Something Irish (Courting Chaos Book 0) Read online

  Something Irish

  Heather Young-Nichols

  Copyright © 2018 by Heather Young-Nichols

  Cover Design Booked by Design

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Chapter One

  As I stood in front of a monstrous castle in Ireland that had supposedly housed my great-great-great-great grandparents, being overcome with the feeling of the history it represented surprised me, to say the least. I never expected my knees weaken like they might not hold me up any longer or the heaviness, as if something was physically pushing down on me.

  It was almost too much.

  History had never been my thing. Sure, I liked hearing old family stories as much as the next person, but it wasn’t something I’d thought about too often.

  Then my grandma had broken her hip and couldn’t go on this fully paid for trip with my grandpa. My college classes had already ended for the summer when Grandpa insisted Mom and I take the trip in their place.

  “Ready to go in, Maggie?” Mom asked beside me.

  “Sure thing,” I said back.

  She looped her arm through mine and pulled me through the entrance.

  This wasn’t the first castle we’d visited, but the damp smell still stung until I got used to it. Like opening an old book. An old book that had been through a flood and dried out. And maybe dropped in the mud.

  “Can you imagine?” Mom asked in the third room.

  I raised an eyebrow because I didn’t know what she meant.

  “Living here. All these rooms but no bathroom.”

  “They had… what’d that guy in Cork call them? Garderobes? Or something even nicer.”

  “No running water,” she countered with a sly smile.

  I’d been told I looked just like my mom. Dark brown hair, mine long, hers bobbed, and pale blue eyes. I guess I did because that look on her face was completely me. Grandpa had shown me pictures of Mom at my age, twenty-one, and I couldn’t disagree.

  We were the snarky, sassy duo separated by a single generation.

  “I’m not saying I want to live here,” I said, then laughed.

  We wandered through that castle until we’d seen all it had to offer, then stopped at another, smaller castle before doing a little shopping. After which Mom suggested we get food. She knew I needed regular feedings; otherwise, the monster would be released.

  I wasn’t proud, but I could harness the word hangry better than anyone I knew. Probably should’ve earned a trophy or two, but I did try to keep it under control. My body just didn’t like low blood sugar.

  Unsurprisingly we made the drive back into town before stopping to eat. We stayed at a hotel about an hour outside of Dublin which was down the street from our favorite place to eat.

  We’d eaten almost half our meals at O’Brien’s and the food was delicious but I would’ve liked to expand out once in a while. Though one of the employees, Eagan O’Brien, made up for anything I might have missed somewhere else.

  My one complaint about traveling with Mom was that she wasn’t all that adventurous. The sites we’d seen during our week in Ireland had been on the beaten path, not off of it.

  She’d looked at me in horror when I suggested driving through the countryside without a map or GPS.

  “What do you feel like having?” Mom asked, skimming the menu that I was pretty sure she had memorized by now.

  It took everything I had to not visibly roll my eyes at her. She knew what I wanted as much as she already knew what she wanted. The menu was merely a prop.

  “Burger,” I answered.

  I had no idea Ireland would be home to the most delicious burgers I’d ever eaten in my life. The meat tasted different. Delicious but different.

  One of the employees said it was because the meat came from a farm ten miles down the road.

  Apparently, I really like fresh meat.

  “See anything good today?” Eagan asked when he came by our booth.

  He was the epitome of the Irish men I’d seen across the country. Dark hair, dark eyes, strong jaw, and tall. Something about him caused my heart rate to kick up a notch when I first saw him. Maybe it was the accent. I’d spent a bit of time chatting with him since I basically saw him every day of the last week and I could listen to him talk for days if he’d let me. I’d also hung out here alone when Mom was too tired to do anything else.

  I shrugged.

  “Didn’t find any leprechauns,” I said with a playful smile. I’d said this to him six times already.

  “You know we keep those well-hidden,” he said back.

  I couldn’t exactly flirt well with my mom sitting across from me. Eventually, she’d snap out a harsh “Maggie” as a warning about something I’d said.

  She didn’t understand that this was just harmless flirting. I wasn’t looking to date him and I couldn’t exactly hook up with him when my mom always around. Plus, I’d never had an actual one-night stand. I’d tried it once, but that had turned into a six-month relationship. I didn’t even know how it happened.

  Eagan gave me a grin before walking away. However, I noticed he didn’t actually check on the other tables the way he did ours.

  “We leave tonight,” Mom said after our food came.

  “I know. It went by so quickly. I wish we could stay longer.”

  Oh yeah. I took a big bite and closed my eyes savoring the delicious flavors in my mouth. That was the burger I’d been thinking about all day.

  “It has been nice,” Mom continued, “but I also want to check on Mom. I hated leaving so soon after her surgery.”

  “Grandpa said she’s OK, though?”

  “Yes. They moved her to the rehab center. The doctors think she’ll recover most of her mobility and be back home soon enough.”

  “That’s good news,” I said.

