Moonlight Lover (14 page)

"Rachel, you are bewitching in that dress." Conspiratorially, Krystyna inclined her head toward Rachel and whispered, "I would warn you, though, the men here are a lonely lot." She straightened and pretended to look around. "Since I want you both to mingle, I must assign someone to look after your welfare, Rachel."

"I can look after myself," Rachel assured her.

Krystyna smiled tolerantly. "I am sure that you can, but as hostess, I am responsible for you. Indulge me, please. I want to be certain that you have someone with you to guard you from attentions you might not wish to encourage."

Scanning the area, she caught her husband's eye and winked. Then her gaze settled on John. "Ah, just the gentleman I need." Slipping her arm from Riley's, she beckoned John over.

Sin-Jin lost no time in joining her. He bowed politely to
Rachel and nodded at Riley. "What can I do for you, Krystyna?"

"Rachel O'Roarke, do you know John?"

Her tone was so innocent, so guileless, it might have fooled any one of a number of people. But Sin-Jin knew Krystyna, knew the devious, sharp mind that existed behind the beautiful face.

She had arranged this, he thought. How much of it for his benefit he didn't know, but he was grateful to her and elevated her to just a fraction beneath his own patron saint.

Rachel just barely succeeded in keeping the sudden leap of panic she felt within her from her face. Had he said something to Krystyna? Did the woman know that he had kissed her? And how many others knew as well? Had he boasted of it to one and all?

"Yes, I do."

If he lived to be a hundred, Sin-Jin was certain he would never hear as much frost in another living soul's voice as he heard in hers. It rivaled the coldest English winter night he could remember.

Krystyna wasn't about to let Rachel's tone deter her. She herself had put up a noble fight in fending Jason off before she gave in to her heart. "Then you know that you are safe."

With a smile, she delivered Rachel's hand into Sin-Jin's and turned to Riley. Lacing both arms through his, she proceeded to the next step of her plan. "Now, there
are still a few unattached young ladies about, all of whom
I know will be very happy to make your acquaintance, Mr. O'Roarke."

"Riley," he prompted her. "If they're anywhere as lovely as you, I'll be forever in your debt for an introduction."

Krystyna laughed. "I think Jason said the term for that was—barney?"

"Blarney," he corrected with a delighted laugh. "You're sure you're married?"

She nodded and smiled, playing along. "Forever."

He sighed dramatically, placing his hand over his heart. "My loss."

Krystyna drew him over to the daughter of a thriving planter. "We shall see."

Sin-Jin shook his head as he watched Krystyna meld into the crowd. To listen to her, one would have never known that she had cut her teeth on political arguments and had had to flee for her life because she was as outspoken as her father was. There were those who feared that a section of the oppressed populace in Poland would rally and side with her in an insurrection. She
sounded now as if she hadn't a thought in the world other
than making a success of her party.

Looking away, Sin-Jin turned his head only to be met by a scowl on the face of the fiery redhead who stood next to him.

Chapter Fourteen

Even angry, she was magnificent. Perhaps she was even more so that way.

But Sin-Jin longed to see her smile at him. Not docilely. He didn't think she possessed a docile bone in her entire body. But perhaps with something other than animosity coursing through her veins.

Taking her arm lightly, but firmly, he guided Rachel toward the crystal punch bowl on the table in the center of the room. "Is something wrong?"

His face, most especially the uninvited touch of his mouth, had haunted her days and endlessly echoed through her nights. Yet now that she was here, standing
next to him, all she could feel was indignant anger. Anger
at his presumption that he could so easily kiss her. And anger at the fact that she was attracted to someone who was British.

How could she feel something so intimate for a race of
people she had sworn to loath to her last dying breath?

Being next to him only made the dilemma that much more vivid for her. She called forth her haughtiest expression and directed it toward him. "Having you watch over my virtue is akin to handing a helpless chick to a cunning, hungry fox and then instructing him to guard it."

He laughed at her analogy. Dipping the ladle into the
well-filled punch bowl, he filled a cup, then handed it to
Rachel.

