After they’d both had their drinks and Clara had fallen asleep much more content, Jo sat and watched her little sister sleeping. She had been through so much in her short years, and yet she trusted people. She was braver than Jo ever was and she embraced every day with enthusiasm, making new friends wherever she went. Clara allowed people into her life and into her heart in a way Jo didn’t any more. She had a lot to learn from the little girl curled up in her bed, she realised.

Although, actually, she felt she was already letting someone in, in the form of Lorcan. As she climbed into bed and lifted her book to read, her mind drifted off to how they had talked so easily all the way to Ivy Lane after their trip to the park.

When she left him at his grandad’s shop, she saw a new little twinkle in Harry’s eyes. Things were different now, she thought. She wasn’t just Jo from The Ivy Inn. She was Jo who was becoming friends with Lorcan. And Lorcan was one of Harry’s greatest treasures. In fact, it was even possible that Harry Gallagher loved Lorcan Gallagher more than he loved his shop, and that was saying something.

It was no secret that Harry would have had Lorcan beatified immediately if there was a way to do so. However, as the Pope was unlikely to accept bribes in the form of Jaffa Cakes close to their use-by date, she very much doubted that Saint Lorcan would be getting a free pass to the gates of heaven any time soon.

She wondered if Harry deemed her good enough for his precious Lorcan, then remembered the way he had smiled so brightly at her and then at his grandson. Nothing would make Harry happier than if Lorcan moved to Derry and found himself a lovely girl to marry. He’d be watching every single step of their burgeoning friendship closely. Maybe she should go and talk to Harry in the morning. Tell him not to be getting any notions. Tell him they were just friends and Lorcan was nursing a broken heart.

And Jo knew exactly what a broken heart felt like. It was a broken heart that had sent her running home from Spain, convinced she would never be happy again.

18

The Break-Up

Colm McCafferty was six foot three inches tall, played Gaelic football and had thighs of steel. He wore his dark hair cropped, and his face was permanently speckled with freckles and a light dash of sunburn. When he played GAA, his pale complexion would be replaced by a ruddy hue that stretched from the top of his shirt to the tips of his ears. The redness, stark against his Irish pallor, only served to make the blue of his eyes extra vibrant.