Page 10 of The Winter Laird

He rolled his shoulders. “I—”

“If it’s about Cory and the pub last night, I’m just glad that we weren’t forever banned for the black eye you gave him.”

“He told everyone he was going to get you in his bed!”

“I didn’t say he didn’t deserve it,” she replied calmly, turning the page. “Wow. The pictures of the inside of this cave-thing—”

“Monolithic structure,” Reilly corrected tightly.

“Right. The inside of thismonolithic structureis beautiful.”

“What does it say about Dowth?” he asked.

She flipped a couple more pages, then shrugged. “Not much. Looks like it’s a good place to go for the solstice sunset and it doesn’t have a waiting period, since you can’t go inside it—no opening available to the public after dark. The northern side is locked to tourists, but the western side reacts the same way that Newgrange does when the sunrise happens. The entire ancient tomb—sorry,monolithic structure—is filled with light.” She glanced up at him, taking in his set jaw and the five o’clock shadow. “Sounds pretty mystical. I wonder what it was originally used for.”

Expertly navigating the car around a small herd of sheep in the road, Reilly risked a glance at her. “What does your little book tell you?”

She read for a minute, then replied, “Says here that no one really knows. Apparently, it has lots of little passageways and rooms. It’s thought to be a tomb for the dead.”

“It’s not.”

She grinned. “But it says in the next sentence there are those that believe it had some other purpose. Astronomical, perhaps? Or something magical?” She clapped her hands together. “Ooh, I bet there were sacrifices!”

“There weren’t any sacrifices.”

“You say that with such authority,” Bri teased.

He glanced at her again. “There were never any sacrifices.”

“You asked,” she pointed out. “No need to get your knickers in a twist. No sacrifices, then.” She glanced at the sky out her window. “It looks like snow. We’re going to freeze our behinds off.”

Reilly took a deep breath and released it slowly. “Brianagh, I…” He rubbed his temple. “I need you to trust me.”

She looked at him curiously. “I always have. Why?” He pulled the car off the road and cut the engine, staring straight ahead for almost a full minute. “Reilly?”

He reached for a bag on the floor behind his seat. He held it in his hand for another long minute before finally handing it over to her. She pulled out a long, woolen dress, followed by some sort of gauzy thing and a pair of very ineffective, rustic-looking shoes.Actually, she thought as she held them up,more like two pieces of leather roughly sewn together.

Weird.

“What are these?”

“I have a, er, matching set in the trunk,” was his reply. “Will you put it on?”

She looked at him in silence until he finally met her gaze. “Reilly, there’s no need to be embarrassed about this.” She bit her lip. “I’ve seen you playing with your sword in the mornings. I’ve kind of figured out that you’re into reenacting the Middle Ages. I get it. That’s fine. And if you want me to be involved, I can give it a shot. I didn’t even know reenactment groups met at Newgrange.”

“Dowth. We’re going to Dowth.”

“Fine. Dowth, whatever, although the brochure says it’s closed to visitors until Easter. I do want to see Newgrange at some point, though. Other than sunrise,” she added, her brow furrowing as she glanced down at the brochure, now lying on the floor at her feet. “There’s a lottery just to get into the lottery to attend the solstice sunrise. Crazy.”

“So you’ll wear it?” He glossed over everything else she’d said.

“Sure. Are there any leggings or tights? I’m really going to freeze if I don’t get something else under it, though.”

“Nay,” he replied, unbuckling his seatbelt. “Nothing but the dress. We have less than thirty minutes to get to where we’re going, so I’ll hop out and watch the road to give you privacy to change.”

She took another look at the dress in her hands and raised an eyebrow. Well, no matter what he said…she was keeping her underwear firmly in place.

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