Moonlight Lover

by Ferrarella, Marie

  Hearing his name, Riley looked up, confused. "Do we know one another, sir?"

  Riley stared at Sin-Jin, trying to summon his image from the depths of his mind and tie it to a name. He failed.

  Sin-Jin nodded his head, taking a step toward the man. "Yes, but not nearly so well as I would wish. I am told that you're the new printer and that we have a brand new Gazette to keep us abreast of what is happening to our neighbors and to our country."

  Riley attempted to rise to the occasion. His legs felt miserably weak this morning and he was forced to sink down on the stool once more. But he smiled his gratitude for the words. "Aye."

  "When he's not drowning in his cups," Rachel put in. When Sin-Jin looked at her, she lowered her eyes back to the huge jumble of letters before her. "Cups you helped to fill, I might add."

  Sin-Jin glanced at the arranged typeset, guessed at the next letter she was reaching for and handed it to her. She murmured something that sounded only vaguely like "Thank you."

  Undeterred, Sin-Jin answered, "As it was, Riley attempted to buy one for me." Beautiful, that was the word for this vixen. Beautiful as a rose atop a dung heap, a discovery all the more startling for the location.

  For a moment, Rachel's throat grew dry, just as it had when he kissed her last night.

  With his eyes on her, slowly sliding down the length of her body, she felt as if she was stripped down to her smallest undergarment. Or less. She damned him for it even as her knees were reduced to the consistency of spring water after the first thaw. She turned her assault on her brother, taking a moment to draw herself together.

  She frowned at Riley all the harder because he was the reason this man had intruded into her life. "So that's where our hard-earned money goes, buying ale for the enemy."

  Sin-Jin's pity for the man increased. He had no love for cowards, but felt in this case that what Riley was doing was exercising discretion. One does not swat at a bee unless one wishes to be stung.

  "A man sets his soul free in many ways." Sin-Jin was beginning to look forward to plucking her stinger.

  Riley turned grateful eyes on the stranger. "You have me at a disadvantage, sir. You are—?"

  His dark brown eyes narrowed as he once again dug into the murkiness of last night, attempting to retrieve the man's identity. "I seem to remember—Lawrence?" He smiled as he said the name, knowing he was right.

  "Yes." Sin-Jin nodded. Drawing his heels together, he bowed formally from the waist, an amused smile on his lips intended solely for Rachel, who quickly averted her head. "Saint John Lawrence." He eyed the back of Rachel's head. "Sin-Jin to my friends."

  "Friends," she echoed disdainfully. "You'll not be finding any of those here." She muttered the words under her breath, but they were loud enough for Sin-Jin to hear, as well she meant him to.

  He merely raised his eyes in her direction and grinned before straightening.

  Chapter Six

  The morning hung about her like a damp cloth. Rachel was tired and irritable and she was in no mood for this intruder—especially after having spent a long night with him invading her every thought, waking or sleeping.

  After the wretched Redcoat had finally departed, the rest of her night had been outlined in painful minutes, inching their way along to dawn like tired snails beneath a merciless sun. She had been angry, unsettled and something more. As Rachel had relived those moments surrounding his presumptuous attack on her person, strange, unseemly thoughts and responses chased one another through her body.

  To be sure, Rachel had been kissed before. She'd been kissed by relatives who loved her and by old friends at partings and reunions. But never, ever had she been kissed the way a man kissed a woman.

  No man would have dared kiss her in that intimate fashion, Riley had confided to her once, taking pity on her. She frightened them all, he said. The news had troubled her only a little and only at first.

  Since she wanted no part of any man too frightened of his own shadow to stand up to her, Rachel had become resigned to letting such things as what other girls dreamed about bypass her entirely. It wasn't as if her life was empty. She had a mission, one not easily shouldered by someone whose frame was so thin, but she shouldered it proudly. Apprenticing Riley in secret while they lived in Philadelphia, she now helped run the Gazette. It was as much her dream as his to bear witness to the dawning of a brave new world, to a brave new time.

