Read Online Born in Shame by Nora Roberts - Free Book Online

unsteady breath. “I don’t think it’s fair to seduce me when I’m nursing our daughter.”
    â€œIt’s fair to seduce you anytime.” He held up his hand, letting the sunlight glint off the gold of his wedding ring. “We’re married.”
    â€œPut your glands on hold, Grayson Thane,” Maggie called out from the next room. “We’ve less than twenty minutes before we have to leave for the airport.”
    â€œSpoilsport,” he muttered, but grinned as he rose. “I suppose I’ll have two of your sisters hounding me now.”
    Â 
    But Gray was the last thing on Shannon’s mind. She could see Ireland below from the window of the plane, the green of its fields, the black of its cliffs. It was beautiful, awesomely so, and oddly familiar.
    She was already wishing she hadn’t come.
    No turning back, she reminded herself. Foolish to even consider it. It might have been true that she’d made the decision to come on impulse, influenced by the drag of her own guilt and grief, and the simple understanding in Brianna’s letter. But she’d followed the impulse through, taking a leave of absence from her job, closing up her apartment, and boarding a plane for a three-thousand mile journey that was minutes away from being complete.
    She’d stopped asking herself what she expected to find, or what she wanted to accomplish. She didn’t have the answers. All she knew was that she’d needed to come. To see, perhaps, what her mother had once seen. The doubts plagued her—worry that she was being disloyal to the only father she’d ever known, fears that she would suddenly find herself surrounded by relatives she had no desire to acknowledge.
    With a shake of her head, she took her compact from her purse. She’d been clear enough in her letter, Shannon reminded herself as she tried to freshen her makeup. She’d edited and revised the text three times before she’d been satisfied enough to mail a response to Brianna. It had been polite, slightly cool, and unemotional.
    And that was exactly how she intended to go on.
    She tried not to wince when the wheels touched down. There was still time, she assured herself, to work on her composure. Years of traveling with her parents had made her familiar with the routine of disembarking, customs, passports. She moved through it on automatic while she calmed her mind.
    Confident now, assured that she once again felt slightly aloof to the circumstances, she joined the crowd moving toward the main terminal.
    She didn’t expect the jolt of recognition. The absolute certainty that the two women waiting with all the others were the Concannons. She could have told herself it was the coloring, the clear creamy skin, the green eyes, the red hair. They shared some features, though the taller of the two had a softer look, and her hair was more gold while the other was pure flame.
    But it wasn’t the coloring, or the family resemblance that had her zeroing in on only two when there were so many people weeping and laughing and hurrying toembrace. It was a deep visceral knowledge that was surprisingly painful.
    She had only an instant to sum them up, the taller, neat as a pin in a simple blue dress, the other oddly chic in a baggy shirt and tattered jeans. And she saw her recognition returned, with a glowing smile by one, a cool, measured stare by the other.
    â€œShannon. Shannon Bodine.” Without hesitation or plan, Brianna hurried forward and kissed Shannon lightly on the cheek. “Welcome to Ireland. I’m Brianna.”
    â€œHow do you do?” Shannon was grateful her hands were gripped on the luggage cart. But Brianna was already neatly brushing her aside to take the cart herself.
    â€œThis is Maggie. We’re so glad you’ve come.”
    â€œYou’ll want to get out of the crowd, I imagine.” Reserving judgment on the aloof woman in the expensive slacks and