Chapter 8
EIGHT
Ronan frowned, staring at the phone after hanging up.
Ciara Doyle had been quite snappy and ended the call abruptly.
But then he had been a little short with her as well, which he regretted.
She was the most unusual girl he had ever met.
Ever since she had walked into his office, he hadn’t been able to get her out of his mind.
With her raven hair and sparkling cornflower-blue eyes, her colourful clothes and that radiant smile, she had ignited a spark in him he had thought was dead.
He hadn’t dared to hope he’d have any kind of relationship with a woman after the break-up with Angela all those years ago.
Since then, he had buried himself in work and shied away from socialising, spending the evenings with his mother, who now needed a lot of care. It was a miserable existence for a young man in his early thirties, but he had become used to it.
And then, when he had been working on the Martha Fitzgerald case and found the prospective heir, he had expected a much older woman.
But then there she was: Ciara Doyle, marching into his office like a whirlwind, shining a light into his dreary existence.
He had felt embarrassed about eating his sandwich in front of her when he realised that she hadn’t had her lunch.
Then they had had that moment in the restaurant, the little repartee about the northside of Dublin, versus the southside and it had made him smile all day afterwards.
She had made him step out of his comfort zone and it had felt so good.
But he knew she had a boyfriend called Brian, which meant she wasn’t available, even had he wanted to see her again.
He was out of practice and felt he wouldn’t have known how to approach her anyway.
Then he had organised the cleaning of the flat above the old bookshop so that she would have a nice place to stay should she want to go up to that remote part of Wicklow and inspect her inheritance. Ciara had been very grateful and he felt that it was a point in his favour.
But this latest phone call had been odd, Ronan felt.
Why had someone cleaned up the bookshop and put all the old books in order like that?
He hadn’t been in the shop since Martha’s death, and then only once just to look at the place in case there would be an executor’s sale, which would happen if they didn’t find the heir.
He had been startled to hear Ciara’s voice on the phone just now and he hadn’t known quite what to say. His shyness and confusion had caused him to snap at her, which she must have thought stand-offish.
Oh, Lord, he thought and wiped his forehead, why do I feel like this about a woman I’ve only met once?
Get a grip, boy, and get back to work. Ronan mentally shook himself and picked up the document he had been looking at when the phone rang.
But it was no use, he couldn’t concentrate.
What could he do about this little ache in his heart?
There wasn’t much he could do, except try to forget her, even if that would take a long time.