"You are hardly what I would term a helpless chick
and I am far from a hungry fox." Although she did stir his
appetite, Sin-Jin thought as he filled a cup for himself.

Rachel held the delicate cup in both hands, afraid of dropping it. Everything in the ballroom, in the mansion
itself, looked so beautiful, so fragile. She felt like a bull in
a shop of breakables.

"That is true." Her admission surprised him, until she added, "a fox can be regarded as a noble creature."

He studied her for a moment, wondering what it was that set his heart beating so fast at the very sight of her.
Each feature could be isolated and, though pleasing, was
not enough to make him endure such a tongue. Somehow, there was more. He decided that the whole was somehow greater than the sum of the parts. It was that which had captivated him so.

He placed his hand on hers. "Why is it that you dislike me?”

She felt her fingers tighten and had to remember that the glass would shatter if she wasn't careful. "Because you are arrogant, you laugh at me and you're British."

Moving her hand away from his, she took a drink of the
punch. It was tangy, stinging her mouth, exciting her tongue. Like his kiss. It had felt much the same, except that kissing him was like drinking raw whiskey on a winter's morn. Her father had given her some once when she was ill. He had done it to bring the color back in her cheeks. It had brought flames to her insides as well.

Just the way he had.

Undeterred, Sin-Jin took her hand in his again. When she tried to pull it free, he closed his fingers over it tightly, holding her prisoner. "You are only partially right. I am British."

Her very glance challenged him. She hated everything that was British. She had cause to. "You could hardly deny that."

"By birth," he persisted, still holding her fingers firmly in his. "There is nothing I can do that would change that. But I have changed my affiliations."

She sniffed. What else could he say? It was dangerous to be associated with the British these days. The war was over in everything but name. And that would come soon enough. "You could be lying."

"Yes," he nodded agreeably. "I could be lying. I could
be a spy." He watched her eyes grow wide as the horror of
the thought set in. It pleased him that it hadn't occurred to her before this. It was a small comfort, but at least it was something. "And so could you."

Now a frown blossomed where doubt had been a moment before. This time, she yanked her hand free. "Are you crazy?" She realized that she had attracted the attention of several people standing close to them.

Annoyed, Rachel lowered her voice. "I'm not a spy," she hissed. There couldn't have been an assumption more ludicrous than that.

Sin-Jin shrugged innocently. He enjoyed baiting her, enjoyed watching her mind work as she struggled out of the maze he cast her in.

"How do I know that?" he asked.

Anyone who knew her knew that was a ridiculous suggestion. She, a spy for the British? She'd just as soon cut out a Tory's heart than do anything at all for them, much less spy for them. Words almost failed her. "Because I'm saying so."

Sin-Jin spread his hands wide, making his point. "And I say that I'm on the side of the Americans."

The insufferable fool. Did he think to trap her with a little wordplay? "It's not that easy."

"Why not?" he pressed.

He was pleasing to the eye. But so had Lancaster been. And he had taken that as his right to do whatever he would with his tenants's wives and daughters. "Because I hate the British."

With that, she turned her back on him and walked away, looking for her brother. Or, if nothing else, escape from Sin-Jin.

This, Sin-Jin mused, watching her, was not going to be easy. But neither was it impossible.

As they were seated for dinner, to her dismay, Rachel discovered that Sin-Jin had been placed in the position to her right.

It was more than just a coincidence. On that she would stake her immortal soul. But Rachel couldn't quite find it in her heart to condemn the woman. There was too much about Krystyna that she discovered she admired.

Still, she resisted the quagmire of emotions that she found herself slipping into. The man was a Brit and thus the man was hateful. There was no room for any feelings beyond that. If there were other feelings, unfamiliar feelings, beating their wings within her like trapped humming birds, searching for freedom, they were of no consequence and couldn't be noted.

She despised the ground he walked on and nothing could change that. If she allowed it to change, she'd be disloyal to her mother, her father and all the members of her family who had died at the hands of British bastards.

