Limerick, Ireland
1858

CHAPTER ONE

..."He has arrived, my lord." The clerk's high-pitched tone carried toward him. The clerk glanced at the paper he clutched. "May I present Captain Quintin Reilly of Beannacht Island and the Widow Crofton, Si...Sian-"

"Her name is said like the river that runs not far from here." Though his gaze remained transfixed by the woman seated on a low bench across the chamber, Quintin growled at the English clerk who betrayed his ignorance of the land he now sought to claim for his home. "The River Shannon. If you plan to live in our land you could at least attempt to learn how to pronounce our names as they were meant to be said. Siannon Rhodes Crofton."

Siannon stood as the clerk stammered an apology, her skirts rustling to the floor in a hasty whisper of silvery grey silk, a perfect match for the darkened depths of her eyes as she turned to face him. She had come to him still garbed in the half-mourning widow's hues society demanded of her.

How oddly appropriate.

The gown's subdued color only served to highlight the lush golden red of her hair and the smooth porcelain fineness of her skin. The gangly girl she had once been had definitely retreated into the past, recognizable only in the hesitation still lurking in her eyes. He tamped down a wisp of regret for the time lost to them both. He was far from the boy he had been as well.

How would they deal together? Surely the solution of the present would cause rough water in the future. How would they face the storms?

Questions far too late to ask, too daunting to answer.

"Hello, Quin." Prim and soft, she greeted him, holding out her hand as though they were meeting on the street or at a casual gathering for tea in a Limerick drawing room.

He touched her fingers briefly--they were soft and cool against his own.

"We best hurry, my father--"

"Aye." He cut off her worries before she could finish them. Best not to further muddy the legal waters until after the deed was truly done.

"Captain. Madam." The magistrate addressed them directly.

Quin straightened to attention as Siannon stood at his side. The soft scents of lavender and lilac drifted from her hair, unleashing an odd and unwanted tenderness. He'd have sworn he hadn't once thought of Siannon Rhodes since she left the island nearly ten summers before, or at least since he'd heard her father had successfully married her to Percival Crofton.

When Quin received her letter, he'd known he couldn't ignore her plight. Outside the offices of O'Brien and Mallory just yesterday, the fear and desperation haunting those deep gray eyes had forced him to realize she had never been far from his thoughts. Doubts flooded him. She had not been happy in her first marriage, despite the much heralded birth of her son. At least this time she would be safe. He owed her that much. The Reillys owed her grand-parents that much and more.

"Join hands," the magistrate intoned.

Quin took Siannon's cool fingers in his own again. Her gaze met his as the magistrate cleared his throat.

"Thank you, Quintin." Her whisper tore through him. Her gratitude chafed against raw wounds he'd striven to forget for too long. The certainty he was selling his name for the opportunity to help Reilly Ship Works out of its present debacle, seared his soul.

Still, this marriage provided protection for Siannon and the boy by the most sure and expedient means. He broke the invisible bonds she held on his gaze as the magistrate droned the words that would tie them irrevocably together.

A vivid image of Granny frowning her disappointment hovered in his thoughts and tightened his throat. The Blessing. Of all of them, he had been charged with the telling and somehow with that charge had come the ability to still believe for the stretch of many years. Though his brothers had long ago ceased to carry the trust, Quintin still accepted the truth deep in the most private depths of himself where no one could touch him.

Memories churned acid in his stomach.

He slid his signet ring on Siannon's finger, noticing again how slim and soft and white her hands were. The gold Celtic knot flanking the R dangled awkwardly from her finger as the magistrate finished his recitation. It was done now, there would be no going back.

"You may kiss your bride." Quin turned to Siannon, waiting quietly by his side.

His wife.

He leaned toward her, intent on giving her a brief public caress to seal the bargain they has just wrought. He'd had no intention of taking a wife before her letter arrived. But she was his now and that was that. Their bargain was about to be signed and sealed.

He cupped her chin. Her turbulent, storm-tossed gaze locked with his as he bent toward her. Impossibly, he could hear the crash of waves against solid timber in the distance, smell the fresh salt of white water, a strange and seductive siren call pulling him toward her. He brushed his lips across hers. A sudden blinding wave of heat rolled through him carrying the pitch and toss of an unseen sea, demanding everything he had to give and more.

The Blessing.

'Tis a sound once heard that lingers on. A sight once seen and never forgotten. A feeling once felt, always remembered.

Granny Reilly's teachings roared across the years, rocking him from the mores he'd grown accustomed to, promising the formidable appreciation that was his right. No, more than that. His duty. What portent could The Blessing carry at this time? The deed was already done. The choice made. Still he felt powerless to resist the maelstrom exploding within him.

He pulled Siannon to him, unable to stop himself, swallowing the soft gasp his sudden demands startled from her. He could not pull back, no matter the distant alarm ringing in his mind. He could not keep from ravishing her mouth, molding her body thoroughly against his. She was so incredibly, bewitchingly, soft. Her hands clutched his shoulders as he anchored his fingers in the shining coppery depths of her hair gathered at her nape.

He tilted her head to more openly accommodate him. The pungently sweet smell of sun-warmed lavender and lilacs rose from her to envelope him. Surely no woman had ever felt so in his arms, never threatened to tear his soul from him with the touch of her lips or rend to shreds any measure of self-possession he laid claim to.

His tongue slid against hers, tasting her. Sunshine and deep summer grass. Sweet heaven, the fiery heat would surely burn them both to cinders. He had never wanted a woman more swiftly or completely than he now wanted Siannon Crofton.

No, Siannon Reilly.

Fierce possession exploded through him. Certainty pierced his thoughts that regardless of their present circumstances or who looked on, he could make love to her right here and damn the consequences.
He shuddered, unable to reconcile the passion raging inside him with the pain that had been his constant companion for five long years. He forced himself to release her as The Blessing echoed down to his toes in all its raw power.

With a silent groan, he reached desperately for any tattered shreds of sanity he might yet possess. Her cheeks and lips were flushed, her gaze wide and filled with a sultry mix of confusion and lingering passion that stabbed fresh desire through his gut.

Everything Granny had crooned proved truer than he could ever have guessed and more overwhelming than anything he had ever anticipated. But what did it mean?

The knowin' is up to us. The doin' another part. Capture The Blessing or suffer the Curse.

"Well, I'd say that about seals the vows as best as I've ever seen it done." The magistrate's chuckle joined his clerk's high titter.

The court officials' amusement grated on Quin's nerves, still raw from
what he had just shared with his wife. He didn't have time to dwell on this muddle. Even now his ship made ready in the harbor to sail back at first light to Beannacht and the duties awaiting him there.

Quin turned his gaze on the magistrate and the snickering clerk, gratified to watch the lad's amusement die away on his lips with a nervous flutter. The magistrate scowled.

"Is the deed completed?" Quin clipped the words off in an effort to hide the rough desires still raging inside him. He refused to look back into Siannon's eyes and risk being snared by the swirl of emotions he'd glimpsed there already.

"Aye." The magistrate ruffled his thick white mustache with his fingers as though wiping the last vestiges of humor away. "You've only to sign the register."

They accomplished the signing in relative silence, sealing his fate with that of Eustace Rhodes's daughter and forever binding their futures together. The finality of the act dragged against his shoulders like weighted stone, Blessing or no.

For a moment he felt tempted to obliterate the two entwined names from the register page and demand his freedom. And hers. He ground his teeth together and turned away from the register. He could not forsake the ancient ties that bound the Reilly and McManus families. The Blessing only served to tighten those bonds.

A curse, in fact as well as deed.