at the vast palette of family life spread before her. Her family? No. Her mother had been the means to her existence, nothing more, and her grandfather hadn’t given a toss about her.
‘I might have cared if this had been my family,’ she told him. ‘But the Conaills were the reason I couldn’t have a family. It’s hardly fair to expect me to honour them now.’
‘Yet you’d love to restore the tapestries.’
‘They’re amazing.’ She crossed to a picture of a family group. ‘I’ve been figuring out time frames, and I think this could be the great-great-grandpa we share. Look at Great-Great-Grandma. She looks a tyrant.’
‘You don’t want to keep her?’
‘Definitely not. How about you?’ she asked. ‘Are you into family memorabilia?’
‘I have a house full of memorabilia. My parents threw nothing out. And my brothers live very modern lives. I can’t see any of this stuff fitting into their homes. I’ll ask them but I know what their answers will be. You really want nothing but the money?’
‘I wanted something a long time ago,’ she told him. They were standing side by side, looking at the picture of their mutual forebears. ‘You have no idea how much I wanted. But now...it’s too late. It even seems wrong taking the money. I’m not part of this family.’
‘Hey, we are sort of cousins.’ And, before she knew what he intended, he’d put an arm around her waist and gave her a gentle hug. ‘I’m happy to own you.’
‘I don’t...’ The feel of his arm was totally disconcerting. ‘I don’t think I want to be owned.’ And this was a normal hug, she told herself. A cousinly hug. There was no call to haul herself back in fright. She forced herself to stand still.
‘Not by this great-great-grandma,’ he conceded. ‘She looks a dragon.’ But his arm was still around her waist, and it was hard to concentrate on what he was saying. It was really hard. ‘But you need to belong somewhere. There’s a tapestry somewhere with your future on it.’
‘I’m sure there’s not. Not if it has grandmas and grandpas and kids and dogs.’ Enough. She tugged away because it had to be just a cousinly hug; she wasn’t used to hugs and she didn’t need it. She didn’t! ‘I’m not standing still long enough to be framed.’
‘That’s a shame,’ he told her, and something in the timbre of his voice made her feel...odd. ‘Because I suspect you’re worth all this bunch put together.’
‘That’s kissing the Blarney Stone.’
He shrugged and smiled and when he smiled she wanted that hug back. Badly.
‘I’m not one for saying what I don’t mean, Jo Conaill,’ he told her. ‘You’re an amazing woman.’
‘D...don’t,’ she stammered. For some reason the hug had left her discombobulated. ‘We’re here to sort this stuff. Let’s start now.’
And then leave, she told herself. The way she was feeling... The way she was feeling was starting to scare her.
* * *
The size of the place, the mass of furnishings, the store of amazing clothing any museum would kill for—the entire history of the castle was mind-blowing. It was almost enough to make her forget how weird Finn’s hug made her feel. But there was work to be done. Figuring out the scale of their inheritance would take days.
Underground there were cellars—old dungeons?—and storerooms. Upstairs were ‘living’ rooms, apartment-sized chambers filled with dust-sheeted furniture. Above them were the bedrooms and up a further flight of stairs were the servants’ quarters, rooms sparsely furnished with an iron cot and dresser.
Over the next couple of days they moved slowly through the place, sorting what there was. Most things would go straight to the auction rooms—almost all of it—but, by mutual consent, they decided to catalogue the things that seemed important. Detailed cataloguing could be done later by the auctioneers but somehow it seemed wrong to sell everything without acknowledging its existence. So they moved from room to room, taking notes, and she put the memory of the hug aside.
Though she had to acknowledge that she was grateful for his company. If she’d had to face this alone...
This place seemed full of ghosts who’d never wanted her, she thought. The costume store on its own was enough to repel her. All these clothes, worn by people who would never have accepted her. She was illegitimate, despised, discarded. She had no place here, and Finn must feel the same. Regardless of his inherited title, he still must feel the poor relation.
And he’d never fit in one of these cots, she thought as they reached the servants’ quarters. She couldn’t help glancing up at him as he opened the door on a third identical bedroom. He was big. Very big.
‘It’d have to be a bleak famine before I’d fit in that bed,’ he declared. He glanced down at the rough map drawn for them by Mrs O’Reilly. ‘Now the nursery.’
The room they entered next was huge, set up as a schoolroom as well as a nursery. The place was full of musty furniture, with desks and a blackboard, but schooling seemed to have been a secondary consideration.
There were toys everywhere, stuffed animals of every description, building blocks, doll’s houses, spinning tops, dolls large and small, some as much as three feet high. All pointing to indulged childhoods.
And then there was the rocking horse.
It stood centre stage in the schoolroom, set on its own dais. It was as large as a miniature pony, crafted with care and, unlike most other things in the nursery, it was maintained in pristine condition.
It had a glossy black coat, made, surely, with real horse hide. Its saddle was embellished with gold and crimson, as were the bridle and stirrups. Its ears were flattened and its dark glass eyes stared out at the nursery as if to say, Who Dares Ride Me?
And all around the walls were photographs and paintings, depicting every child who’d ever sat on this horse, going back maybe two hundred years.
Jo stared at the horse and then started a round of the walls, looking at each child in turn. These were beautifully dressed children. Beautifully cared for. Even in the early photographs, where children were exhorted to be still and serious for the camera or the artist, she could see their excitement. These Conaills were the chosen few.
Jo’s mother was the last to be displayed. Taken when she was about ten, she was dressed in pink frills and she was laughing up at the camera. Her face was suffused with pride. See, her laugh seemed to say. This is where I belong.
But after her...nothing.
‘Suggestions as to what we should do with all this?’ Finn said behind her, sounding cautious, as if he guessed the well of emotion surging within. ‘Auction the lot of them?’
‘Where are you?’ she demanded in a voice that didn’t sound her own.
‘Where am I where?’
‘In the pictures.’
‘You know I don’t belong here.’
‘No,
