ARC: The Seers by Julianna Scott Read Free Book Online Page B

thank you for the invitation.” Then he took a small step back and turned her to face me. “Allow me to introduce my daughter, Rebecca. Becca,” he said, placing a hand on my shoulder, “this is Mrs Alva Bloch. She and her husband Brassal are our hosts this week.”
    “It’s a pleasure to meet you,” I said with my best smile.
    “ Mo daor, conas álainn go bhfuil tú! ” she mooned, gently placing the tips of her fingers under my chin.
    “Thank you,” I said, torn between being embarrassed at the compliment and happy that I was able fudge a basic understanding of what she’d said. My Gaelic was still on the piddling side of poor, but luckily I was dating a fluent speaker with a larger than average romantic side, making me more than capable of recognizing the Gaelic word for “beautiful” when I heard it.
    “And, my word,” Alva gasped, dramatically placing her hand to her chest, “so like your father!”
    “Yes,” I said, glancing down and tucking my hair back behind my ear, never sure what to say to that. “That’s what I hear.”
    “I am so happy you decided to join us this year, we are overjoyed to have so many young people joining us this year. It can be difficult at this time of year, what with most of them in school or attending university…”
    She continued to talk, but I lost all focus the moment one of the servers came over with a tray of champagne. Before he even had a chance to pick up one of the fizzing goblets from the silver tray he held, Alva waved him off with a single flip of her wrist, not even glancing in his direction as she did so – like she was swatting at a bug that was flitting around her ear. The server immediately looked down, his expression hovering somewhere between ashamed and scared as he slunk away like a dog with his tail between his legs.
    I swallowed down the thorns of contempt rising in my throat as I continued to listen to her prattle on, no longer remotely interested in what she was saying.
    Thankfully, before it would have been my turn to say anything back to her, Cormac came to my rescue. “Alva dear,” he chimed in suddenly, “you grow more lovely each time I see you.”
    “Cormac, you old charmer,” she said, stepping over and giving him a cordial but somewhat stiff hug. “I was thrilled to see that you were joining us as well, it’s been far too long! How have you been…?”
    Ugh. More of this?
    I was ready to ask where the ladies’ room was just so I could escape for a few minutes, when someone nearby caught my eye. It was a girl who looked to be about eighteen or so years old. She was the first person other than Alex who I’d seen that was even remotely close to my age since we’d arrived, though Alva had said something before I tuned her out about most of the younger Bhunaidh being in school. Maybe this girl was already out or had taken time off.
    She appeared to have just entered the room and had pulled another woman – judging by their identical shades of auburn hair, her mother – from her conversation to speak to her, but it wasn’t until I saw the mother gesture our way that things got interesting. The mother pointed us out to the girl and whispered something to her, then placed a hand on her shoulder and took a step toward us, but the girl didn’t move. The mother tried again, glaring at the girl in a “don’t you embarrass me” kind of way, but still the girl wouldn’t move. Instead she mumbled something with a small shake of her head then looked away. The corners of my mouth twitched as I watched the quiet argument and snickered quietly; the girl didn’t want to meet us. Her mother was clearly trying to get her to accompany her over so that they could introduce themselves just as everyone else had done, but the girl wasn’t having it.
    Suddenly my hopes began to creep up. Was there actually a person here who was humble and unpretentious enough to realize that mooning over Jocelyn – and by extension, me – was ridiculous? A