Ryan's Place - By Sherryl Woods Page 0,8

offered a tempting distraction. She glanced his way again, noting that his focus on the road was no less intense.

“I’m sorry to disrupt your plans this way,” she apologized yet again, hoping to spark a conversation.

“Not a problem,” he said without looking at her.

“Most people have a lot to do around the holidays.”

“It’s okay,” he said, his delectable mouth drawing into a tight line.

“Will the pub be open tomorrow?”

“For a few hours. Some of our customers have nowhere else to spend Thanksgiving.”

She recalled what Father Francis had said about Ryan having been abandoned by his parents. Obviously, he could relate to customers who were essentially in the same fix—all alone in the world. “It’s thoughtful of you to give them a place where they’ll feel welcome.”

“It’s a business decision,” he said, dismissing the idea that there was any sentiment involved.

“Your own family doesn’t mind?” she asked, deliberately feigning ignorance and broaching the touchy subject in the hope that he would open up and fill in the blanks left by Father Francis’s sketchy explanation.

“No,” he said tightly.

“Tell me about them,” she prodded.

He glanced at her then. “There’s nothing to tell.”

There was a bleak note in his voice she doubted he realized was there. “Oh?” she said. “Every family has a story.”

His frown deepened. “Ms. O’Brien, I offered you a lift home. I didn’t offer to provide the entertainment. If you need some noise, turn up the radio.”

Maggie hesitated at the sharp tone, but even an armchair psychologist understood that defensiveness was often a cover for a deep-seated need to talk. She wondered if Ryan Devaney had ever talked about whatever he was trying so determinedly to keep from her. Maybe he told his secrets to Father Francis from the shadows of the confessional, or maybe the priest was simply better at prying them loose.

“Sometimes it’s easier to tell things to a stranger than it is to a friend,” she observed lightly.

“And sometimes there’s nothing to tell,” he repeated.

Though she already knew at least some of the answers, she decided to try getting them directly from the source. “Are you married?” she began.

“No.”

“Have you ever been?”

“No.”

“What about the rest of your family?”

He slammed on the brakes and turned to glower at her. “I have no family,” he said tightly. “None at all. Are you satisfied, Ms. O’Brien?”

Satisfied? Far from it, she thought as she gazed into eyes burning with anger. If anything, she was more intrigued than ever. Now, however, was probably not the best time to tell Ryan that. Maybe tomorrow, after she’d persuaded him to stay and spend Thanksgiving with her family, maybe then he’d be mellow enough to explain what had happened years ago to tear his world apart and why he claimed to have no family at all, when the truth was slightly different. They might not be in his life, but they were more than likely out there somewhere.

Even without all the answers, Maggie was filled with sympathy. Because with two parents, three sisters and two brothers, a couple of dozen aunts, uncles and cousins—all of them boisterous, impossible, difficult and undeniably wonderful—she couldn’t imagine anyone having no one at all to call family.

Ryan caught the little flicker of dismay in Maggie’s eyes when he’d announced that he had no family to speak of. He was pretty sure he’d seen something else, as well, a faint glint of determination.

Maybe that was why he wasn’t the least bit surprised when she invited him to stay over once they reached her family’s large house off Kendall Square.

“It’s nearly two in the morning,” she told him. “You must be exhausted. Please stay. I’m sure there’s an overflow crowd here tonight, but there’s bound to be a couch or something free. If worse comes to worst, I know there are sleeping bags in the attic. I can set you up with one of those.”

“Don’t worry about it. I’m used to late nights. I’ll be fine,” he insisted as he began unloading bags from his trunk. Since she and Father Francis had loaded the car, it was the first time he’d realized that she must have half her worldly possessions with her. He regarded her wryly. “You planning on a long visit?”

“Till after New Year’s,” she said.

“What about your job? You do have one, I imagine.”

“I’m between jobs,” she said.

“Fired?” he asked, pulling out the familiar note of sympathy he used when his customers hit a similar rough patch.

“Nope. I quit a very good job as an accountant for a corporation. I’m