Excerpt

Boston, Massachusetts
1858

CHAPTER ONE

"Never again." Devin Reilly growled through gritted teeth for at least the dozenth time. Pride alone held his spine erect. No Reilly had ever crawled from the deck of a ship or collapsed in an ignominious heap upon reaching landfall and he'd be damned if he'd be the first.

"If ye've any prayer of making that ship, ye'd best hurry. She's the last one bound fer San Francisco fer more than a week." The ticket agent's words spurred Devin's course along Boston's crowded dockside as he fought his way back toward the wallowing implement of torture that had brought him to this land of opportunity a mere hour earlier.

The Sweet Rose Marie.

He shuddered, wondering what type of lecture the literature professors at Dublin University would have made out of that misnomer. His stomach quivered anew just thinking about the roil and pitch of the extended voyage from Limerick. He'd never felt so wretched in his life. Yet here he was forcing what little speed he could manage from his protesting muscles as he hastened up the ship's gangplank for the last time. He needed to gather his belongings and board the magnificent clipper ship just two berths away. He could only hope the trip to San Francisco aboard her would offer surcease from the relentless nausea that had plagued his Atlantic crossing. His stomach clenched in mutinous rebellion as he crossed the deck.

"Diabhal." Devil curse this weakness in his limbs. No matter how many times he made the transition between motionless earth and moving ship, he would never get used to it. Right now he didn't have time to linger over his miserable reactions to something that should be as inbred and soul-deep as his very name, but he'd give his left arm, and possibly a good portion of his right, for a hot cup of Granny Reilly's special ginger tea--the one thing that had ever granted him relief from his detestable sea-sickness. Only California's easy gold and the urgent need of it back home had prompted his hasty travel aboard the Sweet Rose Marie.

"After this I will never cross so much as a pond on any other than a Reilly vessel," he vowed as he slung his bag over his shoulder and tucked his sketchbook under his arm. "Ever again."

Struggling to keep a tight clamp on his weakness, he exited down the gangplank for the last time. Boston's dockside bustled with activity--people, carriages and horses darted in every direction in a startling collage that stung his senses no matter where he looked. This New World was brighter somehow than the one he'd left behind. The colors crisper, the lines of the buildings straighter and the sounds sharper. Welcoming land breezes ruffled his shirt, carrying the distant scents of damp earth and green grass mixed with the pungent evidence of human habitation from the city before him. His stomach heaved again. No relief here. He moved aside on the quay, biting back a self-disparaging groan as the men behind him jostled past.

He rested his hand on a rough-hewn crate and took a deep breath. His legs still felt like melted India rubber instead of strong Reilly muscle and bone. He could almost hear the derision in his older brothers's voices as they taunted him for being the only Reilly unable to put to sea. Quin and Bryan never suffered the slightest twinge even in the heaviest seas.

"Hey, Reilly." The hail forced him to turn back toward the ship. "Ye forgot this, mate."

A worn envelope fluttered in the assistant purser's hand and then came flying toward him. He caught the missive and waved his thanks. The seaman had proven to be a friend during the crossing. The only good memory Devin would take from it.

"Good luck, Reilly, I hope ye find yer gold." Devin winced as the man's hearty shout voiced his intentions to all and sundry. He offered a farewell salute and tucked his mother's letter away in his waistcoat next to the ticket as he turned to rejoin the throng and make his way to the clipper.

Another grass scented puff of breeze teased him, promising relief from sea air and harbor stench. He forced himself forward and tried to take his mind off his continued queasiness. A young woman glanced his way as she stepped up into her carriage. Like the scent of greenery in a city, she seemed out of place--a soft and pretty refinement in pale green taffeta, at odds with the bustle and noise on Boston's waterfront.

Devin lost his grip on the tablet and charcoal he carried under his left arm as a bulky shoulder thumped him from behind.

"Hey, you." A deep voice growled as the drawing supplies clattered to the dock.

Despite his rubbery legs, Devin managed to remain standing. Turning, he faced the shoulder's sulky owner, a rough character with a dark beard and filthy bowler angled over greasy curls.

"And what might I be able to do you for, sir?" Devin strove to remain polite although he longed to smash his fist into the man's sneering face. Not a very auspicious beginning to his American adventure.

The man' s eyes widened as Devin spoke and he poked his equally cumbersome companion in the side. "Here, Henry, he's one of them Irish."

Henry, a scruffy-looking chap with a scraggly blond mustache and patched trousers, frowned and narrowed his eyes. "Took our jobs away from me and my brother, them Irish did." His breath wreaked of whiskey and he bunched his formidable looking fists.

"You damn foreigners, takin' over everythin'." The first man sneered as his companion advanced. "Go back to yer slimy little island and stay there. We don't want yer kind here."

Seeing the blow coming didn't help. Devin's sea-worn muscles couldn't react fast enough. Henry's meaty fist sent him flying backward out into the path of an oncoming carriage as a shrill scream rent the air.

