everyone’s attention. Not that he could blame them. One of them had brown hair that reminded him of honey. His stallion definitely had something to say now. Take her for a ride. Niall ignored his stallion, but even he couldn’t deny that he wanted to bury himself in those curves. Her generous hips swayed as she made her way to the priest’s table. Niall narrowed his eyes.
“Did you hear me, mate?”
“What?”
“I said what do you make of it?” Tomas asked, nodding toward the priest’s table.
“I’m not sure.”
His stallion picked up on bits and pieces of their conversation, but even with his acute hearing it was hard to make out the details with all the voices and laughter that filled the pub. Púca. It didn’t make sense. Were they talking about them? Had he heard the priest right? Niall had thought the priest had something to do with the veil from the moment he’d spotted him outside the pub. And now the one with hair like honey and shapely curves had something to do with it, too. He had to get close to her and find out what this meant. Yes, get close to her. We want her to ride us. Niall silenced his stallion. Inconvenient beast. Now was not the time to let his stallion’s desire to bed her get in the way of discovering why the veil had lifted.
“But we should stick around and find out,” Niall said.
Niall didn’t notice the bartender approach.
“Can I get you two more whiskey?” she asked.
“Aye,” Tomas said. “You don’t happen to know those two talking to the priest?”
She looked a little miffed at his question, which she clearly took to mean Tomas was interested in one of the women. “That one over there...” The bartender pointed to the woman that had Niall’s stallion ready to mate, even if he wasn’t. “...is here to investigate you.”
The bartender was summoned by a man seated at the other end of the bar, and left to serve him. Niall watched the honey-haired woman with even greater interest. This definitely had something to do with the veil’s disturbance. He didn’t know what, but if she was here to investigate him then maybe he should give her what she’d come for. Just then she looked up and met his eyes across the bar. He wasn’t sure why, but couldn’t help grinning at her. Must be his stallion. Her cheeks were flushed. His nostrils flared. Shite. This is going to be harder than I thought. His stallion could smell her desire. And he coughed, because he noticed something else had grown hard, too. She ignored him and said something to the priest instead. Niall frowned. He didn’t know why it bothered him that she disregarded the hunger his stallion had clearly awakened. Another woman joined their table, and they talked for a few minutes. Then both the priest and the woman who’d joined them got up and left, the priest stopping to talk to the man who’d summoned the bartender for a drink a few minutes ago. Then he walked past where he and Tomas were seated on his way out of the pub.
“You should go talk to her,” Tomas said.
“Aye, we shall. If she’s here to investigate us, then let’s give her what she wants.”
His stallion pranced in agreement.
Tomas chuckled. “Your stallion is what she wants. I could smell her from here and I don’t think it was me she was looking at.”
Niall grinned. “You caught a whiff of that, too.”
“Aye, maybe you’ve found a mate in that one.”
Niall groaned. His stallion had wanted her from the moment she walked into the pub, but it didn’t change the fact that he didn’t want a mate, and he didn’t know if she had something to do with the veil. But that didn’t seem to convince his stallion, who suddenly perked up. She was staring straight at him. Go to her. He grinned.
“There’s no denying there’s something that lass sees in you, but for the life of me I can’t figure out what,” Tomas ribbed. “And I think your stallion is in agreement.”
Niall laughed. Talk to her. His stallion gave him a swift kick. He tossed back another shot of whiskey and headed toward her table.
