Page 5 of Irish Legacy

The words landed tight behind Quinn’s ribs. She held her breath, turning the idea over in the quiet of the booth. That would be more than she dared to ask for. At this point, she was starting to give up on the idea of meeting the right person at all.

She clinked her bottle against Natalie’s pint glass. “I like that. Cheers.”

3

It was after midnight, and the pub had finally thinned to something manageable. The wedding crowd had mostly drifted off. A dozen or so remained, clustered at tables with the loose energy of people who weren’t ready to call it a night just yet.

“Go on,” Jack said, already reaching for a clean glass. “I’ve got it.”

He didn’t need to say it twice. Trish pulled a pint for herself and carried it into the snug. Natalie and Quinn sat close together, heads bent, their voices low enough that Trish couldn’t catch the thread. Emma was leaving the snug with an armload of empties, bottles clinking against pint glasses.

“Thanks, Emma. You don’t have to do that. You’ve done more than enough tonight.”

“It’s fine.” Emma set the glasses on the bar and came back in. “Take a seat and relax for a while.”

Trish lowered herself onto the bench across from them. The wood creaked the way it always did. The first pull of Guinness went down cold, and her shoulders dropped an inch. Emma settled beside Natalie, one hand resting on her knee like it had always been there.

“I love this time of night,” Emma said to Quinn. “The musician has packed up and everyone’s had enough drinks that they’ll sing. Jack has a great voice. He’ll always sing one or two.”

Quinn smiled. “I’m already having the best night so I can’t imagine it getting any better. You have no idea how nice it is to just… be. I rarely get to switch off outside my own home.”

She didn’t say it like a line. It sounded like a woman setting down something heavy.

“Where are you staying?” Trish asked. Just conversation. She expected the answer before it came. Ashford Castle, probably. Or the lodge in Cong. Somewhere with a gate and a driveway and someone to park the car.

“I found this cute little Airbnb down by the river. It’s tucked away and private.” Quinn’s fingers wrapped around the bottle. “I’m looking forward to waking up with the quiet. The birds. The sound of the water.” She paused. “I’m only here for a week, so I want to make the most of it. Really relax and unwind.”

Trish took another drink.

The cottage behind the old mill. Damp in winter, but entirely out of the way.

Quinn leaned back against the high timber wall of the booth and let her eyes fall shut. Just a second, long enough to let out a slow breath. Trish watched her. It wasn’t merely the Hollywood polish or the blond hair curling damp against her collar. The woman had an undeniable gravity. People paid millions to put that presence on a thirty-foot screen, but sitting here in Kilvolan, wearing a plain jumper with rain still drying on her shoulders, she was somehow still captivating.

Quinn’s eyelids lifted. Her gaze landed dead center on Trish.

The look didn’t wander. It lingered on Trish’s mouth, drifted down to the undone top button of her work shirt, and climbed back up. Trish gripped her glass.

Trish looked away, reaching for her pint. Pure foolishness. A movie star wasn’t sizing up a woman who spent her days dragging kegs across wet concrete. More likely Trish had a smudge of cellar dust across her cheek, or her hair had gone wild from the damp air outside. She took a long, cold pull of stout to kill the thought before it could take root.

Shouts erupted out in the front bar, followed by the heavy slap of palms against tabletop. Someone hollered for quiet, the banter died away, and Jack’s voice cut through the drafty silence. He sang Raglan Road. His tenor was rough, carrying the weight of a long week in the fields.

Emma rested her cheek against Natalie’s shoulder, their fingers laced together on the dark pine. The music filled the tight wooden box of the snug. It settled over the hum of the beer coolers and the rain tapping the street window.

Trish traced a slow path through the condensation on her glass with the pad of her thumb. Jack’s voice wound through the old song. The melody worked its way into the timber walls, smoothing out the tension still lodged behind her ribs, the tightness that had nothing to do with the fire in the grate and everything to do with the woman sitting across from her. She told herself it was only the stout, only the long night, only the way the snug always shrank when the music turned tender. Nothing more.

When she finally lifted her head, Quinn wasn’t listening to Jack at all. Not the rough edges of his tenor, not the familiar ache in the lyrics that always made the older locals shift in their seats. Her blue eyes were fixed on Trish. They carried the same heavy focus that had just dragged across her mouth and lingered at the open collar of her shirt.

Trish shifted on the worn leather of the snug seat. She hadn’t been looked at like that in years. Even then, in the dim corners of city bars, it had been a transaction, almost safe in its predictability. Someone looking for a quick story or an easy weekend. This was different. Quinn’s gaze wasn’t hunting. It was quiet, curious, turning over something she hadn’t expected to find in a village pub on a wet October night. A woman who could have anyone was staring at a publican who hadn’t bothered to change her own wallpaper in six years.

Trish set her jaw. The stout, the music, the late hour playing tricks on both of them. Nothing worth examining too closely.

A round of applause rolled through the pub then, mixed with scattered cheers and a few whistles. Trish blinked, the noise pulling her attention back to the open floor.

The door from the front bar swung open and Jack came through sideways, three pints in his hands.

“The groom insisted I drop these down to the owner and her friends.” He set them on the table, one in front of Trish, one for Emma, one for Natalie. “Said it wasn’t right, the woman who owns the place paying for her own drink in her own bar.”

Quinn lifted her empty bottle. “I think I need another one of these.”