Pursued by the Rogue (The Fairy Tales of New York Book 1) Read Online Free

switching to orange juice.” She glanced at Faith’s and Dawn’s full pints’ and then back down at her half pint. “Seriously, how do you drink that much beer?”
    “Practice,” said Faith and Dawn nodded sagely and reached for hers.
    “I’m mostly in it for the froth.”
    “Head,” corrected Faith. “And next time – if Pop’s not looking – I’ll make yours bigger.”
    “Only if your pop’s not looking?” Mercy teased.
    Faith nodded, her bright blue gaze encompassing Dawn and Mercy both. “There are rules concerning how much head to put on a glass of Guinness. Commandments, some might call them. Not to be messed with. I value my own head also.”
    Dawn laughed, and then not two seconds later lost her grip on the glass and narrowly missed spilling the lot. As it was, a good quarter of it ended up on the table. “Good job, genius,” she muttered, reaching for napkins to mop up the spillage. “Sorry. I’m nervous. Also a klutz.”
    “What’s to be nervous about?” Mercy reached over and squeezed her fingers as Faith called for a cloth from the barman.
    “Oh, you know.” Vague was good, Dawn decided. Vague and klutzy went well together.
    “ I know,” murmured Faith, as she leaned over and cleaned up Dawn’s mess. “Impressing old friends is hard. Try being the barmaid in this equation.”
    “As if that’s all you do here,” Mercy said. “Just like all Zel does is stand in front of a camera and look beautiful. Just like all I do is pick grapes back in Argentina.”
    “Dawn runs her own genetic research company,” Faith pointed out.
    “Yeah, but she’s a klutz.” Zel came on board the conversation with a lazy wave of her hand. “I vote we keep her anyway.”
    “Exactly.” Mercy grinned. “The beauty of old friends is that don’t have to impress them.”
    Just like that the years fell away and Dawn sat back and relaxed into the warmth these three other women provided. Reunions didn’t have to be a stilted show-and-tell full of awkward silence. Maybe they could just sit here and get to know each other all over again.
    Maybe she could dream of Finn now and know that things had worked out for the best.
    “Is he still watching you?” Faith asked.
    “Who?”
    “Finn.”
    “No,” she said, and it was true, for his attention had shifted to a dark-haired boy of around four years old who was running towards him with no signs of stopping. A slender, dark-haired woman followed at a more leisurely pace. Finn crouched down and hugged the kid, picking him up so that they were shoulder to shoulder and head to head.
    Finn had a son?
    Finn spared a kiss for the woman.
    Finn had a wife?
    That was …
    So …
    Expected.
    Perfectly normal. And that pang of bitter envy in the vicinity of her heart?
    Indigestion.
    No children for Dawn and no regrets.
    Honest.
    “What are you looking at?” asked Zel.
    “Finn’s son.”
    Zel turned, so did Faith. Mercy was already facing that way.
    “Godson,” Faith corrected. “That’s Gil. A friend of Finn’s died young and his wife, Emmeline, gave birth two months later. Finn had already agreed to be godparent. One thing I will say about my brother is that he took that promise seriously. He doesn’t always nail the religious aspects of the job but the male influence and the music … he’s all over that.”
    “That’s so sweet,” said Mercy.
    “Yes.” Dawn picked up her Guinness and drank.
    Her gaze met Finn’s again and held.
    Yes, it was.

Chapter Two
    ‡
    F inbar Sullivan had a decision to make, and it wasn’t a Beethoven versus Mozart type call. He could declare his interest in Dawn to the world – or at the very least to his sister –and set about making something happen, or he could try to ignore the inexplicable hold Dawn Turner had on him and carry on as usual.
    Not much of a decision at all.
    Two days had passed since Faith’s reunion with her school friends. Two days of Gil-loaded activities involving Times Square, junk food