Chapter 2
CHAPTER TWO
Aisling struggled for breath, as she suddenly stared up at blue skies. What had just happened? “Blimey O’Reilly. What on earth—?”
Then a man’s worried face appeared. “I’m sorry. I’m such an eejit. Here, let me help you up.”
The man—the one from the window before—extended a hand.
She glanced at it, then him, then realised there was no real way she could stand up by herself without ripping her dress. And much as she didn’t want to, there was nothing for it but to accept his help.
She touched his palm, and sure enough, that same strange sensation she’d experienced before swept across her. But no. No, no. The man with whom she seemed to have an instantaneous bond couldn’t be so clumsy as to knock her down. That wasn’t how this was supposed to go.
He pulled her up, her too-tight dress protesting as a big ripping sound filled her ears.
“What the actual—?” She swallowed a word and glanced down—fortunately the bodice was still in place, but the side split had crept higher. Heat filled her chest. “You ruined my dress!”
“I’m so sorry.”
“Why weren’t you looking where you were going?”
His brown eyes studied her, he was biting his lip.
Well, so what if perhaps she should’ve been a little more careful too? “What are you doing here, anyway? The hotel is closed for a private function.”
“I’m, er, staying here.”
Great. So he was the mystery guest who’d cajoled Ash and Mam into staying while a family event was on. “Today is my brother’s wedding day, and you’ve just banjaxed it.”
“I’m so sor—”
“Sorry, I know!” she snapped. “Look, now I’ve got dust all over me!” She tried to brush it off, slapping it from her skirts, as clouds of dirt particles drifted into the air.
“Can I help?”
“What do you think you’re going to do? Beat the dust out of my dress while I’m still wearing it?
No, you can stay away.” She stuck up a hand as he moved closer.
“I don’t want you anywhere near me.” Her head started aching, and she touched the French roll which felt a lot flatter than before. Her breath hitched. “My hair!”
Another man came into view, glanced at her, glanced at the man. “You okay here, Andy?”
So that was his name. Well, if this man knew the klutz then he was likely equally bad. So she glared at him too.
“I’m fine,” Andy mumbled.
“Well, I’m not,” she sniped.
Andy turned to her, a pleading look in his eyes. “I really didn’t mean it. I don’t know what to say but I’m sor—”
“Don’t. I don’t want to hear it. I need to go.” She moved past, clutching her dress. Maybe she could pin it or—
“Well, well, well. Is that the woman you were telling me about?” Andy’s friend said.
Her steps slowed, and she turned, eyes narrowed. “What woman?”
The freckles dusting Andy’s face disappeared as his face darkened to red. “Nothing,” he mumbled.
Obviously not nothing. “Did you tell him about spying on me before?”
“I wasn’t spying,” he protested.
“Sure and you weren’t.” She huffed out a breath.
“I mean it. I was looking out the window at the view, then I saw—”
“A different view, right?” Andy’s friend chuckled, like he thought it was funny.
She narrowed her eyes. He was more handsome than most, and looked like he knew it too. She’d always despised men like that.
She crossed her arms, then realised that only made her bulge more than she ought, so she pretended to scratch the side of her neck in order to hide her décolletage.
“You need to watch where you’re going, Andy.
And you,” she stabbed a finger at his friend, “need to learn to shut up and mind your own business, Randy.”
His jaw sagged. Good.
“And you both need to treat women with respect.”
“I wasn’t trying to be disre—”
“I don’t have time for this. And I don’t want to see either of you again this weekend.” And she hurried away without a backward look.
* * *
Andy pressed his lips together as the dusty-bottomed bridesmaid hurried out of sight.
“Andy, my man, can I just say that is not the way to get a girl’s attention.” Grady sniggered.
“I didn’t want her attention.”
“Mm-hm.”
“I didn’t.”
“Well, I can understand why you were distracted before. She’s a right feek.”
Yes, she was, with that face, and that hair, and curves in all the right places. Not that he trusted beautiful women anymore. “It was an accident, and just happened.”
Grady winked. “Sure it did.”