  She only nodded. But it was like she wasn’t really with me anymore. Her thoughts weren’t at least.

  Mom tried her best to hide just how distracted she was, but of course, she’d be worried about her mother. She would’ve preferred to stay home, but Grandpa had insisted.

  Now the week had gone by quickly and it was time to leave.

  She yawned twice after we finished eating and we had to get on the road to the Dublin airport. She was absolutely going to sleep the entire plane ride home.

  I stood, reaching for my purse, but came up empty. I looked around for it, squatting down to search the floor before popping back up and giving the area another quick survey.

  “Shit,” I said loudly. Probably louder than I should have.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “My purse.” I bent over to look under the table again but still found nothing.

  Where the hell could my purse be?

  “Did you leave it in the car?” she asked.

  “I don’t know.”

  I weaved through the other patrons until I could get out the door. When I got to the car, I checked the front seat and the back then popped the trunk. The car wasn’t all that big, there weren’t a lot of hiding places yet still I found nothing.

  “Shit, shit, shit.”

  “Are you sure you didn’t leave it at the hotel this morning?” Mom asked as I began to panic.

  “I know I had it when we left Cloverfi
eld Castle.” The last one we’d went to today.

  I rubbed the back of my neck to ease some of the tension building there.

  It was all I could do since nothing less than finding my purse would ease my tightening chest.

  “Then where could it be?”

  “I don’t know,” I snapped, then immediately felt bad. “Fuck.”

  She already had a lot of stress happening all at once and really didn’t need me biting her head off when she tried to help.

  It wasn’t her I was mad at in the first place, anyway.

  I should’ve apologized right away. Instead, I stormed back into the pub and dropped onto a stool at the bar, then pretended not to notice when Mom quietly sat beside me.

  A long, seemingly endless silence hung between us.

  Mom wouldn’t speak to me unless I said something first. That was what she did if she thought I owed her an apology, which, of course, I did. She could wait out as long as it took when I was a teenager. I’d had to be the one to break first and I would be this time too.

  “I’m sorry,” I said quietly.

  Mom only raised an eyebrow and cupped a hand behind her ear. I took a deep breath, then blew it out slowly.

  “I said I’m sorry,” I repeated, only this time, I spoke louder for her to hear me.

  “All right,” she said, then turned to face me. “Let’s work the problem. I would guess you didn’t have much cash in there right?”

  “No, but—”

  “Fortunate. The plane tickets are back at the hotel, so those are safe. You had your phone in your pocket. I know it was your favorite purse, but it can be replaced.” She paused for a moment. It was like watching her mentally mark off tasks on a list. “Credit cards?”

  I shook my head. “I only have my debit card which I can cancel on the bank app.”

  “Ok, good.”

  “Mom,” I said with a sigh. “My license was in there and my passport. I don’t’ think I can get on the plane tonight.”

  “Oh… fuck.” She blinked four times then said, “Why in the hell was your passport in your purse?”

  “Does it matter?”

  “I guess not.”

  “What am I going to do?”

  “About what?” asked that familiar, deep voice with its heavy accent.

  Just like every other time he spoke to me, my heart thudded harder against my chest at the sound of his voice.

  I’d never used the word dreamy to describe a man before, but the one in front of me was the pure definition of the word.

  His accent sure didn’t hurt, either.

  “I lost my purse,” I said, glancing up at him. Not much more to say about it.

  “Ah.”

  “It has my passport in it and we’re supposed to get on a plane home tonight.”

  “Oh, that’s shite.”

  I shrugged because what else could I say? It was absolute shit.

  There I was in a foreign country, no way to get home, and no idea what to do about it.

  “So what do we do?” I asked, focusing back on my mom.

  She’s a mom. She’s supposed to know the answer to everything. Plus, I’d noticed she’d already started searching on her phone.

  “Looks like we need to contact the American consulate. Which is in Dublin. Exactly where we’re headed.” That sounded rather hopeful. Possibly easy even. “However,” she continued while still scrolling through her phone, “they aren’t open on the weekend unless it’s a serious emergency. Also, you have to make an appointment and bring a list of documents with you.”

  “So… I can’t leave with you tonight.”

  Chapter Two

  Mom’s eyes shimmered as if she were about to start crying. She probably was since she’d been a crier my entire life. She cried at everything, including commercials.

  But this…this was different.

  “No. You can’t leave with me,” Mom finally said. “You can’t get on a plane without a driver’s license back home and certainly not without your passport internationally.”

  We both fell silent. Didn’t seem like I had a lot of choice.

  This scary, nervous energy made my stomach clench and turn. I couldn’t get home. Honestly, I didn’t know when I’d be able to either.

  Mom’s drawn, sullen face did a complete turnaround as she tried to put on a happier front on a not so great situation.

  “We’ll stay,” she said. “I’ll stay. Obviously. We have to stay.”

  “Absolutely not,” I said back immediately. “You have to get back to Grandma. Grandpa and I forced you to come on this trip when you really wanted to stay with your mom. You should go. I’m sure I’ll only be a couple of days behind you.”

