Moonlight Lover (32 page)

Slowly, as if he had never seen a woman before, Sin-Jin turned Rachel around to face him. His eyes were soft, worshipful, as he filled his hands with the sweet flesh of her breasts.

Rachel moaned as she felt her skin being gently, tenderly kneaded. Sparks shot all through her, like the ones that emerged from a well-fed fire on the hearth at Christmas.

Why couldn't he get enough of her? The more he touched, the more he took, the more he wanted her. Would he never be sated? Sin-Jin wondered. Would there always be this bittersweet ecstasy of wanting her haunting him waking and sleeping?

He groaned, feeling his loins fill and pulse. "Each time I have you, it's as if I've never been with a woman before, as if it was all completely new to me." Sin-Jin pressed a kiss to the hollow of her throat and rejoiced at her low moan, at the way her fingers tightened on his shoulders. "What sort of spell have you woven over me, you Irish witch?"

"There's no spell being woven that I know of. I can't

be helping you with your problem, Lieutenant. I've difficulties of my own. This is new for me." She raised up on her toes, her breasts slowly rubbing along his chest. She saw the flare of passion in his eyes and felt her own being kindled. They fed on one another, goading each other to new heights. "And by all that's holy, may it never be old for either of us."

Rachel brought her mouth to his, her blood already heated past the boiling point, her desire full blown and demanding. She knew, from things she had heard while she had been growing up, that she should be demure. That these were pleasures a man was wont to take and it was a woman's lot to endure this as she did all the sufferings of life.

But there was no sense of endurance involved for Rachel. If anything, within her beat a desire for more, a desire to discover every secret harbored within Sin-Jin's fine, firm body. Beyond that very first moment on the ship, she had not experienced any shyness, had never felt the wish to retreat.

It was all part of her nature. Rachel had always hungered for knowledge, to peek behind the closed door, to pull aside the drawn curtain. A man's body was nothing new to her. She had deliberately crept out to the lake and watched, hidden in the bushes, as her brother and his friends went swimming. She'd been nine at the time and thought male bodies to be silly and repulsive.

She gloried now in Sin-Jin's body. She liked the way she could make him moan her name, liked the look that entered his eyes when she touched him. The blue orbs turned smoky as the tips of her fingers softly stroked, claiming the most secret of places for her own.

It made her feel weak in her stomach.

It gave her power.

With urgent fingers, Rachel pushed Sin-Jin's shirt from his shoulders, then slowly spread her palms along his bare flesh, branding him with her touch.

Sin-Jin buried his head in the curve of her neck, inhaling deeply. The scent that clung to her hair reminded him of spring. Always spring.

"Do you have any idea what you do to me?" he murmured thickly as he coaxed her petticoats from her hips.

Rachel's hands mirrored his, tugging his britches down. She matched him movement for movement, inch for revealing inch, until he was naked and she almost so.

Her body was quivering, restless with anticipation. Burning for him. "Show me," she whispered breathlessly. "Show me."

Gently, he laid her flat on the goose-down bed and slipped the last of her clothing away from her body. His breath caught in his throat as he looked at her. But rather than lie with her, his body cleaving to hers, Sin-Jin bent his head and began to dust her limbs with soft, sweet kisses that ignited her soul and sent a raging inferno through every part that he touched.

He moved slowly, languidly, as if they had all of eternity left to them. As if he wasn't making her mad by the very action. His tongue traveled along her legs, her knees, lingering on her thighs until she was reduced to a palpitating bowl of pudding.

And still he traveled on.

Her gasp lodged in her throat as his tongue darted and stars shot through her veins and whirled dizzily in her head.

"Sin-Jin?" His name was half a cry, half a query as something powerful pushed its way to the fore. It seized her in an iron grip as it threatened to rip completely through her body.

He raised his head for a moment. "Let yourself enjoy it, Rachel," he urged seductively. The words skimmed hotly along her moist skin.

She curled tufts of the worn blanket beneath her fingers, scrambling madly for some foothold to steady
her. It kept building, this power, this energy inside, like a
pot that had been forgotten upon the hearth until its contents threaten to spill over.

