“You’rehoping? Were you thinking I’d say no?” Even if he proved an absolute dolt at washing dishes, she wasn’t about to turn him away.
“I warn you, I’ve little experience with it.”
“I’d wager you’re a fast learner.” She tossed a large, dry rag in his direction. “I’ll wash. You dry.”
He was a natural-born dryer, which was rather like saying one was a natural-born breather. Drying dishes didn’t require much skill.
“Donaghue is here every week, I’ve noticed,” he said as he dried a pewter plate. “Does he come around often?”
“Finley’s been visiting since he was a lad, back when all of our parents were yet living.”
“An old friend, then?” Sean slid the dried dish into the age-worn cabinet.
“Quite old.”
Sean raised an ebony eyebrow. “He’s my age, you realize. That’s not so very old.”
She scrubbed a bit of potato off the large serving pot in which she’d made the night’s coddle. “He was always Liam’s friend. I suppose that makes him seem older. Almost like another brother.”
“Is that what he is to you?”
In that moment, with an intuition most women are born with, Maeve pieced something together. Despite all of the time they’d spent together, despite her tendency to snuggle close to him when he drove her about in the cart, and despite the rather obvious cow eyes she made at him across the table every Sunday evening, Sean was jealous.
Of Finley Donaghue, of all people.
The kind thing to do would have been to put his mind at ease, to swear reassurances and speak sweet words of tenderness. But thewisething was to let him discover her feelings for himself.If their pattern became her having to swear up and down to her feelings anytime life gave him reason to wonder even a little bit, ’twould be a long and tiresome life indeed.
She let him chew on his thoughts as they finished the last of the washing. Sean didn’t grow angry or demand answers. He made no further comment, really, only stood with a furrowed brow and a downturn to his lips that clearly said,I’m pondering where I stand with a woman, and I’m not terribly keen on the answers I’m formulating.
So Maeve, being a font of compassion as well as a believer in the importance of a bit of humor, decided to help him along a bit. “Did you know that Finley has nearly five hundred head of sheep, a surprising number of which have black wool? Did you further know that he’s at his wits’ end over a particular weed growing in his back pasture? His wits’ end, Sean.”
His confusion only grew. She managed not to laugh, but ’twas a close-run thing.
“And can you guess how it is that I know he’s at his wits’ end over the weeds in his back pasture?” she pressed. “Because he told me. He has, in fact, told me several times a week for the past three years. Weeds, Sean.Weeds. For three years.” She took the rag from him and hung it over the back of a chair. “What was the last topic you and I chose to talk about?”
“We’ve covered so many in just the past quarter-hour.”
Maeve stepped closer to him and set her hands on both of his arms. “Precisely, you daft man. You are the one I enjoy talking with, the one who stays behind to help me rather than taking his leisure at the fire with my brothers.” She slid her hands up his arms and to his shoulders. “You are the one for whom I brave cold winter nights simply to snatch a moment of your company. Finley comes around often, as he’s a neighbor and a good friend of Liam’s. But you, Sean Kirkpatrick” —she wrapped her armsaround his neck— “are the oneIwatch for and wait for and hope will someday come by more often than once a week.”
His arms slid around her waist, and he pulled her close against him. “I’d be here every day if Desmond allowed it.”
“Because you like me?”
“Because Finley, apparently, needs help with his weeds.”
She leaned her head on his shoulder, settling into the warmth of his embrace. A woman could grow quite used to such a thing. “Christmas is this week.”
“Is it? Didn’t we just have Christmas a year ago?” His hand rubbed a slow, lazy circle on her back.
“Will Desmond be allowing you the day, or are you to be working yourself to the bone on Christmas, as well?”
His head rested atop hers. Her heart leaped about. She held more tightly to him.
“We’re to have Christmas evening to ourselves,” he said.
Just what she’d hoped he would say. “Will you come have Christmas supper with us?”
“I’d love to.”