"It seems that fate insists on throwing us together," Sin-Jin commented as they sat down.

"It seems that fate has dark hair and very becoming clothing." As she spread out the fine linen upon her lap, she glanced in Krystyna's direction. The woman was in the center of a heated discussion that sounded far more interesting than anything that was going on at her side of the table.

"You mean Krystyna?" Sin-Jin guessed.

She gestured at the place setting. "Did you tell her to do this?"

He laughed. "You don't know Krystyna very well yet or you'd know that no one tells Krystyna to do anything. She does what she pleases."

"And so shall I." Rachel turned her attention to the older man on her left.

Rather than argue, Sin-Jin said nothing further to her. Instead, he directed his conversation to the well-endowed woman seated on his right.

Rachel had absolutely no idea why that bothered her. She should have been relieved that he was annoying someone else rather than her. Instead, the ease with which he transferred his attention to the simpering woman at his side annoyed her.

As Rachel listened involuntarily, the voluptuous, brainless twit, obviously well into child-bearing years, giggled into her napkin every time Sin-Jin said anything to her that could have feebly qualified as a witticism.

She certainly didn't find him witty, she thought contemptuously as the man next to her droned on about the proper way to raise tobacco. She found Sin-Jin tiresome. Irritating. Insufferable. And she could find no way to rid him from her mind.

It was customary, after the meal was done, for the ladies to retire, leaving the gentlemen to their conversation. It was a custom Rachel had heard of and thought
immensely unfair. She waited, as the dishes were cleared
away, for some subtle announcement that would signal the separation, She saw Morgan McKinley glance expectantly at his daughter-in-law.

To Rachel's surprise, Krystyna merely smiled back. She slowly looked up and down the long table. "Would anyone care for some after dinner brandy?"

Morgan cleared his throat. "Countess." There was a note of warning mingled with exasperation in the senior McKinley's voice.

The old bear had long since learned that he could not intimidate her, Krystyna thought fondly. This was her party, hers and Jason's, and she would run it the way she chose. "Ladies can drink brandy too, Mr. McKinley."

Morgan opened his mouth, then closed it again like a carp circling a fish hook and deciding against taking the bait. He knew that there was no use in expecting the traditional from her. She had always been everything but.

With a grunt, he rose, leaning on his silver cane. "Those who wish to be part of the rabble, remain here. The others who crave a bit of relief from this chatter, follow me." He waved them on to another part of the spacious room. Several men joined him.

Morgan knew that most of the women would cluster together like brooding chicken out of habit, no matter what Krystyna tried to orchestrate. She had nerve and he admired her innovative spirit and courage. But it was
hard to him to let go of ways that had been passed on from
father to son since the beginning, and at times he found himself short with her.

Jeremiah, the tall, stately house servant who was as integral part of the household as Morgan himself, appeared. Spotless white gloves on his large hands, he
held a tray with a decanter of brandy before him. Moving
slowly, he approached first Morgan, and then the male members of his household. When the last had taken his fill, Jeremiah approached Krystyna at the table. Conversation faded to an intermittent exchange as everyone turned to watch.

Krystyna poured herself a glass and thanked the man, then brought the glass to her lips. She sipped it with reverent appreciation.

"I would like to be having a drop as well."

Riley turned to look at Rachel down the length of the table. "Rachel?" he mouthed in surprise. She never partook of spirits. What was she about?

"If it's good enough for our hostess," Rachel answered the inquiring look in her brother's eyes as she accepted a glass from Jeremiah, "It is good enough for me."

Krystyna sipped her brandy, watching the younger woman. She was aware of the disapproving frowns that
graced some of the other women's faces. But she was used
to that, used to censure for what she thought, for the way she behaved. It neither stopped her nor drove her. She could only be the way she was.

With a brave smile, Rachel drew a sustaining breath and swallowed a healthy mouthful. Her eyes instantly clouded as the alcohol rolled down her throat, taking a whirling, cylindrical path down to her stomach. It burned as it settled.