  “Maggie, I can’t just leave you in Ireland.”

  “Of course you can. I’m a big girl, Mom. In college. We can pretend I’m studying abroad if it helps.”

  “Maggie,” she said with a sigh.

  “It’s fine. I’ll stay a couple extra days, then be home. Though there’ll be a fee for changing the flight, right?”

  “I don’t care about that.” She worried on her bottom lip, her teeth running back and forth over the bottom one. “OK. OK. We can make this work. I’ll have your dad transfer some money into my account since you don’t have yours. Then I’ll leave my bank card with you so you can withdraw cash. I don’t know if anyone will let you pay with my card. I can’t remember if they check the signature on the back.”

  “I can withdraw money.”

  She needed to calm down and know that I could take care of myself. I didn’t live with her and my step-dad Dan Greene. I had a little apartment, made sure I grocery shopped and fed myself. I could handle this.

  “I’ll extend the car rental, but you’ll have to drive me to Dublin to the airport.”

  I snorted, then said, “I’ve successfully driven on at least one occasion.”

  “Only once?” Eagan asked with a smile as two pints we hadn’t ordered landed in front of us. Glancing up to find Eagan had been the one to bring them, I raised an eyebrow at him.

  “Ya look like ya could use it,” he said pointing at the beer.

  Being surrounded by delicious Irish men with their deep voices and swoony accents could’ve gone very differently for me if I hadn’t been traveling with my mother. Though if I was honest with myself, I’d admit it was unlikely. I just liked to think it might have. Liked to think I’d put myself out there for a vacation fling. But reality tended to be different.

  I smiled up at him.

  “Eagan, Maggie has to stay here for a couple more days,” Mom said. “But she doesn’t have her credit card or bank card. Will you let her use mine to pay here?”

  I closed my eyes, shook my head, and counted to ten so I wouldn’t bite her head off. She was about to leave her only child in a foreign country. She needed a little leeway to be crazy but this helicopter parent thing was getting on my nerves.

  “Course.”

  “Mom?”

  “At least I know you won’t starve,” she said matter-of-factly.

  “Mom,” I said again, louder to catch her attention. “The hotel. Remember the desk guy bragged about how it’s a good thing we’re leaving because they’re completely sold out for the next few weeks.”

  “Yeah, he said we missed the rush.”

  “Which means, I have nowhere to stay and no card to find somewhere else to stay. They all require a credit card.”

  Her face fell and that crease appeared in the middle of her forehead. The one that only showed up when she was trying to figure out a solution to a serious problem.

  “Look, it’s fine,” I assured her. I searched around for Eagan, who happened to still be close by. “Where’s the nearest bus station?” I asked him.

  “Why?” Mom glanced up at me, that line still on her forehead.

  “Isn’t that where homeless people stay? The bus station?” I asked Eagan more than my mom.

  He snorted then folded his arms across his chest.
r />   “Maggie Dwyer, you stop that right now,” Mom snapped in her best mother voice.

  “I have an idea,” Eagan said to us. “You can stay upstairs at my place.”

  “Absolutely not,” Mom replied before I could.

  “Why not?” I asked.

  “You don’t know him.”

  “It’s better than the street.”

  Eagan chuckled then interrupted our bickering. “Wait, wait. I rent the place on Airbnb when I’m out of town and usually a couple of weeks later in the summer for extra cash. You can check the ratings.”

  “And where will you be?” Mom asked with a raised eyebrow.

  Eagan’s attempt to hold back a grin was a complete failure. “I’ll stay with my brother.”

  She gave Eagan the stare-down before nodding slowly.

  “How much?” she asked.

  “No charge.”

  That was incredibly generous of him and not something I thought most people would do. For some reason, I felt reasonably good about staying in space. Even if he wasn’t going to be there.

  “If you’re comfortable with that, Maggie, I suppose it could work.”

  “You worry too much.” I finished off my beer. “Let’s go get our stuff. We have to get to the airport to change my flight and get you on yours.”

  “Eagan,” Mom called out. “When do you get off?”

  His eyebrows rose. I snickered behind Mom’s back. I don’t think she noticed the double entendre.

  “I was wondering if you could drive us to the airport, then get my daughter back home? I can pay you.”

  “Sure,” he said, sounding even more Irish than before. “Let me make a phone call.”

  Eagan walked away, giving my mother the opportunity to lay on all her ‘mom advice.’ Advice I didn’t want back home and most certainly didn’t want now.

  She acted like me staying in Ireland a few extra days was a bad thing.

  While I loved time with Mom, having these extra days without her might be a perfect ending to the vacation. Just to give me a little time to explore some of the things I wanted to see. Things she’d scoffed at when I suggested them.

  We officially checked out of the hotel earlier before going out to explore because we knew we wouldn’t return in time for checkout and didn’t want to pay for another day when it was only a few hours. However, the hotel had agreed to hold our bags until we returned.