Born in Shame
Page 40

She merely scowled and shifted direction so that she veered toward the right-side drive.
Measuring her mood, he opted to kiss her hand rather than her mouth when he’d opened the car door for her. “Dream within a dream,” he murmured. “Poe had some lovely lines on that. You’ll dream of me tonight, Shannon, and I of you.”
“No, I won’t.” She said it firmly as she slammed the door. After shoving up the sleeves of his jacket, she backed out of the drive and headed up the rain-washed road.
The man had to have a screw loose somewhere, she decided. It was the only explanation. Her only choice was to give him absolutely no encouragement from this point on.
No more cozy dinners in the kitchen, no music and laughter in the pub, no easy conversations or staggering kisses in the fields.
Damn it, she’d miss it. All of it. She pulled up in Brianna’s drive and set the brake. He’d gone and stirred up feelings and desires she hadn’t known she was capable of, then left her with no other option but to squelch them.
Pinheaded idiot, she thought, slamming her door before racing toward the house.
Shannon fought off a scowl as she opened the door and found Brianna beaming smiles down the hallway.
“Oh, good, he lent you a jacket. I didn’t think of it till after you’d left. Did you have a nice time then?”
Shannon opened her mouth, surprised when the usual platitudes simply weren’t there. “The man is insane.”
Brianna blinked. “Murphy?”
“Who else? I’m telling you, he’s got something corked around in his head. There’s no reasoning with him.”
In a move so natural neither of them noticed, Brianna took Shannon’s hand and began to lead her back toward the kitchen. “Did you have a quarrel?”
“A quarrel? No, I wouldn’t say that. You can’t quarrel with insanity.”
“Hey, Shannon.” When the kitchen door opened, Gray glanced up, pausing with a huge spoon of trifle half way to a bowl. “How was dinner? Got any room for trifle? Brie makes the world’s best.”
“She’s had a to-do with Murphy,” Brianna informed him, urging Shannon into a chair before going for the teapot.
“No kidding.” Intrigued, Gray dumped the trifle, then went for another bowl. “What about?”
“Oh, nothing much. He just wants me to marry him and have his children.”
Brianna bobbled the teacup, barely saving it from shattering on the floor. “You’re joking,” she said and nearly managed a laugh.
“It’s a joke all right, but I’m not making it.” Absently she dug into the bowl Gray set in front of her. “He claims to be courting me.” She snorted, took a swallow of trifle. “Can you beat that?” she demanded of Gray.
“Ah . . .” He ran his tongue around his teeth. “Nope.”
Very slowly, her eyes wide, Brianna took her seat. “He said he was wanting to court you?”
“He said he was,” Shannon corrected and spooned up more trifle. “He has this wild idea of love at first sight, and that we’re meant, or some ridiculous thing. All this about remembering and recognition. Bull,” she muttered and poured out the tea herself.
“Murphy’s never courted anyone. Never wanted to.”
With her eyes narrowed Shannon turned to Brianna. “I wish everyone would stop using that antiquated word. It makes me nervous.”
“The word,” Gray put in, “or the deed?”
“Both.” She propped her chin on her fist. “As if things weren’t complicated enough.”
“Are you indifferent to him?” Brianna asked.
“Not indifferent.” Shannon frowned. “Exactly.”
“The plot thickens.” Gray only grinned at the heated look Shannon shot at him. “You’d better understand the Irish are a stubborn race. I’m not sure if the Irish of the west aren’t the most stubborn. If Murphy’s got his eye on you, it’s going to stay there.”
“Don’t make light of it, Gray.” In automatic sympathy Brianna laid her hand over Shannon’s. “She’s upset, and there are hearts involved.”
“No, there are not.” About that, at least, Shannon could be firm. “Considering going to bed with a man and spending the rest of your life with him are two entirely different things. And as for him, he’s just a romantic.”
With her brows knit, she concentrated on scraping the last of the trifle from her bowl. “It’s nonsense, the idea that a couple of odd dreams have anything to do with destiny.”
“Murphy’s had odd dreams?”
Distracted again, Shannon glanced at Brianna. “I don’t know. I didn’t ask.”
“You have.” Gray couldn’t have been more delighted. He leaned forward. “Tell me—especially the sexy parts.”
“Stop it, Grayson.”
But Shannon found herself laughing. Odd, she thought, that here should be the big brother she’d always wished for. “It’s all sexy,” she told him and licked her lips.
“Yeah?” He leaned closer. “Start at the beginning, Don’t leave anything out. No detail is too small.”
“Don’t pay him any mind, Shannon.”
“It’s all right.” More than full, she pushed the empty bowl aside. “You both might find it interesting. I’ve never had a recurring dream before. Actually, it’s more like vignettes, in random order. Or what seems to be.”
“Now you’re really driving me crazy,” Gray complained. “Spill it.”
“Okay. It starts off in the field, where the stone circle is? Funny, it’s like I dreamed it was there before I saw it. But that’s not possible. Anyway”—she waved that away—“it’s raining. Cold, there’s frost. It sounds like glass grinding when I walk on it. Not me,” she corrected with a half laugh. “The woman in the dream. Then there’s a man, dark hair, dark cloak, white horse. You can see the steam rising off them, and the mud that’s splashed on his boots and his armor. He rides toward me—her—full out. And she stands there with her hair blowing. And—”
She broke off. She’d caught the quick, startled look in Brianna’s eyes, and the silent exchange between her and Gray.