Free Moonlight Lover by Marie Ferrarella

dissipate. Now the pounding returned with a vengeance. He eyed his sister wearily, but with a measure of patience. She was, after all, doing the tasks that he should have been about this morning.
    "And what 'how could I' is it now, sweet sister?" He shook his head, thinking that she had probably driven Sin-Jin off permanently with her display of temper. "Rachel, I swear by all that is holy, you are beginning to be a very difficult woman to love."
    Her small features puckered into a pout. "Don't you swear at me, Riley Sean O'Roarke." She tossed her head as she reached for the ink. "And if you did love me, you wouldn't have invited the likes of that horrid man to eat with us."
    She never wanted to see his face as long as she lived. Or longer. And here was her brother, inviting the man to dinner. With an oath, she grasped the handle of the inker and applied it to the typeset with more force than was necessary. Ink oozed between the letters and she swore even more royally.
    Riley knew that there was something about the situation that wasn't quite right, but a sweet temper was something neither one of them possessed. He moved until he was directly before her, his male pride wounded.
    "And since when is it that I'd be needing your permission before asking someone to come and break bread with us?"
    Her chin went up like the comb of a game cock before a battle.   "Since right now." Riley could have sworn lightning flashed in her eyes. Green lightning. "It's his head I'd rather be breaking than any miserable loaf of bread."
    Riley's temper simmered down like a pot of stew that had the flame go out beneath it. Concern took over. "Rachel, what's come over you?" He failed to understand his sister's reaction. It appeared to be totally out of proportion to what had just transpired. Even for Rachel.
    She didn't want to share the details with him, at least not yet. It was too raw. "I don't like Tories. And, I might add, I was under the opinion that neither did you."
    She glanced down at her hand. With an annoyed cry, she set the roller down and looked at her fingers. They were all tipped in black. She sighed, rubbing her apron over them. It seemed as if the ink had permanently seeped into her skin.
    Was that all there was to it? Riley wondered. She thought Sin-Jin was a Tory? Didn't she realize that he would have never befriended a loyalist? Riley let out an annoyed breath. "The man isn't a Tory, Rachel. He's an American."
    Rachel raised her eyes to Riley's. "And how do you know that?"
    There were times that Riley felt Rachel was too suspicious. "He said so."
    Was Riley really that simple? She spread a sheet of paper over the platen with a snap of her wrists. "And if I'd be telling you that I was the queen of England, would you believe me?"
    Riley grasped the handle on the printing press. As he pulled it toward him, the two sides moved closer together. He frowned at his sister's condescending face. "No, of course not."
    Rachel tossed her head impatiently as she made her point. "Well, why not? I said so."
    When she was like this, there was no reasoning with her. He had more of a chance of winning an argument with the King than he had with his pigheaded sister. "Rachel Colleen O'Roarke, you are impossible."
    "No, not impossible." She turned to pick up another sheet of paper. A movement caught her eye, and she looked out the window that faced the edge of town. Sin-Jin was just disappearing from view astride his horse. He cut a magnificent figure and she hated him for it. "Just very, very angry," she said in a heated whisper.
    It was her cherished conviction that married men who kissed women other than their wives or their mothers should be hung by their thumbs over the nearest chasm.
    Especially when they kissed so well.
    With a huff, Rachel spread out the sheet. Riley knew better than to continue the conversation. It was doomed from the beginning.
    Bronson Calloway let out a prolonged sigh of relief as he saw the big black stallion approach