“No.” Because her eyes were stinging, Maggie’s voice was sharp as a whip. “And it’s that lack I inherited from you. I only came today to tell you that you won’t run Brie ragged while I’m gone. If I find you have, I’ll stop the allowance.”

“You’d take food out of my mouth?”

Maggie leaned over to tap the box of chocolates. “Yes. Be sure of it.”

“Honor thy father and thy mother.” Maeve hugged the Bible close. “You’re breaking a commandment, Margaret Mary, and sending your soul to hell.”

“Then I’ll give up my place in heaven rather than live a hypocrite on earth.”

“Margaret Mary!” Maeve shouted when Maggie had reached the door. “You’ll never amount to anything. You’re just like him. God’s curse is on you, Maggie, for being conceived outside the sacrament of marriage.”

“I saw no sacrament of marriage in my house,” Maggie tossed back. “Only the agony of it. And if there was a sin in my conception, it wasn’t mine.”

She slammed the door behind her, then leaned back against it a moment to steady herself.

It was always the same, she thought. They could never be in the same room together without hurling insults. She had known, since she was twelve, why her mother disliked her, condemned her. Her very existence was the reason Maeve’s life had turned from dream to harsh reality.

A loveless marriage, a seven-month baby and a farm without a farmer.

It was that her mother had thrown in her face when Maggie had reached puberty.

It was that they had never forgiven each other for.

Straightening her shoulders, she walked back into the kitchen. She didn’t know her eyes were still angry and overbright or her face pale. She walked to her sister and kissed her briskly on the cheek.

“I’ll call you from Dublin.”

“Maggie.” There was too much to say, and nothing to say. Brianna only squeezed her hands. “I wish I could be there for you.”

“You could if you wished it enough. Rogan, are you ready?”

“Yes.” He rose. “Goodbye, Brianna. Thank you.”

“I’ll just walk you—” Brianna broke off when her mother called out.

“Go see to her,” Maggie said, and walked quickly out of the house. She was yanking at the door of Rogan’s car when he laid a hand on her shoulder.

“Are you all right?”

“No, but I don’t want to talk about it.” With a final tug, she jerked the door open and climbed inside.

He hurried around the hood and slipped onto the driver’s seat. “Maggie—”

“Don’t say anything. Anything at all. There’s nothing you can do or say to change what’s always been. Just drive the car and leave me alone. It would be a great favor to me.” She began to weep then, passionately, bitterly, while he struggled with the urge to comfort her and the wish to comply with her request.

In the end, he drove, saying nothing, but holding her hand. They were nearing the airport when her sobs died and her tensed fingers went limp. Glancing over, he saw she was sleeping.

She didn’t awaken when he carried her inside his company jet, or when he settled her in a seat. Nor did she awaken all through the flight as he watched her. And wondered.

Chapter Six

MAGGIE awoke in the dark. The only thing she was certain of in those first groggy minutes was that she wasn’t in her own bed. The scent of the sheets, the texture of them was wrong. She didn’t have to sleep on fine linen habitually to recognize the difference, or to notice the faint, restful scent of verbena that clung to the pillowslip in which she’d buried her face.

As an uncomfortable thought zeroed into her brain, she stretched out a cautious hand to make certain she was the only occupant of the bed. The mattress flowed on, a veritable lake of smooth sheets and cozy blankets. An empty lake, thank Jesus, she thought, and rolled over to the center of the bed.

Her last clear memory was of crying herself empty in Rogan’s car, and the hollow feeling that had left her drifting like a broken reed in a stream.

A good purge, she decided, for she felt incredibly better—steady and rested and clean.

It was tempting to luxuriate in the soft dark on soft sheets with soft scents. But she decided she’d best find out where she was and how she’d arrived. After sliding her way over to the edge of the bed, she groped around the smooth wood of the night table, eased her fingers over and up until she located a lamp and its switch.

The light was gently shaded, a warm golden hue that subtly illuminated a large bedroom with coffered ceiling, dainty rosebud wallpaper and the bed itself, a massive four-poster.

The veritable queen of beds, she thought with a smile. A pity she’d been too tired to appreciate it.

The fireplace across the room was unlit, but scrubbed clean as a new coin and set for kindling. Long-stemmed pink roses, fresh as a summer morning, stood in a Waterford vase on a majestic bureau along with a silver brush set and gorgeous little colored bottles with fancy stoppers.

The mirror above it reflected Maggie, rumpled and heavy-eyed among the sheets.

You look a bit out of place, my girl, she decided, and grinning, tugged on the sleeve of her cotton nightshirt. Someone, it seemed, had had the good sense to change her before dumping her into the royal bed.

A maid perhaps, or Rogan himself. It hardly mattered, she thought practically, since the deed was done and she’d certainly benefited from it. In all likelihood, her clothes were gracing the carved rosewood armoire. As out of place there, she decided with a chuckle, as she was in the glorious lake of smooth linen sheets.

If she was in a hotel, it was certainly the finest that had ever had her patronage. She scrambled up, stumbled toward the closest door over a deep-piled Aubusson.

The bath was as sumptuous as the bedroom, all gleaming rose and ivory tiles, a huge tub fashioned for lounging and a separate shower constructed from a wavy glass block. With a sigh of pure greed, she stripped off her nightshirt and turned on the spray.

It was heaven, the hot water beating on the back of her neck, her shoulders, like the firm fingers of an expert masseuse. A far cry from the stingy trickle her own shower managed at home. The soap smelled of lemon and glided over her skin like silk.

She saw with some amusement that her few meager toiletries had been set out on the generous counter by the shell-shaped pink sinks. Her robe, such as it was, hung on a brass hook beside the door.