Chapter 7 #2
They found Quinlan’s fish restaurant down a little side street and went inside.
It wasn’t crowded, so they managed to get a table by the window, where they sat down and started to peruse the menu.
Marian picked a shrimp cocktail with Marie Rose sauce and Claire a crab sandwich.
‘All freshly caught early this morning,’ the waiter told them.
They also ordered a celebratory glass of white wine and then sat back, smiling at each other while they waited for the food to arrive.
Marian showed Claire the outfit on the Pamela Scott website: a light blue linen shift dress with a matching jacket.
She clicked on the order button and put in her credit card details when Claire said she loved it.
‘Where’s that book you bought?’ Marian asked. ‘I’d like to look at the blurb and see what it’s about.’
‘I put it into the bag with the dress,’ Claire said and searched among their shopping that they had put on a free chair beside them. ‘Here it is,’ she said and pulled out a brown paper bag and gave it to Marian. ‘You’d better have it as you’re going to read it first.’
‘Thanks.’ Marian turned the book over and read the short blurb. ‘It’s about a man who has been away from his hometown in County Clare for a long time and how he is finding his roots.’
‘A bit like us,’ Claire remarked. ‘Except it was our great-grandfather’s roots in a place we had never been to.’
‘Yes, but that’s a different kind of story,’ Marian said.
‘Yes, that’s true,’ Claire said. ‘A real mystery with a happy ending.’
‘Exactly,’ Marian said. ‘I was so excited about your journey and your quest to find out the truth about that family feud when our great-granddad left Magnolia Manor and never came back.’
‘It was such a nerve-racking time,’ Claire said.
‘Sneaking into the family archives when nobody was looking and pretending to be someone else. Telling lies and trying to keep calm all through the months before I revealed everything to the family. I don’t know how I coped.
But I was obsessed. I just had to find out what happened. ’
‘You went undercover like a real-life spy,’ Marian said, still feeling huge admiration for her sister, who had never given up despite having to lie to everyone.
‘I know.’ Claire grinned. ‘I found out I was quite good at lying.’
They were interrupted by the waiter bringing them their food and wine. ‘Shrimp cocktail and crab sandwich,’ he said, putting their orders in front of them.
They dug into the delicious seafood accompanied by a glass of crisp white wine, followed by a cup of coffee and slice of apple tart that they shared. Then Claire sat back and picked up her phone. ‘I’m just going to send Pierce a text and then look up a few emails for Karina. Hope you don’t mind.’
‘Of course not,’ Marian said. ‘I can look up that author and his website. He seems like an interesting man.’
‘And not bad looking either,’ Claire said with a wink.
‘That’s not an issue,’ Marian said, trying to look stern. ‘It’s the quality of his work that matters.’
‘Of course,’ Claire said with mock seriousness. ‘Absolutely.’ Then she busied herself with her messages while Marian made a face at her.
Marian laughed and pulled her phone from her pocket, thinking how nice it was to be so close to her sister again.
They had been apart for such a long time and had missed each other very much.
She turned her attention to her phone and googled John Peters, looking up the website as it came up.
And there he was again, in a different photo, standing against the backdrop of green hills with the glint of the sea at an angle.
Possibly that village he had mentioned during their chat on the plane.
He was dressed in a white polo shirt which clung to his muscular torso with a dark blue sweater across his shoulders.
His smile was wide and charming and Marian felt a dart of recognition.
That was the attractive smile he had beamed at her during the trip.
And then those brown eyes and the crinkles around them, the dark hair with a sprinkle of grey…
He was indeed very handsome and she remembered his deep voice and slight French accent mixed with an Irish lilt. All very attractive, of course.
But as she had said to Claire, it was his novels she was more interested in.
She saw that he had published ten in the past five years, which was impressive.
The first five were in the thriller genre, but then he seemed to have switched to literary fiction, which were the ones that had sold the most copies, mainly in ebook format, even though the printed books were also quite popular, especially in Ireland.
His new book was at the top of the list, and then there was another one, soon to be published, with a link to preorder for the ebook.
The novel had the title Family Secrets and it would arrive as soon as it was published into the reader’s Kindle, if they had an account.
Marian, despite having both an account and a Kindle, preferred nevertheless reading what she called ‘a real book’ that she could hold in her hand.
Despite this, she clicked on the preorder button for the Kindle edition and then proceeded to read the description of the book.
It was quite short but what it contained made the blood drain from Marian’s face.