  People with such a mission did not have time to be kissed, especially not by pompous British fops.

  Still, after he had kissed her, her lips felt blurred and burned, as if a candle had been held too close to the flesh. She had damned his soul to hell twenty times over as she had tossed and turned her way into the morning.

  When morning had finally arrived, Rachel had gone on to take her ill-humor out on Riley. If it had not been for her brother, she wouldn't have even met this horrible man, much less been subjected first to his thoughtless pawing and then to the aftermath of that invasion of her privacy.

  And now he was here, bigger and bolder than life. Standing in her establishment, hers and Riley's, looking at her with those eyes of his that could pierce a solid wall as easily as a cannonball could go through paper. Rachel felt her temper flaring.

  "As I said, you'll find no friend here." She kept her back to him. "You might have nothing better to do, sir— you'll note I did not call you 'good sir' because you are not good—than to stand about and gawk at god-fearing, hardworking people, but my brother and I do have something better to do." She glanced over at Riley expectantly. Was he just going to sit there all day? "Well, is it to stone you've turned?"

  The timbre of her voice caused Riley's head to throb even more painfully. He held it now, as if it would fall off and break any moment. "No, stones don't have heads that ache."

  Pity warred with vindication. Her voice softened just a little. "Well, then perhaps you won't be hurrying so fast to that rodent-infested local tavern the next time you think you have something to celebrate. Drowning yourself in demon rum is no way to do it."

  Riley ventured a look at her delicate, stormy face from behind his fingers. How could anything so small make so much noise? "It's wasn't the rum I was referring to, Rach. It was the mighty sound of your sanctimonious voice, drumming in my ears."

  Rachel drew herself up to her full height. She was no more than a foot shorter than her brother, but she took no notice of that. And, in not noticing, she bridged the difference.

  It stung her that their private argument was a source of entertainment to this interloper. She spun on the heel of her worn slipper and glared at Sin-Jin. "I'll thank you to leave now."

  She looked at him expectantly. Her nostrils flared ever so slightly in impatience when he made no move to do as she said.

  Sin-Jin rested an elbow on the corner of the printing press. His manner appeared careless, but he had satisfied himself that he was disturbing nothing. "You always seem to be thanking me for leaving."

  Would nothing wipe away that infernal smirk of his? "It's the best gift that you can give me."

  He straightened, amused by the exchange between them. "Don't be so hasty to judge, Mistress O'Roarke." He leaned closer to her. "You hardly know me."

  “I know more than I want to. "Another gift." Her manner clearly dismissed him.

  But Sin-Jin wasn't about to go so quickly. He had wasted a night, he could afford to let another half hour go by, especially in such stimulating company. Other than Krystyna, he was used to simpering women, not ones who made the very air crackle. He felt oddly exhilarated.

  Sin-Jin turned to Riley, who was watching in silence, enjoying the temporary respite. "Where do you hale from, O'Roarke?"

  Riley blinked, relieved to have a civil question addressed to him for a change. Since it was obvious that he and his sister originated from Ireland, he answered as to their last residence. "Philadelphia."

  Though she was proud to be an American, because Sin-Jin was British, she reverted to a more antagonistic answer,
to a centuries-old feud written in blood and tears.

  "Ireland," Rachel declared at the same time, her chin lifting proudly.

  "Both," Riley clarified. "From Ireland ten years ago. From Philadelphia three months in the past."

  Sin-Jin had become used to things, other than tempers, evolving slowly in the Americas. "And you've started a periodical so quickly?" he marveled. "Where did you get the printing press?" He tapped a corner of the imposing structure.

  As if suddenly remembering that they had a paper to get out, Rachel turned back to her task. Glancing at the next line on the page, she chose her letters swiftly, digging them out of the wooden cases.

  "It's ours," she informed him. "We brought it with us from Philadelphia."

  "Mr. Franklin knew of someone who could sell us a press cheaply and arranged for it," Riley added.

  Sin-Jin's eyes narrowed. It was a common enough name, but only one man came to mind at the mention of it.