"Whoa!" A harsh shout followed close behind as Devin hit the ground hard. His breath whooshed out of him. His rucksack of belongings tore free of his shoulder He twisted to avoid the sharp hooves thrashing in his direction and gained his feet as the carriage horses reared and bolted. A quick assessment revealed the anxious face of the driver and the panicked expression of the lovely young woman who had caught his eye only a few moments before. Her deep brown gaze locked with his for a fear-charged moment before the carriage zigged along the quay at a frantic pace toward the water.

"Diabhal." The curse tore from him and he took off after the carriage, the terror in her eyes spurring his actions. Pain jolted up his limbs, but he ignored it, dodging the gawking populace in a desperate race to catch the carriage.

The driver's garbled commands carried back to Devin. The man's efforts to control the runaway pair managed to slow the carriage a small bit as the horses struggled betwixt the training of the whip and the instincts of nature. His efforts would not be enough.

Evaluating his few options, Devin snagged the reigns of a fine black mare being held by a rag-tag lad. "I'll bring her back, boy-o."

He swung up into the saddle without breaking stride, ignoring the shouts from behind him as the mare's owner voiced his protests. Devin clucked his tongue and leaned far over the horse's neck.

"Come-on, darlin', show us what you've got," he coaxed, his breathing harsh while his heels dug into her sides.

With a responsive flick of her dark ears, the animal launched into a champion gallop. Devin gained quickly on the careening carriage as its horses battled each other and their driver. He wheeled his own mount in front of the carriage, cutting off the end of the docks as a possible, but all too deadly, escape route. The carriage teetered ominously for a moment and then tore free of its intertwined harnesses like a ship losing its mooring.

The carriage team screamed their fear and distress. He snagged their reins and coaxed them to a steaming halt as the carriage continued its inexorable tilt, landing with a solid crash and resounding shudder against the stalwart side of a tall warehouse.

"Hold these." He threw the reigns to a seaman who had jumped from their path at the last moment.

Devin slipped from the mare's back and rushed toward the carriage, his first concern for the hapless occupant whose frightened gaze had forced him after the vehicle. He braced one foot against the wheel and levered himself up enough to reach the door handle, pulling it open with a jerk.

"Are you all right?" he called into the darkened confines. He couldn't make out anything for a moment until one pale hand extended up from the gloom.

"Yes, I think so." There was a slight rustle of petticoats and short whisper. Although he couldn't make out the word, it sounded distinctively like a muttered curse. "Could you help me out?"

Devin stretched out to grasp her gloved hand, locked his fingers with hers and pulled. A hot frission of awareness sizzled up his arm like a jagged bolt of lightening. Sweat prickled the back of his neck as thunder pounded against his ears in a wild storm only he could hear. His breath locked in his throat and he fought the instinctive desire to release his grip as the contact shot into his heart and hurtled straight through his soul.

The Blessing. He grimaced and pulled her into the sunlight as Granny's words echoed through his mind, clearer than ever before.

'Tis a sound once heard that lingers on.

"Not now." The words groaned out of him as he pulled the girl to safety. The Blessing signaled life-altering events. "I don't have time for this now."

The knowin' is up to us, the doin's another part.

She slid against him as he helped her down. The touch of her body against his echoed through him, a relentless summer storm circling around and through his being without mercy. Thunder and lightening. Blessing or Curse?

He set her on her feet and held her for a moment longer and a heartbeat closer than necessary. His mind's frantic signals to release her somehow did not quite make it to his hands as they tightened on her trim waist.

It is a feeling once felt, always remembered.

The Blessing signaled the need to make a decision, to set a course for your heart's desire, but all he could think of was the overwhelming urge to gather her to him and never let go. Impossible.

Her dark gaze, wide and unfathomable, trailed his face before locking with his own. Smoky amber, fathomless and eternal. Her lips parted in a small oh, as if she felt something of the power surging between them. She smelled of ginger and chamomile and he couldn't shake the certainty that despite the distance he'd traveled and the journey he had yet to face, he had just come home.

A sight once seen and never forgotten.

Unable to release her, he seemed just as unable to breath, to move, other than to lean forward and cover her parted lips with his own. Home indeed. Who was this woman?

"Mo chroi." The Gaelic endearment echoed from deep inside. My heart.

Longing swept through him in a heady, unstoppable torrent at the taste of her mouth. All vestiges of sanity and purpose vanished as the need to gather her to him crested and broke over his common sense, drowning all rational thought. Her lips seemed frozen beneath his for a fraction of time, then she melted against him like water rippling along a shore. She tasted as sweet as rain on a summer afternoon, felt as soft as a breeze floating in from the back meadow at home.

Home. Beannacht Island. A sharp reminder of his objective in traveling to America pierced the haze. As if this entire adventure would not be enough to explain, the vision of Quin's frowning censure over such a public display as he was creating with this woman swooped in.

Devin tore his mouth from hers and stepped back.