“It did,” he insisted. And he didn’t really understand her overreaction. It wasn’t like he’d meant to bump into her.
“Clearly you need some help on the women front.”
“Clearly that shouldn’t be from you, Randy,” he countered.
“Why did she call me that?”
Maybe because she had eyes and a brain and could tell that Grady sometimes engaged in chauvinistic Romeo behaviour. “Come on. Let’s get out of here.”
“Before the banshee returns?”
She wasn’t a banshee, Andy thought, as his sneakers hit the path and he picked up speed. He’d deserved her scorn. Well, maybe not all of it. But he could imagine his own sister getting upset if he’d wrecked her clothes. Even if it was an accident.
And, dare he admit it, there’d been something kind of appealing in the raw, wild way she’d let him have it with both barrels. She wasn’t embarrassed about speaking her truth. Even if her truth was a little skewed.
He settled into the rhythm of running like he used to, back when he trained for triathlons.
Those days felt a million years ago now.
Even if it was only two. Still, it was remarkable how much a life could change so dramatically.
One minute, training for the Olympics. The next, tearing a calf muscle so badly that the surgeons had said he’d never reach elite status again.
He’d wondered if it was that injury that had precipitated Greta’s rapid change of heart, transferring her attention from Andy to his training partner.
But again, no good came from thinking like that.
“You’re better off without her anyway,” he muttered, as he dug deeper to ascend the hill.
If Greta really was that fickle, it was better he found out before the wedding than after that part about loving and cherishing in sickness and in health.
That’s what his family had said anyway, his sister adding that it obviously proved that Greta was so shallow she couldn’t even cope when he’d had a temporary injury.
“Muttering to yourself again?” Grady called.
“Mind your own business,” he snarked back, before realising that was exactly what the curvy bridesmaid had said. His lips slanted up and he put on more speed.
He knew Grady meant well, but taking advice from someone who only had to breathe to get a woman’s attention wasn’t quite the same as it was for most normal blokes.
And Andy knew he was a normal bloke. Brown-red hair his mam called auburn, freckles and brown eyes didn’t hit most as handsome, or so his older sister had teased all his days.
It had felt a miracle when Greta had shown interest, and she’d made her interest plain.
But now he wondered if her attention had been rooted in the lofty ambitions of his supposed jet-setting competition career rather than his far more humble self.
She hadn’t exactly been shy about asking him to move in with her, or teasing him to dream bigger than his PE teaching career.
She hadn’t liked it when he said no, that if teaching was good enough for his parents then it was good enough for him.
And staying in his parents’ granny flat was a better way to save money than a place that would’ve stayed empty for weeks while he was away for competitions.
Knowing his parents or sisters were likely to barge in at any time had helped keep him from doing things with women that he might regret.
That, along with his faith. Which, now he thought about it, was probably also part of the reason why Greta had been happy to move on with someone who didn’t share his supposed “extreme” values about no sex before marriage.
“Good thing you’re over her,” he muttered, “and never think about her at all anymore.” How was it she still had a hold over him after all this time? Lord, set me free.
The path opened up to a clearing, and what looked like the ruins of a castle nestled between a golf course and the sea.
Huh. That was unexpected. He knew the place he was staying at was called the Castle Griffin Hotel, but thought that referred to the hotel part being the Griffin Castle. Was this the original instead?
Glad for the distraction, he put his hands on his hips, breathing harder than he liked. Obviously he still had some way to go before he was back to full fitness, but that had been a good workout.
Grady drew alongside him, puffing harder than Andy.
Good. He could still beat him at something.
“Hey a castle. That’s so cool.”
Andy noticed a sign and wandered over. The plaque showed a photo from the 1800s, then gave a spiel about the castle ruins being all that remained after a fire in the 1920s, and an explosion in the sixties designed to deal with the wrecked shell of what was left.
His heart twisted, no doubt recognising itself in the description.
Not that Greta had exploded anything, except her vow to love him.
Her refusal to go through with the wedding had been the fire, and the explosion had happened later, when she’d married a man he’d once counted as one of his friends, leaving Andy shattered.