  "Franklin?" He looked at Rachel's back, but she refused to even turn around.

  "Benjamin," Riley explained.

  Sin-Jin crossed his arms before him, not wanting to catch his new acquaintance in a lie, but still, it was a little difficult to believe. "I had heard that Benjamin Franklin is in France."

  Her head lifted slowly. "Are you calling us liars?" Rachel demanded, her voice raising an octave on the last word.

  Riley waved his hand to silence his sister. He could well see where there would be room for misunderstanding and doubt.

  "Mr. Franklin gave us the letter before he left for Paris. He knew that we were interested in making our home further south. Philadelphia had become too crowded for our tastes. We're country born and bred," Riley explained with a fond smile that was reminiscent of a simpler life. "It has always been my dream to start my own periodical, employing things he had taught me."

  Sin-Jin was intrigued. He glanced in Rachel's direction, but she still had not turned around. She did, however, elbow him out of her way as she reached for letters further down in the tray.

  "He taught you?" Sin-Jin echoed.

  She detected the slight edge of disbelief in his voice. It annoyed her, as did everything else about him.

  "And what is so surprising about that, I'd like to know? Mr. Franklin is our guardian." She turned slowly to look at him now, her words daring Sin-Jin to dispute the fact. "Or was," she amended. The time she had spent in the man's home were among her fondest memories. There had been no poverty, no fear while they lived there. Only warmth. And finally, finally, enough to eat. "We've no need of one now, being full grown."

  Sin-Jin couldn't help the smile that rose to his lips at her last statement. "That you are," he murmured agreeably.

  Why was she even bothering to answer him? The man was unspeakably smug and condescending, as were all his kind. Rachel shot him a disgusted glare. She had work to do and no time to spare for him, especially since Riley would probably be more of a hindrance than a help today, given his condition.

  Carefully, she laid the last line of text down, slipping the typeset in backward. With a huff, she slowly inked the long, rectangular surface of reversed letters. That done, she laid the predampened paper over the letters and rolled the bed into its place. Pushing her drooping sleeves up higher on her slender arms, she grasped the printing press handle and pulled. The platen creaked as it pressed further down on the other surface. Between them, they indelibly stamped the news upon a single sheet of paper.

  Releasing the handle, she carefully rolled out the lower platen and then lifted the single sheet up. She could have been no gentler than if she was handling a newborn babe. She perused the page quickly, satisfied.

  Well done she told herself.

  Riley was aware that their visitor was eyeing his sister with more than just passing interest. He smiled to himself as he continued speaking. Perhaps he wouldn't have to look after Rachel for the rest of his natural life at that.

  "When we landed in Philadelphia, fresh from Ireland, Rachel and I were alone." For the moment, Riley thought best to skip a few details. If they became friends, there was time enough to fill in the rest. "We made his acquaintance not long after that. He's a very generous man."

  Rachel looked up from the next sheet she was carefully spreading out over the platen. "He's a saint." Her gaze washed over Sin-Jin. "Not like some." Without thinking, she touched her hand to her lips before continuing with her chore.

  Sin-Jin grinned as he saw a blot of printer's ink smudge her lips. Taking a handkerchief from his coat pocket, he crossed to her.

  Though her back was now to him, she sensed his presence next to her. Turning, she was about to demand to know why he was hovering over her like some vulture waiting for its supper to die. But before she could ask anything, Sin-Jin took her chin in his hand. When she tried to move her head back, she found that his grasp was firmer than she thought.

  "Here now, exactly what is it that you have a mind to be doing?" Her voice quavered ever so slightly and she once more damned his soul to hell for the unsteadiness he always seemed to generate within her. Her hands fell to her sides.

  Sin Jin saw what appeared to be a flicker of fear in her eyes before it was replaced by a blaze of anger. Yes, a decidedly interesting woman who merited the time that he was going to have to invest in getting to know her. One did not tame a wild creature in the space of a day.

  Why was her brother just sitting there on that godforsaken stool? Why didn't he come to her aide, Rachel wanted to know. And what kind of a man was this, to paw her before her own brother?

