‘Me?’ He paused. ‘I… er manage an estate. Look after the repairs and maintenance, that sort of thing.’
She nodded, slightly surprised, which was wrong of her. Did his slight hesitation mean he was embarrassed? You shouldn’t judge by appearances but he was wearing a well-tailored suit which even to her untrained eye looked expensive. Certainly not clothes to be doing repairs in.
‘I’ve been to a business meeting,’ he said, quickly catching her quizzical gaze. ‘With my family’s lawyer. You’re much easier on the eye than him.’
Thankfully the barman appeared with her glass of wine so she didn’t have to respond to the compliment. He was so sure of himself, and she suspected comments like that came easily without much substance to them but for all that, he was charming and entertaining. It wasn’t as if she had any other plans for the rest of the day. The rain had put paid to those.
‘Thank you,’ she said to the barman as he handed her the red wine and gave a tumbler of amber liquid to Conor.
‘Sláinte,’ he said, lifting his glass.
‘I always wondered how you say it. I’ve read it a score of times in books but never heard it said.Sláinte,’ she said, trying to copy his pronunciation which sounded more likeslancha.
‘Not bad. Do you know what I like about you?’
Hannah jerked her head in surprise at the rather direct comment. ‘No. As that wasn’t a rhetorical question, I assume you’re going to enlighten me.’ Her mouth quirked in amusement as she realised she was rather enjoying this light sparring.
‘You haven’t looked at your phone once. So many people can’t exist for five minutes without checking something. It’s like some kind of addiction these days. We have a strict family rule at home: no phones at meal times or when we’re all together. Mam won’t have it.’
‘My Aunt Miriam doesn’t like phones much either but that’s because she’s a bit of a technophobe. My uncle loves a gadget, but he’s rubbish with his phone. He usually has to get me or my sister to show him how to do everything and then he promptly forgets.’ She laughed with a little pang as she thought of Miriam and Derek back home. Not her real parents, but the closest she and Mina had ever really had. Their birth parents had been the original daredevils, real thrill-seekers always on the lookout for the next adrenaline rush. But that was also the reason why they weren’t in their lives. Hannah winced momentarily thinking about the crash that killed them. Her real mother, so like Mina, wouldn’t have thought twice about giving up her job and going to a different country. Hannah had only managed to cross the Irish Sea and it felt like a giant leap. She often wondered whether, if her mother had lived, she would have been a disappointment to her.
‘I have to admit I might have taken a couple of pictures if the weather had been more amenable.’
‘That’s the weather for you.’ He lifted his glass in toast as he took a sip.
She stared a little curiously at the glass. ‘I’ve never tried whiskey.’
‘You’ve missed a treat and this is the good stuff. Want a taste?’
Normally it would have seemed far too familiar, but all her caution seemed to have been not just thrown to the wind but tossed into the Irish Sea.
‘Yes please.’
He held out the glass. ‘You have to smell it first.’
She took a cautious sniff and then a second.
‘What do you smell?’
Oh no, she was rubbish at this sort of thing. Her sister was the foodie and Hannah felt a slight pang. She missed Mina’s bubbly enthusiasm for anything relating to food and drink. But then that was why she was here – to learn. Taking a deep breath in, she closed her eyes and concentrated.
When she opened them, Conor was watching her. Darn it, he was into this stuff too. She hated getting things wrong. All she could smell was alcohol and matchsticks, and she was pretty sure neither was the correct answer but that’s what she was getting, so she went with it.
To her surprise, he nodded eagerly. ‘Matchsticks, yes. Exactly.’ He gave her a delighted beam, which made her feel she’d aced a test. ‘The whiskey is aged in oak barrels – that’s where you get the woody aroma – the barrels have previously been used for Bourbon and then the whiskey is transferred to barrels that held American rum, which gives it that wonderful spiced characteristic.
‘Now taste.’
Holding the cut-glass tumbler, she took a careful sip. She’d heard whiskey referred to as fire water before and she didn’t want to make a complete fool of herself coughing and choking. To her surprise, notes of spice and even vanilla warmed on her tongue. Without thinking, she took a second sip, enjoying the slide of liquid down her throat, heating as it went.
‘Wow, that’s not what I was expecting at all.’
‘Ah, that’s because this is the good stuff. We keep it to ourselves.’ He winked. ‘May I?’
She realised she was clutching the glass to herself.
‘Sorry. Yes.’ As she thrust the glass towards him, her fingers brushed his and there it was again, that little sense of connection. Did he feel it too? Or had the wine and whiskey addled her brains?
‘Have you any plans for this evening?’ he asked before taking a smooth swallow from his glass. She eyed the column of his neck. God, he was sexy, that was for sure. Normally a man like this wouldn’t look twice at her. She knew she could pull in a few admiring looks, but she was realistic enough to acknowledge she was no supermodel. It didn’t matter to her. She’d always got by on her brains and work ethic, which were more important.
