Wedding at King's Convenience / Bedding the Secret Heiress: Wedding at King's Convenience

Maura sighed. Hadn’t taken him long to get Hollywood into the conversation.

“Sounds good,” Jefferson said, taking a sip of his thick black beer.

“Has your Rose had her baby yet, Michael?” Maura asked, then said in an aside to Jefferson, “Michael and Margaret are about to become grandparents.”

“We are indeed,” the pub owner said and gave Maura a knowing look, “so the extra money made when your film crew arrives will be most welcome.”

Maura closed her eyes. Clearly, all anyone wanted to talk about was the notion of having a film made in their little village. Michael had hardly left to bustle back to his bar when three or four other locals found a reason to stop by the table and talk to Jefferson.

She watched him handle the people she’d known all her life with courtesy and she liked him for it. Surely a man like him didn’t enjoy being the center of attention in a village less than a third the size of the town he called home. But rather than being abrupt, he seemed to almost encourage their chatter.

Maura listened with half an ear as Frances Boyle raved about her small traveler’s inn and the good service she could promise King Studios. Then Bill Howard, owner of the local market, swore he’d be happy to order in any and all supplies Jefferson might require. Nora Bailey gave him her card and told him again that she ran a full-service bakery and would be happy to work with his caterers and finally Colleen Ryan offered her skills as a seamstress, knowing that being so far from Hollywood, his costume people might be needing an extra hand, fine with a needle.

By the time they wandered off, each of them giving Maura a nudging glare, Jefferson was grinning and Maura’s head pounded like a badly played bodhran drum.

“Seems as though you’re the only one who doesn’t want my business,” he said, then took another sip of his beer.

“Aye, it does at that, doesn’t it?”

“So why are you holding out?”

“Holding out?” Maura pretended surprise. “I’ve not promised you a thing, have I?”

“No,” he said, smiling. “You haven’t. You’ve just sat by and let me talk and wheedle and eventually raise my offer a bit each day.”

True enough and she had hopes he’d go a bit higher yet before the deed was done and the bargain struck. If her friends and neighbors could curb their enthusiasm a little.

“The whole town wants this to happen,” he said.

“Aye, but the whole town won’t have the disruption of a film crew camped out on their land during the height of lambing season, will they?” She considered that a point well made and rewarded herself with a sip of her beer.

“You said yourself that most of the sheep give birth out in the fields. We’ll be filming mostly at the front of the house. Outdoor shots of the manor—”

She snorted. “It’s a farmhouse.”

“Looks like a manor to me,” he countered, then continued quickly, “There may be a few scenes around the barn and the holding pens, but we won’t get in the way.”

“And you can promise that?” She eased back in the booth and looked at him across the table.

“I’ll promise it, if that’s what it takes to get you to sign.”

“Desperate now?” She smiled and took another soothing drink. “Might make a woman think you’d be willing to sweeten your offer a bit.”

“You drive a hard bargain,” Jefferson told her with a nod of approval. “But I might be willing to go a little higher yet, if you’d make up your mind and give me your decision.”

She smiled to herself, but kept it small so he wouldn’t see the victorious gleam that had to be shining in her eyes. “As well I might, depending on how much higher you’re talking about.”

He gave her an admiring tip of his head. “Too bad your sister’s not the one making this deal. I have the distinct feeling she’d be easier to convince.”

“Ah, but Cara has her own priorities, doesn’t she?” Smiling at the thought of her younger sister, Maura could admit to herself that she would have eventually accepted Jefferson’s offer even if he hadn’t paid her for the use of her land. Because he’d agreed to give Cara a small part in the movie. And since her sister dreamed of being a famous actress, Cara had been walking in the clouds for days now.

“True,” he said. “If she were doing the bargaining, she might have wangled herself a bigger part.”

“She’ll do fine with what she’s got. She’s very good, you know.” Maura leaned forward. “For a few weeks last year, Cara was on one of those British soap operas. She was brilliant, really, until they killed her off. She had a lovely death scene and all. Made me cry when she died.”

His mouth quirked, just high enough to display a dimple in his left cheek. “I know. I sat through the tapes.”

“She is good, isn’t she? I mean, it’s not only that I’m her sister and love her that makes me think so, is it?”

“No, it’s not. She’s very good,” Jefferson told her.

“She has dreams, Cara has,” Maura murmured.

“What about you? Do you have dreams, too?” he asked.

Her gaze met his as she shook her head. “’Course I do, though my dreams are less lofty. The barn needs a new roof and before long, my old lorry’s going to keel over dead with all four tires in the air. And there’s a fine breed of sheep I’d like to try on my fields, as well.”

“You’re too beautiful to have such small dreams, Maura.”

She blinked at him, surprised by the flattery and, at the same time, almost insulted to be told that her dreams were somehow lacking in imagination. She’d once had bigger dreams, as all young girls do. But she’d grown up, hadn’t she? And now her dreams were more practical. That didn’t make them less important. “They’re mine, aren’t they, and I don’t think they’re small dreams at all.”

“I just meant—”

She knew what he meant. No doubt he was more accustomed to women who dreamed of diamonds or, God help her, furs and shiny cars. He probably saw her as a country bumpkin with her worn jeans and fields full of shaggy sheep. That thought was as good as a cold shower, dousing the fire in her hormones until she felt almost chilled at the lack of heat.

Before he could speak again, she glanced to one side and announced, “Oh look! The Flanagan boys are going to play.”

“What?”

Maura pointed to the far corner of the pub where three young men with dark red hair sat down, cradling an assortment of instruments between them. While Michael finally made good on his promise and delivered their bowls of steaming potato-leek soup and soda bread hot from the oven, the Flanagan brothers began to play.

In moments, the small pub was filled with the kind of music most people would pay a fortune to hear in a concert hall. Fiddle, drum and flute all came together in a wild yet fluid mesh of music that soared up to the rafters and rattled the window panes. Toes started tapping, hands were clapping and a few hearty souls sang out the lyrics to traditional Irish music.

One tune slid into another, rushing from fast and furious to the slow and heartbreaking, with the three brothers never missing a beat. Jefferson watched the energized crowd with a filmmaker’s eye and knew that he’d have to include at least one pub scene in the movie they would be filming here in a few months. And he was going to put in a word with his director about the Flanagan brothers. Their talent was amazing and he thought the least he could do was display it on film. Who knew, maybe he could help more dreams to come true.

Once he finally got Maura to sign his damned contract.

Jefferson’s gaze slid to her and his breath caught in his chest. He’d been aware of her beauty before now, but in the dim light of the pub with a single candle burning in a glass jar on the table, she looked almost ethereal. Insubstantial. Which was a ridiculous thought because he’d seen her wrestle a full-grown sheep down to the ground, so a fragile woman she most definitely was not. Yet he was seeing her now in a new way. A way that made his body tighten to the point of discomfort.

You’d think he’d be used to it, he thought. He’d been achy for nearly a week now, his body in a constant state of unrequited readiness that was making him crazy. Maybe what he needed to do was stop being so damn polite and just swoop in and seduce Maura before she knew what hit her.

Then a whirlwind swept into the pub and dropped down at their booth, nudging her sister over on the bench seat.

“Oh, soup!” Cara Donohue cooed the words and reached for her sister’s bowl with both hands. “Lovely. I’m famished.”

“Get your own, you beggar,” Maura told her with a laugh, but pushed her soup toward her sister.

“Don’t need to, do I?” Cara grinned, then shot a quick look at Jefferson. “Have you convinced her to sign up yet?”