A balding man was inside, and I could see he was wearing a suit and tie. He flung open the door and wrestled with the seatbelt, and once he’d unclipped it, he practically fell out of the driver’s seat and onto the patchy grass underneath. Then he dived back in, his stubby legs flapping about before finally emerging with a black briefcase. The whole thing was like a slapstick comedy routine out of a Monty Python movie, and I watched in silent awe at the display.
Narrowing my eyes, I wondered if he had the right house. He was wearing a dark suit, his tie done up, and his jacket still on. Lawyer? Debt collector? The odds were at two to one. His forehead was dripping with sweat as he waddled up the path, cursing under his breath.
Standing, I set down my glass on the table and leaned against the railing of the deck. “Can I help you?”
“Ah,” he said, glancing up at me. “Are you Skye Williams?”
“Yeah.” I looked him over and tried to hold onto my laughter. He looked like a penguin waddling up the path, and his short stature didn’t help one bit, nor did his thick Irish accent. He was a long way from Antarctica.
“My name is Robert O’Keeffe,” he said, dabbing his forehead with a handkerchief. “I’m here on behalf of you mother, Aileen.”
I stared at him, my amusement turning into full-blown shock. I hadn’t heard from her since I was two years old, and even then, I couldn’t recall a single thing about the woman. All I had were a few creased photos and the random memories Dad used to mumble before he died. The meds the doctors put him on loosened his tongue, and for the first time in my life, I’d learned a little about the ghost of my mother, the Irish woman who’d come to Australia for adventure and ended up with my dad.
“My mum?” I asked the man. “You mean the woman who abandoned my dad and me when I was two? What does she want?”
The man, Robert O’Keeffe, wrung his hands. “I’m very sorry to be bringin’ the news, but your mother has passed on.”
I raised my eyebrows.
“It happened a month ago,” he went on, looking forlorn. “I’m very sorry for your loss.”
I raised my eyebrows. I was supposed to feel something, wasn’t I? Sadness, shock, despair, or whatever emotion was comparable, but I didn’t feel anything. How could I when I didn’t even know her? My mother was a stranger.
“How?” I asked instead. Looked like morbid curiosity was now a thing with me.
“Heart attack. It was very sudden.”
I snorted and glanced out across the ocean.
“I know this is a shock to you,” he said, climbing the stairs and standing on the deck next to me. “But she left you everythin’ she owned. I’m a longtime friend, but I’m also the executor of her will.”
Everything was numb. Even the strange weather wasn’t bothering me anymore.
“I guess that means I’m stuck with her debts now,” I drawled. Glancing up at the sky, I added, “Thanks, universe. Just what I need. Just add bankruptcy to the pile, and you’ve got your trifecta. I knew something was coming today. I knew it.”
“No, no,” Robert said, watching me curiously. “She had no debts. You can be sure of that.”
“Then give me some good news, Robbie,” I said with a scowl. “I lost my job to a cheaper workforce overseas, my boyfriend dumped me last night, and now you show up in your suit and tie and say my stranger of a mother has died. I’m a financially ruined, emotionally whiplashed orphan. Give me your best shot.”
He beamed at me. “Aye, you’re the spittin’ image of her with your long black hair and green eyes, to be sure. She was just as strong willed with the mouth to match.”
Another tidbit of information had just fallen into my lap, and I wasn’t sure how to take it. When I was little, I’d always dreamed of her. I would lie in bed—cuddling whatever soft toy was my favorite that week—and dream up wild stories of what she would be like. She was from a faraway place that seemed so magical to a little girl of seven. Ireland with its green hills, wild forests, and fairies. Adventure…it seemed its call was in my blood.
Robert set his briefcase down on the table and popped the latches open. When he lifted the lid, he pulled out a pile of papers and a pen that glinted gold in the clear autumn sunshine, never mind the fact we were standing in the shade. The thing looked solid. As in twenty-four karat.
“I need some signatures to make it official, but here’s the list of her assets.” He cleared his throat and began to read. “To my daughter, Skye, I leave all my earthly possessions and assets. The cottage I have called home for twenty-five years, which has been in our family for a hundred and fifty more, that resides in the village of Derrydun, Ireland. My shop, Irish Moon. All my belongings and inventory. The bank accounts and whatever remains in them.” Robert shuffled another paper and read the amount, “Thirty-five thousand euros in the savings account. Twenty-eight thousand euros in the business account. Forty-six thousand euros in the term deposit.”
“Whatever,” I said, trying to keep calm about the one hundred and eleven thousand euros, not to mention the house and that Moon thing. It was about time she gave me something other than heartbreak. “Where do I sign?”
“I must warn you,” he said, holding out the pen. “There’s one condition that needs to be upheld.”
I snatched my hand back. “Which is?”
“As her last living relative, you must come to Derrydun. Your mother stipulated it in her will,” he said. “All costs associated with your travel will be looked after by her estate, but the condition still