  "Riley?"

  There was an urgency in her call that could be interpreted a number of ways. Sin-Jin chose to ignore them all as he raised his handkerchief.

  "Is she always this skittish about having dirt cleaned from her?" Sin-Jin glanced over his shoulder at Riley as he began to wipe at the smudge on her lip.

  Rachel managed to draw her head back this time. "Dirt?" she muttered, feeling like a complete fool.

  Sin-Jin's smile grew. He already guessed that she hated him for it. It only added fuel to the fire. "On your lip. Printer's ink."

  Still holding her chin in his hand, Sin-Jin applied long, soft strokes to her bottom lip. It was a very simple action. There seemed to be no earthly reason why it should arouse him so.

  Rachel had never felt anything so incredibly gentle in all her life as the touch of his hand along her lip. She completely forgot that there was cloth in the way. The gentleness reminded her of the time she had handled a week-old kitten she had discovered in a corner of the old church.

  But the kitten had never made her feel this unsettled, as if there was a storm churning within her, longing to break free.

  With an oath that systematically lowered the origin of all his ancestors, she batted Sin-Jin's hand away, knowing she had already let him see too much in her eyes. "I'm fully capable of cleaning myself."

  Sin-Jin gallantly surrendered his handkerchief to her. "Then you must let me watch some time."

  Chapter Seven

  "When hell freezes over."

  Rachel glared at Sin-Jin as she uttered the prophesy. Her fingers spasmodically tightened around the handkerchief, wishing it was his neck instead.

  Who did he think he was? Just who in the bloody blazes did he think he was, looking at her with those piercing blue eyes of his and wagging that smooth tongue around? Did he think just because he had kissed her once—completely against her will—that gave him the right to act as if she were a common doxy, ripe for the picking?

  She'd seen his like, a hundred times she'd seen his like in Ireland, lording it over people less fortunate than themselves, people born on the wrong side of the shilling, or the wrong side of the continent, as it was with her and hers. As it was with her mother.

  Sorrow and anger filled her as she thought of her mother.

  Not trusting herself to keep her fingers from encircling his throat and wiping away his smile by force, Rachel threw the handkerchief back at him. She turned
from him and returned to her work as if he didn't even exist. Perhaps if she worked hard enough, she could forget his presence altogether.

  She heard the soft murmur of Sin-Jin's voice and her brother's responding. The rogue's voice sounded like cool rainwater descending on a parched land. She struggled to shut the sound of it out. And all the while, as he spoke, Rachel could have sworn she felt his eyes on her, taking in her every movement as if she was spilt milk and he the cloth that had been dropped over it, absorbing the white puddle bit by bit.

  She felt trapped, insulted and yet, somehow, it was all wildly exhilarating. Her heart, that traitorous wretch, was pounding. She hadn't the slightest idea how to deal with it. She decided to meet it head on, the way she approached everything else. Her method wasn't demure. She had been told time and again that it wasn't a woman's way to act like that, but it was hers.

  When she deliberately turned and lifted her head, she caught Sin-Jin staring at her as if she were a piece of cheese and he a hungry mouse. And he had the gall not to turn his head away in embarrassment, as if staring at her like that was his God-given right.

  The bastard.

  Rachel wiped her inky fingers on the ragged apron she had bound around her waist. "And just what is it you're looking at?"

  Pugnaciously, Rachel took a step toward Sin-Jin. To her annoyance and perhaps secret admiration, he didn't back away.

  Even with the army of small devils that were pounding wickedly with hammers in his brain, Riley was certain he had never seen his younger sister so testy. Never had he seen her taking so much umbrage with a man who had scarcely said five sentences to her. What in the name of St. Patrick had come over her?

  "You," Sin-Jin answered easily.

  He was supposed to look away, be embarrassed at being confronted. Not look proud of it. What was the matter with this man? Lord God, she wished he'd stop looking at her like that. She didn't like the way it made her feel, like a sack of sugar about to blow away in the wind.