“Fin—”
He placed the case on the table and lifted the lid. “It’s a rare miniature version.” He pointed at the contents, laid against black velvet. “It has all its components—thermometer, floats, weights and measuring flask. It was invented by Bartholomew Sikes in the early nineteenth century to more accurately measure the proof of a particular batch of spirits. The tax man took right to it. It’s an efficient little gadget.”
“Fascinating. You can demonstrate another time.”
Bracken closed the case. “This situation with Emma Sharpe could expose you, couldn’t it, Colin?”
“Expose me to what?”
The priest didn’t smile. “You’re a natural undercover agent. You don’t mind going into dangerous situations alone. You have good skills and experience but you rely on gut instinct.” He set the case back on the sideboard. “You and your brothers are similar that way.”
“Yep. We don’t like overthinking, which is what you’re doing, isn’t it?”
“Emma Sharpe has you tied up in knots. I’m not sure you’re aware of just how much that’s the case, but perhaps you’ll want to take a moment to stand back and use your head.”
Perhaps he would, Colin thought. “Thanks for the advice,” he said dryly.
Bracken opened a drawer in the sideboard and took out two small navy blue soft velvet pouches. He carried them to the table as if they were fragile. His hands shook as he emptied first one, then the other, on the white lace.
“They’re rosary beads,” he said, touching the two sets, one of clear glass, the other of pink glass.
Colin nodded. “I see.”
“My brother, Declan, gave them to my daughters on their first communion.” He delicately lifted the strand of clear glass beads. “They were handmade by a friend in Sneem.”
“I’m sorry, Fin.” Colin didn’t know what else to say. He was better at action and quick decisions than he was at figuring out what to say to a man who’d lost everything.
“I came here with a foot planted in my old life. I don’t mean the whiskey business.”
“Your wife and daughters.”
Bracken set the clear beads on the table and picked up the pink ones. “I’ve had to examine my heart. Walking this coast alone, being here in Rock Point alone…” He rubbed tiny beads between his thumb and forefinger. “I’ve found I have to live in the present. You’re good at that, Colin. It’s one of your strengths. Your work demands it, but it’s your nature, too.”
“I’m not a deep thinker. You, Emma Sharpe—deep thinkers.” Colin gestured toward the hall behind them. “Hungry?”
Finian gently replaced the beads in their velvet cases and returned them to their drawer. “Yes,” he said finally, “I’m hungry. How thorough were you in searching this place?”
“Not at all. I thought I might at least find a couple grand in the couch cushions, as rich as you are.” Colin started down the carpeted hall, shifting back to Bracken when they reached the kitchen. “Ainsley d’Auberville was here yesterday. She’s half in love with you, Fin. It’s the sunglasses.”
He grunted. “She has boundary issues.”
Colin made no comment.
“The FBI is investigating the information I provided?”
“Oh, yes.” Colin grinned. “Why do you think I searched this place?”
Bracken all but rolled his eyes. “I involved you in this situation and you want to be sure I’m not going to do anything that reflects badly on you. I’ve been thinking. If we can get the d’Auberville painting back, we can see if the Dürer etching and Viking bracelet are depicted.”
“There is no ‘we,’ Fin, and you’re in Emma Sharpe land now.”
“In another life, maybe I’d have joined the guards, or become an art detective myself.”
Colin placed the purloined key on the counter. “Were you tempted to stay in Ireland?”
“It doesn’t matter. I made a commitment to serve this parish.” He brightened. “We’re having a bean-hole supper in a few weeks. You’ll have to explain that to me.”
“Fin—”
“I know. I’m worried, too. Answers seem as hard to grasp as the fog.”
They drove separately to Hurley’s. A fire crackled in its traditional brick fireplace, and a few parishioners at tables up front greeted Bracken. Colin realized they didn’t know he’d chartered a plane to Ireland.
Tourists occupied most of the waterfront tables, drinking, laughing, reading on their printed placemats about how to eat a lobster and exclaiming about assorted lobster facts.
Bracken’s table, however, was vacant. He sat down and motioned for Colin to sit across from him, but he didn’t fetch glasses and a bottle of Bracken’s finest. “Sister Joan, the security guard wounded in Wexford, the bomb in the Sharpe attic.” Bracken spoke in a low voice. “Colin…this killer must be found and brought to justice. This violence must stop.”
“I don’t disagree, Fin, but you’re a priest now.”
“All the more reason for me to do what I can to help.”
Colin thought he understood his friend’s frustration and sense of impotence, but he said, “I’m having coleslaw—real coleslaw, not the slime I had in Ireland.”
Bracken smiled and said nothing. He didn’t order whiskey, or the coleslaw.
CHAPTER 33
EMMA WAS IN COLIN’S TUB WHEN HE ARRIVED back at his house. Her little surprise. She heard him call to her. “Upstairs,” she called back, sinking into the steamy water. In another moment, she heard his footsteps on the stairs. Strong, deliberate, rhythmic. By themselves they had her blood rushing.
She’d left the door ajar. “You do live dangerously,” he said, opening the door the rest of the way and leaning against the jamb.
“I’m under massive amounts of bubbles. I had a sample bath gel in my suitcase and figured why not?” She moved a little, bubbles all the way up to her chin. “It’s a very girlie scent.”
“So I might just wither on the spot if I joined you, huh?”
She noticed him glance at her clothes heaped on the floor. “Yes, it’s true,” she said, amused. “I disrobed before climbing into the tub.”
“I’m trying to remember the last time I took a bath. I might have been nine.”
He walked into the small bathroom, opened a built-in cupboard, pulled out a badly
