“Even you?”
The fireplace snapped and spit with a newly laid log. He let his hand fall away. “I make myself the exception. Poor Washburn, his heartfelt desire the size of Texas. You blindside him with all the punishment of a steaming locomotive. I must admit, your beauty gives you a unique advantage, a desirable woman can manipulate so well. But then again many men are ignorant that beauty does not necessarily ring true with honesty and virtue.”
She pulled away, raised her chin. His words stung…her damaged ego the price of her belief that she could help change things. “Oh, we are at that again. You play the high-handed Washington bureaucrat, toasting away your life while the rest of us roll up our sleeves and do the dirty work. Tell me about your quiet safe little existence in Washington. Was the horror of your imprisonment in Richmond a reality for you?”
He flopped on the sofa next to her. “You’re right, I don’t see it up close, but every agent I have in the field, I would die a thousand deaths for. I deal with the reality of Yankee bullets fired at my brothers, General John Rourke and Colonel Ryan Rourke daily. And too many of our brethren in blue, face Confederate bullets. The Rebels will have no mercy if they discover who has revealed their best-laid plans to the Northern armies. It’s not a pretty picture—a shovelful of dirt over your eyes.”
She flourished her handkerchief and fluttered her eyes. “Do you not think I am good at what I do?” Why did she require his approval?
He set his glass down, looked at her with unflinching directness. “I cannot think of anyone more suited to the task. You are intelligent, resourceful, and an excellent actress. Do you laugh at me while the Saint has you in his arms?”
“Get out.”
He did not leave. He moved his arm around her. Her pulse beat wildly like a hummingbird whose wings never stop and would die if caged.
“Need I remind you that you are in my home and under my protection? I demand you reciprocate and act your part as a gentleman.”
“But I’m not a gentleman.”
Silence loomed like a heavy mist. The grandfather clock ticked.
“I could scream.”
In the shadowed lantern light, the colonel’s eyes fixed upon her, predatory, a physical threat. She had not the slightest wish to embrace that threat, or to cultivate it. “You won’t.”
He raised a hand and tipped her face up to meet his. He lowered his head, his lips hovering above her. Was he going to kiss her? She had never been kissed, had pushed away those girlish inclinations. What would it feel like? Luscious anticipation and the slow burn of curiosity and desire curled through her.
He took her in his arms, crushed his mouth to hers, kissed her longingly and deeply, igniting a bone-melting fire that spread through her blood, consuming her. His fingers splayed through her hair, making her scalp tingle. Unable to halt the overwhelming stirrings ensnaring her heart, she moaned into his mouth.
From the time she clapped her eyes on him, her fascination for him knew no bounds. And touching him now, she was incapable of resisting the growing tenderness she held for him as a man.
Control. Take control.Stop now! It was all wrong. He was punishing her. Was it his anger with the Saint? The war? Rachel shoved against his chest. Grabbed the Colt. Pointed the long, steel barrel at him.
He stopped cold.
He could have slapped the gun away by brute force. Instead, he sat quietly, breathing as hard as she was.
“I’m sorry, Rachel. I’m truly sorry.” He raked his fingers through his hair. “This war has made us all a little crazy.”
“I don’t understand—” Her hands shook holding the gun. Her emotions swung like a wild pendulum between the irony of his behavior and her shameful response.
“I don’t expect you to,” Lucas said. “May I?” He took the gun from her trembling hands and placed it on the table. “Despite your assumptions, I do not take advantage of unwilling women, and I assure you, I do not need to do so.”
An unaccustomed pain settled in her breast along with a stripe of jealousy. “You must be inured with women throwing themselves at you, Colonel Rourke. Is this a new experience for you to have a woman say no?”
He shrugged, rose and halted in the doorway, his back to her. “I’ll leave tomorrow.”
She listened to his footsteps thud up the stairs, kick his door shut and settle on his bed. She did the same, then punched a pillow and covered her face to muffle her sobs. She cried for all the months of isolation and loneliness. She cried for living on the edge of danger. No…she could not hold him responsible for what happened. The war in its infinite idiocy had raked death and ruin and madness everywhere. No one was unaffected.
She touched her lips where his mouth had been. Was it so wrong? How would it feel to sleep comforted by him, to have his arms around her…
Chapter Seven
Lucas lay in the darkness. Peace, he knew, could be shattered in a million variations, a rain of ashes, a disease borne on the wind, a cannon blast, the firing of a thousand devil Rebels, the sun dying like a candle snuffed out. In smaller ways, the hushed whispers and moans in the dark. Rachel and the dratted Saint. Images beyond the wall broke into blisters and dripped like acid. He paid attention, listening to his uneven breathing, his hands curled into fists, letting the night sink in, allowing the loneliness to fester.
He counted the hours chiming on the clock in the hall and, with it, the hoot of an owl retired to the coos of mourning doves. The sun did not rise, it overflowed in a blaze of glory in brutal contrast to his mood. He ripped the sheets back, crawled from the bed and stared out the window. The day stayed silent except for an occasional snort from the horses in the barn. The stallion smelled the heat of the mare. Simon hummed a tune as he fed them, but both seemed to come from far away.
On the other side of the wall, she moved about, and he listened to her every footstep, had grown to know every nuance of her, every movement, every gesture, every touch, even her scent. The heavier footsteps of a man, he did not hear. Had the Saint departed during the wee hours or had Lucas imagined his presence?