She ran from it. She arched toward it, greedy, wanting.
The room dimmed and whirled.

His mouth was hot, teasing, mercilessly savage in its kindliness. She had never imagined, even in the wildest of fantasies, such overwhelming pleasure.

Her breath was short, her chest rising and heaving as she felt his tongue suddenly thrust into virgin territory. Rachel arched her back as stars mingled with rockets and burst within her. She wanted more. She could not bear another moment.

And yet, and yet—

She let out a long shudder as her body plunged down from the highest precipice. Her eyes fluttered open and
she saw him in a purple haze. How could she still be here,
in her room, when all this had happened to her?

Rachel stared at Sin-Jin, uncomprehending. "What have you done to me?"

"No more," Sin-Jin assured her, his body slickly gliding along hers as he raised himself to lie beside her, "than you have done to me with your own brand of witchcraft."

And then he began to make love to her with his mouth all over again. He entwined kisses about her neck like a necklace of the most precious of metals. He moved slowly, patiently, until she was ready again to receive him. Ready again to fall from the top of the mountain. When she was, he entered and together they rode to glory.

The afternoon light faded, melding into the evening outside her window. But within the small room, time had stopped altogether and nothing on earth existed except two people who had found one another.

The days slowly passed and negotiations dragged endlessly on. The ever patient, ever affable Dr. Franklin seemed to be the only unruffled one at the long table. John Adams, his temper ever short, was volatile, and John Jay grew impatient. The British negotiators were petulant, the French removed and at times, disinterested. It began to appear as if the final signing of the treaty was an impossible goal for all concerned.

Rachel began to long for home in earnest, but kept her thoughts to herself. She had no wish to seem ungrateful to her mentor. And there were compensations for being here, she mused, looking at Sin-Jin over the inn's unsteady table where they took their dinner.

Franklin accepted a second helping of stew, peering over his glasses at the ample display of cleavage as the innkeeper's daughter refilled his plate. He looked up and saw Sin-Jin's knowing smile as the young woman
retreated. Franklin pushed his glasses up the bridge of his
nose and chuckled.

"A man takes his diversion where he finds it." He cleared his throat for Rachel's benefit. "Sin-Jin, you said you had family in England."

He'd hardly use the term "family," Sin-Jin thought. There was only Alfred. Vanessa had ceased to count a long time ago.

Sin-Jin nodded, laying down his fork, his meal half finished. "A brother."

Franklin heard the coolness in Sin-Jin's voice. He raised his eyes to Rachel's and saw that she had detected it as well. He kept his tone amiable as he spoke. "How long since you've seen him?"

Sin-Jin remembered it to the day. The day he left to serve in His Majesty's Army. "It'll be ten years the first of July."

Franklin raised a brow, intrigued. "You're very specific."

Sin-Jin shrugged. "It was his wedding day."

And a rift had obviously formed, Rachel thought. Why? Had Sin-Jin's brother married the woman who Sin-Jin loved? Interest twined with a tiny spark of jealousy as Rachel looked at Sin-Jin for a long moment.

Franklin nodded as he slid the last of his bread along the plate. The innkeeper cooked nearly as well as his daughter served, he mused. "I see. You loved the same woman."

Sin-Jin's shoulders stiffened slightly. He didn't want to talk about Vanessa in Rachel's presence. It was a thing of the past in any event. He'd long since gotten over her. "Once," he agreed.

Franklin heard words that weren't being said. "Grudges are horrible things, Sin-Jin." He wiped his plate clean, knowing he would undoubtedly regret it later. Only the young could eat without care, he thought enviously. "They haunt everyone involved. The one who bears the grudge and the one who receives the brunt of it." He pushed his plate away and leaned forward to look at Sin-Jin. "Life is short, my boy. Amends are being made between countries. Brothers should follow suit."

The elder statesman paused and took a long sip of his wine. "One never knows what tomorrow might hold." He searched Sin-Jin's face and saw before him a rare man. "Why don't you go and see him?" Franklin leaned back again and sighed. "Nothing seems to be happening here and the promise that it might is far removed." He turned toward Rachel. "Go with him," he urged.

