Page 102 of Irish Brute

“Good afternoon.”

I peer around him, at the clock on the stove. He’s right. It’s 1:17 in the afternoon. “Where is everyone?” I ask.

“It’s Sunday. Fairfax’s day off. I asked Grace to take Aiofe to her cottage for a sleepover.”

“Why would you do that?”

“Because I want to feed you breakfast. Or lunch. Whatever. And then I want to lay you down on the dining room table and bury my face between your thighs.”

I blush. But I don’t even consider telling him no. “What’s for breakfast?”

He points to a bowl and a carton of eggs. “I make a decent omelet.”

“I seem to recall that.”

I watch him crack the eggs. Whisk them. Add salt and pepper and a healthy splash of milk. He’s generous with butter in thepan, and he sprinkles plenty of cheese over the eggs before he folds them.

While he divides the omelet onto two plates, I pour myself a cup of coffee.

“Do you want tea?” I ask.

“If I have any more, I’ll be swimming.”

“How long agodidyou wake up?” I ask, following him into the dining room.

He doesn’t answer.

He doesn’t move.

He stands in front of me like he’s been turned to stone, and finally I have to step around him.

“Braiden?” I ask, but then I see what stopped him.

It’s a woman. She’s shorter than I am by six or seven inches. Plump, like she doesn’t spend a lot of time working out, and pale, like she stays inside a lot. Her hair is a fiery red, framing her face in tight curls. She’s got enormous grass-green eyes. She’s wearing a floor length white dress, cut high across her throat, like a wedding gown for a nun. The effect is heightened by the large gold cross that hangs around her neck.

“Braiden?” I say again.

But he doesn’t respond to me. Instead, he stares at the stranger. “Birte,” he finally says. “You’re not supposed to be downstairs.”

“Downstairs,” she says in an ethereal voice, like an angel who’s just learned a new word. “Birte dares. Who cares?”

“Braiden?” I say his name a third time. “Who is this?”

He looks at me. Looks at the other woman. Looks at the omelet on his plate, at the melted cheese that’s cooling into a waxy lump.

Frightened now, I repeat my question. “Whoisthis?”

The woman in white tilts her head to one side. She smiles a pretty smile at Braiden. In the same angel voice she used before, she asks, “Who is this? Who is this? Who is this?”

Braiden mutters something in Irish, a curse I’m certain, but I don’t understand the words. The other woman must, though, because her forehead creases into a frown. She clutches her necklace with one hand and makes the sign of the cross with the other.

One last time, I say my husband’s name. “Braiden? What is going on here?”

He clears his throat. “Samantha Kelly,” he says, with the same formality he used months ago, introducing me to Fairfax and Aiofe, to the other people living in this house. “This is Birte Antóinín Mason. My wife.”