“Not sure how.There’s no road to the chapel anymore, only a climb up the mountain.The legend is real enough, but my father reminds me that Ernst is always full of crazy Emmanuel stories.He’d have everyone in Lauchtenland seeking Him if he had his way.”He leaned toward her.“We can go, call it one last fun adventure before you go home.But Scottie, all this to discover who held your legs?”
“Someone held onto me, or Mrs.Johansdotter, her daughter, and I would be dead.”
“Don’t get your hopes up, lass, for finding this mystery chap, please.”He reached for her hand.“Sometimes mysteries are just that…mysteries.”
“I know, but when you started telling me about Wenthelen, I felt it here.”She patted her middle.“Like she’s my sister.Five hundred years older, but still… She was a love child like me.And now she has a chapel where God’s eye beams down.Fable or not, I have to see this place.”Scottie glanced at her platter, the fish and chips barely touched.She was too full of curiosity about this ancestor the House of Blue also rejected.
“Then we’ll go.Maybe we’ll discover she confronted the number one nemesis of her time as well.”He laughed, but Scottie considered his point.
“MP Fickle’s great-times-seven-grandfather.Or grandmother.”
“Wouldn’t that be a tale to tell.Now eat your fish and chips,” Michael said, tossing her a playful, albeit sexy, wink.So much of her time in Lauchtenland with Kate was as expected, minus the mobs.However, meeting Michael Cross wasnotexpected and, despite her promise to Dad to return home the girl who left, she changed every time she was in the presence of this Cross man.
The conversation settled over fish and chips, with Scottie asking Michael for a date to hike to the chapel.Michael promised to do research then add it to her diary first chance.
Afterward, they chatted about nothing and everything—favorite songs and movies—and not refusing two large slices of Stella’s chocolate cake.
It was during her final bite of cake that Scottie realized when she went home, Michael would go back to Port Fressa for another HMSD assignment, perhaps falling in love with another Purnell.He’d kiss her like he’d kissed Scottie in the doorway.
She swallowed a taste of jealousy.She didn’t want him to kiss anyone else like he kissed her.To hold anyone like he’d held her.To makeherfeel as wanted as Scottie felt.
Pushing her cake plate away, she observed him as he answered a text on his phone.He was handsome but not in a way that put a girl off.Cap was good-looking and rugged with an interesting, expressive face.Michael’s features approached perfect, if one could use the term for any human, yet he was so strikingly imperfect.
“Mum,” he said, tossing his phone to the table.“She can’t let go that I’m more a Cross than a Pratt.Once again, she’s appealing to my age and any possible vanity about my future—” He stopped, making a face.“Why am I bringing you down with my venting?”
“Did she text at Fickle’s office?”
“Am I becoming so obvious?”He grinned.“Yes, again, that’s not why we left.Fickle was digging in.Mum’s text proved a fortuitous tool to pretend something pressing was on your diary.”
“I suppose you’re right,” she said, sighing.“I’d hoped to get something actionable out of him.”She looked in his eyes.“By the way, you look like you stepped in poo when your mom sends a text.At least when I think it’s her.”
“Poo?Really?”He laughed softly, exhaling, relaxing his shoulders.“I’ll work on that then.Now, what were we talking about?”
“I can’t remember.Isn’t that nice?Shug used to say there’s nothing better than frivolous chitchat among friends.It frees the soul.”
“I’d like to meet this Shug one day.She sounds enchanting.”
“Enchanting?”Scottie laughed, missing Shug a bit.“Hardly.She’s the quintessential strong southern woman who takes no flak from anyone yet loves her family and friends with the fire of the sun.”
“How lucky to have been raised by her,” Michael said, his comment undergirded by the sound of a small band warming up.Michael waved the proprietor over.“Is this new?Live music?”
“Yes.You.”He pointed to Scottie then Michael.“Dance.Ildlys.”He clapped his hands, and patrons at the center tables began to shove them aside and stack the chairs on top.
The band’s dissonant sound of the guitar and fiddle warming up turned the Belly of the Beast into a Hearts Bend barn or backyard where the melodies of Appalachia met the whine of western music.An upright bass and a bodhran joined the set, along with an accordion.
Suddenly the notes came together, and the Beast’s patrons began to stomp and clap.Couples migrated to the floor, hands clasped as they danced side by side in skilled, specific steps.
“What is this?”Scottie said.“Ildys dance?”
“Ildys is an old Danish word for firelight.It’s a dance for the out of doors, under the stars and around a fire, but Ernst’s big fireplace will do.”
Michael took her by the hand to the dance floor.The lights dimmed and thousands of bluish bulbs glowed from the heavy timber beams holding up the Belly of the Beast.
“The stars,” Scottie whispered.
Michael tucked Scottie by his side, his left hand around her waist.“Take my right hand with yours.Put your left hand on mine resting on your waist.Now, step forward with your right foot, rock back on your left, then we turn to the right.Step forward and rock back.”
She tripped the first two turns, learning the music and the feel of Michael.She laughed softly as he encouraged her, his warm breath in her ear.
