Love and Blarney Read Free Page B

and hurt warred for dominance in her tone of voice with anger emerging the victor. “What part of the tale you spun me was true?”
    His brow furrowed but he didn’t take his eyes off the road. “Nearly everything. I left Ireland when I got my master’s degree. After a brief stint as an intern, I got a job on Wall Street. Seven years and several promotions later, I met you.”
    She remembered every fruity detail of that cocktail-flavored night. It was her thirtieth birthday, and she’d gone to an exclusive Manhattan nightclub to celebrate. She’d ordered her third—or was it fourth?—cosmopolitan when she’d caught him staring at her across the dance floor.
    If his clothes screamed money, his demeanor roared success. She’d held his gaze and flashed him a tipsy come-hither smile. He hadn’t hesitated. Within seconds, he’d maneuvered his way through the crowded dance floor and stood before her. The moment she’d heard his Irish accent, each melodious word skittering across her skin in an erotic dance, Jayme had fallen in love.
    And she’d assumed he had too. Unshed tears stung her eyes. She blinked them away, dug her French-manicured nails into her palms. “Please, what happened to make you move to another country and never look back?”
    He exhaled sharply. “After a massive row with my father, he threw me out and I didn’t return. But the row was the catalyst, not the cause. It was more an accumulation of things. Long story short, I was the only one of my siblings to excel in school. Instead of getting a criminal record, I got a university degree—a good one at that. You come from a family where academic prowess is both expected and lauded. I come from one where the ability to pick a lock is considered an essential life skill. How could I tell you about them? Your family is nothing like mine.”
    “Perhaps not, but why would you think I’d judge you for yours?”
    He frowned. “Why wouldn’t you? Everyone else does.”
    “I’m not everyone else. I’m your wife.” She clasped her trembling hands in her lap. If only he’d told her the truth. Yes, the image of Ruairí belonging to a family of lawbreakers jarred. No, it didn’t fit with the image of the educated, cultured man she’d fallen in love with. But none of that mattered.
    “The man you met was a successful stockbroker,” he said, a hint of bitterness in his tone. “That’s what you saw, that’s who you agreed to date, that’s who you married.”
    “Bullshit. I loved you. How could you lie to me? You should have told me the truth about your family before the wedding.”
    “I was going to tell you. I intended to tell you.”
    “But?”
    His fingers flexed over the steering wheel. “But I got caught up in the whirlwind of our romance. I didn’t want our perfect bubble to burst. You have to understand—”
    “I don’t have to anything. You should have told me. I would have listened.”
    “Would you?” He turned slightly in his seat, and their eyes met briefly before he returned his gaze to the road. “Come on, Jayme. You’d have realized we weren’t right for each other. I know it was selfish, but I couldn’t bear the idea of losing you.”
    “For heaven’s sake,” she snapped. “You wouldn’t have lost me.”
    He raised one dark eyebrow. “Come on, admit it. You’d have run a mile. Would you have knowingly married a man from my background?”
    Her mouth opened on autopilot but she swallowed her protest. Did he have a point? Her parents had made no secret of their disapproved of her husband. They’d raised her to assume she’d marry a man who moved in the same social circles as her family. It was an assumption she’d never thought to question. Until Ruairí, she’d always dated guys her parents would consider son-in-law material. Disregarding his lack of WASP connections was one thing. Would she have turned a blind eye to his unsavory Irish relatives?
    “Well?” he prompted. “How would you have reacted if I’d