She smiled as the light of day crept in through her windows. There would be no racing down the hills and across the velvet green dales of Ireland today. Her home there was as much a part of the distant past as her youth. If she were to rise and glance into a mirror, no brilliant eyes, radiant smile or porcelain skin would meet her stare. She would see an old woman, wrinkled and weathered, one who had lived, survived tragedy, known ecstasy, and knew now that death could not be far away. She could look out a window and see rocks, gray in the thin light of winter, jagged and wild and, perhaps, even exciting. This was America, the shore of Rhode Island, the place she now called home.
And a fine home it was. Sean William O’Riley had done himself and his family proud. The sea was his heritage, sweeping through his veins, and he had come to this place, this granite shore, and made himself a fine living chartering beautiful ships with high masts and billowing sails. They lived in a stately mansion and wanted for nothing, and the respect he had shown her, caring for an old relation all these years, was proof that he was a good and loving man.
He was a good businessman, too, working with that new young fellow, Cal, and with Eddie Ray….
Her smile faded as she remembered seeing Eddie in her dream.
Eddie Ray was missing.
One of the best captains on the Eastern Seaboard, he had taken out his favorite vessel, the Sea Maiden, and he hadn’t been heard from since. He had disappeared.
But he had been in her dream, standing in front of the cottage and warning her, though there was no reason for him to be there, when he had always lived here, in the States.
Even as that thought came to her, the door to her room was flung open and Kat stood there for a moment, posed in the doorway, like a regal figurehead standing strong against the rise and fall of the sea. Katherine Mary O’Riley, her great-niece. She was Sean’s daughter, and as young and beautiful as Bridey had once been herself.
“Oh, Aunt Bridey!” Kat cried, clearly upset.
“What is it, child?” Bridey asked, sitting up against her pillows.
Kat flew across the room and threw herself down next to Bridey on the bed.
“They found the Sea Maiden floating out by one of the islands.”
A tremor shook Bridey’s heart. Hadn’t she just seen Eddie, captain of the Sea Maiden, in a glen in Ireland, where he shouldn’t have been?
And hadn’t he just been warning her about the shadows?
“And Eddie?” Bridey asked softly, dread knowledge filling her mind.
Kat looked down at Bridey with troubled blue eyes.
“Not a sign of him,” she whispered, close to tears, and then she sat up straighter.
“It’s her,” she said grimly, staring at Bridey through narrowed eyes. “That bitch. I don’t know how, but somehow Amanda did something to him.”
“Ah, now, lass. Your own dear mother would’na’ mind that your father found happiness with another.”
“Oh, Bridey,” Kat protested. “That’s a crock! Amanda is barely five years older than I am, thirty-one. She married my father for his money—you know she did. And now Dad is in a hospital in Dublin and the boat has been found, with no sign of Eddie, and I know—I just know—she did it….”
“Now, lass, how can that be? Your da is in Ireland, and Eddie went missing here right before the party, and you know Amanda was with your da that day,” Bridey said softly.
“I don’t care. She did it—somehow. She poisoned my dad,” Kat insisted. “She’s evil. Pure evil.”
“Now, Kat.”
Bridey tried hard not to betray any emotion in her face, but her mind was racing. Why on earth had Sean taken it upon himself to marry that young blonde…what was the word they used over here? Bimbo. That was it and it described Amanda O’Riley all too well.
She couldn’t say such things to Kat, though, or she would only make things worse. She smoothed her great-niece’s hair. “Don’t you worry, now. Didn’t you tell me you were going to ask Zach Flynn to see that Sean comes home safe and well?”
Kat nodded. “I called him this morning, and he’ll be on his way today.” Then she offered Bridey a smile. “And you were the one who said I should ask Zach.”
“And you did right to listen to me,” Bridey told her. “He’ll get your da home, that he will.” She was grateful that Kat had practiced enough control to send Zach for Sean. Amanda was Sean’s wife. If he was incapacitated, she called the shots, and having Kat there spewing accusations wouldn’t help anything. Not only that, if there was something to be discovered, if there was a threat, Zach was trained to handle such a situation.
“I should be with my father,” Kat said softly.
“But you’re with me,” Bridey said, and smiled. “And blessed I am, child. Zach will bring Sean home, and he’ll get to the bottom of whatever is going on here, I promise you.”
But Bridey knew. He would not find Eddie. At least, not alive.
She had seen the dark coach, and the plumed black horses.
Eddie was dead.
And the coach of Death was still thundering down on them.
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