She knew she wanted to. Her curiosity aroused to a fever pitch, she desperately wanted to meet the woman who had been Sin-Jin's first love. But there was duty to see to and she had a responsibility.

"But I'm here to record history," she reminded Franklin.

The man took out his pipe and tobacco pouch. Carefully, he measured out a portion and pressed it into the bowl.

Sin-Jin rose and took a poker from the hearth. Holding it carefully, he lit the pipe for the other man.

Franklin nodded his thanks as he sucked on the stem. The light caught and the dark flavor wafted from the bowl. Satisfied, Franklin turned his attention to the couple beside him.

"At this rate, history is being written at half a page a month. You will not miss much if you are gone for a fortnight or so." He exhaled, forming a smoky gray ring that hovered above his head like a halo for a moment before fading. "I cannot, of course, tell either of you what to do, but if it were me," he said grandly, waving his hand in the air, "I would go before it was too late."

Rachel laughed as she rose. Standing beside him, she placed her arms around Franklin's neck and kissed his cheek. "Still writing Poor Richard's Almanac after all these years?"

He chuckled and patted her hand. "Once a philosopher, always a philosopher."

Chapter Thirty-three

As the open black carriage rumbled along the narrow road, drawing closer to the old weathered manor where he had played as a boy and grown to manhood, it felt to Sin-Jin as if he had never really been away. Everything looked exactly the same as he remembered it.

And at the same time, though the estate had not changed, he felt as if all that had happened to him during those years had befallen him in another life, another time. Perhaps it had even happened to someone else.

The manor, the estate, they were not part of his life any longer and hadn't been for almost ten long years.

The carefree boy who had laughed and ran through these fields had long since gone.

The long, hot days of summer were leaving their imprint on the land. The grass had turned a deeper green and the trees had lost their blossoms. In the distance he saw a small thatched cottage. Three children were playing before it. Memories stirred within his breast.

Summer, Sin-Jin remembered, had always been his favorite time of year.

As the cottage disappeared from view and the manor loomed before them, Sin-Jin felt Rachel stiffen beside him. He turned to look at her. Her face had grown pale. Was she ill again?

"What's the matter?"

Rachel struggled against the feeling that was settling over her, like a fisherman's net covering the waters, trapping its quarry beneath. Her throat tightened.

"It looks like his house," Rachel whispered, as if the
sound of her raised voice would bring all the pain echoing
back to her.

He looked from his ancestral home to her face and didn't understand. "His?"

"Lancaster's." Her mouth felt dry as she spoke the man's name. "Harold Lancaster." The very sound of it made her stomach tighten like an angry fist being raised vengefully in the air.

Sin-Jin laid a comforting hand over hers. He remembered her nightmare, her screams filling the small cabin. "That was in Ireland. This is England."

She looked at him. Didn't he understand? "He was English."

He should have realized what an ordeal this would be for her. Sin-Jin regretted the impulse that had prompted him to bring her. But she had been the one to ask if she could accompany him. He raised a hand to signal the driver to turn the carriage around. "If you're going to be uncomfortable—"

She shook her head and tugged at his sleeve. She knew
what he was going to say. Sin-Jin dropped his hand. "It's curious I am to be knowing more about the man who knows so much about me. Besides," she added more quietly, "my place is with you."

He smiled at her, affection filling him. At times, her reasoning surprised him, but only because of the perverse way she behaved. The expected always became the unexpected with Rachel. "Because you want to see the estate where I was born?"

A smile curved her lips as she shook her head. "Because I want to see the woman who was stupid enough to choose your brother over you."

Sin-Jin settled back into his seat as the carriage drew closer still. He could make out details of the manor now. The vines that had twined and quested for the gables at the top of the manor when he had left had long since gained their goal. The bluish gray stone walls were half blotted out with vegetation. He wondered if it was by design or neglect.

"You don't know what my brother looks like," he reminded her, though her phrasing amused him.

Rachel tucked her arm around his in a gesture that could only be construed as possessive.