Page 6 of Beneath Pearly Irish Skies
Chapter Two
Sunlight was streaming into the stables for a change.
Kade paused from mucking out the stall and leaned against his pitchfork. He took a moment to enjoy the quiet and the light as it wrapped around him. He’d awoken happy like usual—his mum had said he’d been happy from his first moment of breath—but there was a new excitement in him.
Megan was finding her way and setting roots in Ireland, something he believed would make her happy—hopefully with him. After yesterday, she knew how he was feeling, and he’d seen in her eyes that she felt the same. She was going to need time to sort things out, of course, as evidenced by her quiet yet searching demeanor at the farm yesterday afternoon. Good thing he was a patient man.
His longest standing pony nudged him in the back.
He laughed, turning to rub Winston’s black and white neck. “She’s a lot like you were when we met. Hurt and scared but with the biggest heart. You didn’t know what you had in you, but I did. Took you some time to figure things out.”
Winston neighed and nodded vigorously.
“Glad you decided to let me help you,” he said, starting to work again and whistling the pub classic “Wild Rover.”
“It’s lovely to see you’re whistling this morning, Kade,” he heard a female voice say.
Winston startled next to him, and he put a calming hand on the horse’s side as he turned his head.
Sorcha Fitzgerald stood in the sunlight in the white dress she always wore when she visited him. Some ghosts seemed to have an unlimited wardrobe, and others continued to wear their last earthly outfit. Kade had never figured out the particulars. It didn’t change the reason for their presence.
“You have a right to be upbeat, certainly,” she continued. “Things are going well with Megan.”
He couldn’t help but smile, both from the pleasure of seeing his old friend and from her recounting of things. “I thought you were around, although you haven’t shown yourself. I smelled your orange scent on my way to the arts studio yesterday.”
“It’s a fine place to have named after me, don’t you think? I’m glad Carrick finally saw sense and donated it to the village. No point in building a house for someone who’s dead and can’t enjoy it. I’d much rather be venerated this way.”
Kade snorted. In life, Sorcha Fitzgerald had possessed a sharp humor about the way of things. Dying didn’t seem to have changed it. She’d returned months ago to help her husband, Carrick, find new love with Megan’s sister, Angie. And since Sorcha was nothing if not stubborn, she’d announced she was going to help Carrick’s friends too. Or at least Kade. He looked forward to seeing what she had in mind.
“The arts center is going to enliven the souls of a lot of people, Sorcha. Much like your poetry did for you and those who read it. Maybe one day a poet like you will come and teach there.”
“A grand thought.” She cocked a brow. “Are you saying you read my poetry, Kade Donovan?”
Winston nudged him in the back, and he continued to soothe and pat the pony as a few others neighed in their stalls. Not all of his animals saw spirits. Kade couldn’t say why some did and some didn’t, but the same was true of people. He’d always seen them. Like his granny had. Carrick saw spirits too, yet he had only seen Sorcha for a time—and so Kade had discovered another mystery. Ghosts could choose not to be seen, even by those who naturally possessed the sight. Living in Ireland, he knew anything was possible, but still, life held plenty of secrets. He recalled a piece of Sorcha’s poetry along those lines.
“‘The sunshine strikes a patch of land, and the secrets held in the soil retreat into holy springs for cleansing.’ That might be my favorite passage.”
Her mouth curved. “You have a romantic Irish soul as well as the biggest heart in the county. It’s one of the reasons I always liked you.”
He watched as her brown hair billowed in the sunlight as if touched by wind in another place. “Is that why you’re helping me? I understand why you helped Carrick. He was your man, and you wanted him to be happy again.”
She fussed with her sleeves. “Maybe I’m helping you because of how you took care of Carrick after I died, but we’re getting off track. I’m here to talk about Megan.”
He hadn’t expected a straight answer. Spirits were still people, after all, and they had minds of their own. He’d stopped trying to figure out why some stayed around and others didn’t. “Then talk.”
This time she snorted. “Megan is unsettled after realizing you have feelings for her, which she shares, by the by.”
Hadn’t he seen as much in her eyes? He knew better than to think it meant their seas would be calm, but he’d call it progress. “I’m glad for it, but she’s still fighting to sort out the past. I hadn’t planned on sharing my heart with her yesterday, but it’s like I told her. I trusted it was the right moment.”
“You helped her find her center, and that’s a tremendous gift, Kade. Something her deceased husband never gave her.”
He crossed his arms. “Oh? Do you spirits all know each other?”
She scoffed. “No, he’s passed along to wherever his next place is, but I looked into him. I don’t like him. And you know I’ve always been inclined to admire a brave man fighting for a cause.”
While he didn’t have the slightest idea how she could “look into” such a thing from the beyond, her words confirmed what he’d suspected. Hadn’t Angie bit her lip to keep from talking poorly about Tyson the other night at the pub? “It’s hard to be angry with a dead person.”
“And yet Carrick managed to be mad at me for three years,” she said, tracing the Celtic symbol of the Trinity knot on the wall of the stall, one he knew bespoke of eternal love. “But that’s Carrick. Megan is the softer kind. She’s the sort to get stampeded by life, whereas you know how to calm the stampede. Both inside and in the fields.”