The long castellated wall of ivy-covered dark grey stones led to square towers either end. He peered through a window-shaped gap into what must have once been part of the family’s living area, now a quiet grassy area, partly portioned into what looked like a vegetable garden.
Grady whistled. “Can you imagine having your own castle?”
“Nope.” He couldn’t think of anything worse. “My granny flat is enough to keep clean, thank you.”
“Sure is.”
Yeah, Grady might tease, but he only said that because he knew Andy had neat-freak genes.
“Sometimes I wish my parents loved me enough to let me live at home instead of kicking me out like they did,” Grady complained.
“Come on, you and I both know they love you and that you deserved it.” After a certain incident involving too much of the black stuff.
“Ah, that was a grand time.” Grady laughed, which drew half a smile from Andy. “Sometimes I don’t know why I am friends with you, when you keep reminding me of things like that.”
“The feeling’s mutual, my friend.”
Grady punched him lightly on the arm. “I have to say it’s nice to see you cracking jokes again.”
“It wasn’t a joke.”
“Oh, and he’s still at it. Okay.”
Okay, yes. It had been a long moment since he’d felt game enough to crack a joke, after being gas-lit for so long about what was considered funny.
What was funny was how when people talked about gas-lighting it so often seemed to be how women were the victims, and men always the evil perpetrators.
Andy was proof the opposite could be true.
That a woman with certain narcissistic tendencies could be just as much to blame.
Which only made him feel weaker, and even despite the therapy his counsellor had offered, he still knew he could be vulnerable to a strong woman.
Which was why he’d take his time before dipping his toe into the dating scene again.
Like maybe five or, better yet, ten years.
No way was he ever going to get caught up in the heady world of hormones and attraction and leaping into a relationship before he really got to know the woman.
Like, really got to know the woman. Mam and Da had warned him when he’d come home engaged.
And considering he’d thought he’d known Greta and she’d still blindsided him, then he knew this would take years.
Hey God, I want to do things Your way this time.
I’m pretty sure I need to wait five years.
So help me to be patient while I’m waiting for the right woman to appear.
So, at the rate he was going, after waiting a minimum of five years before he was emotionally healthy to date again, then another two to three years before he’d know whether a woman was worth pledging his forever to, he was looking at a solid ten years before he could possibly consider himself ready to say “I do” again.
Not that he’d said it the first time, but—
“You okay over there?” Grady asked.
“Yep.” He shoved his shoulders back. “I’m good.”
Because he was now a man with a plan, a man who would place himself firmly on the shelf until he felt emotionally ready again.
Which meant he could enjoy seeing this part of Ireland with no strings attached, no need to impress or be impressed by or join Grady’s schemes to find some fun that inevitably involved flirting and ended with sore heads the next morning.
Andy might want to see his friend come to know God, but it didn’t mean Andy had to compromise his values.
He wasn’t a pushover, no matter what Greta might’ve thought.
“Hey, you know the hotel restaurant is closed tonight? We should hit the local pub instead.” Grady glanced at him as Andy’s nose wrinkled. “I saw they have karaoke.”
His interest flickered. He might not have had a lot of great qualities, at least as far as Greta was concerned, but his karaoke skills were on par with his running. She’d never been ashamed of him in that regard, at least. “Sounds like a plan.”
Grady laughed. “You’ve always liked a plan, haven’t you?”
“Yeah.” A plan meant not wasting time, meant he knew where he was headed, what he should work on now to set up success for the future.
It meant getting organised, getting his ducks in a row, and then watching his hard work get executed effectively.
Except, of course, when his body didn’t work as he’d trained it to.
Or when the person he’d planned to spend forever with decided she didn’t want him after all.
His heart dipped. He pushed past it. That was the past, remember?
“Come on. I’ll race you back. Last one back buys the steak.”
“Hey!” Grady protested as Andy set off.
He drew in a deep breath of Atlantic-fresh air, picking up the pace as Grady’s footsteps thudded behind him. The past was done. He’d asked God to set him free. So he was going to trust that He’d heard Andy’s prayer.