Page 80 of Calling on the Matchmaker
“I need to figure out what to do first,” Enya whispered, her eyes pleading with Finola.
The knocking thudded again, this time louder. “Finola?”
She pushed up from the mattress, but Enya clutched her arm. “Please?”
Finola nodded. It wasn’t her place to interfere in Enya’s life. “Okay.”
Enya fell back into her pillow and pulled the covers up over her head, as if that could somehow keep her hidden from Da.
Inhaling a deep breath, Finola slipped out of bed. “Da? Come in.”
The door opened, and he stepped inside. He was attired as usual in a finely tailored suit, his red hair neatly greased and combed, and his face cleanly shaven. Even though he looked as successful and put-together as always, something about him hinted at despair. Maybe it was the slump of his shoulders or the sadness in his eyes or the droop of his mouth.
“I’m sorry for waking you, Finola.” He fidgeted with a piece of paper in his hands.
“I was awake already.” She waited for him to look at the bed and to see Enya’s outline under the covers.
Instead, he unfolded what appeared to be a letter.
She glanced at the draperies and the amount of light in an attempt to gauge the time. “You’re in town early this morning.”
“Aye.” He ran his finger along the edge of the paper. “I came straight away so I could see if Riley Rafferty’s message to me is true.”
“Riley sent you a message?” Finola’s pulse tapped an uneven pace.
“He had it delivered to me last night.”
“Oh?” A strange foreboding came over Finola. She had the urge to stalk over to her da, rip the letter from his hand, and shred it into a hundred tiny pieces.
“You can imagine my frustration when I received the news.”
“What news?” Did she really want to know?
“Don’t tell me you aren’t aware.” His tone was suddenly edged with censure, and when he peered across the room at her, his normally kind and patient eyes were filled with disappointment.
“I saw him last night. He brought me home from visiting in the Kerry Patch. We said good-bye as usual.”
But was it as usual? Or had there been a finality about the parting she’d overlooked?
“He called off the match.”
Even as her da spoke the words, Finola guessed the truth—Riley’s words of love had been his good-bye, that’s what.
Protest swelled along with bile. What had she done now? “He can’t call it off. He needs the match to win the election, and you need the steel contract.”
Her da shook his head, frustration creasing his brow and crinkling his eyes. “He said that Rafferty Wagon Company would honor our contract anyway, that they would purchase the steel for their wagons exclusively from us.”
“But the election?”
“He dropped out of the race. I stopped by his campaign office on the way home, and it’s cleaned out. Everyone’s gone.”
His quitting wasn’t possible. Not when she’d promised to marry him, had even begun to accept the fact that she would have a different life than the one she’d imagined.
Her muscles tensed. “The campaign must have moved locations.”
“He’s done, Finola. When I went to the wagon shop, I was told he left the city.”
Riley was gone?
