Patricia Rice by Moonlight an Memories Page A

creature?" she asked once she had the tongue to utter the words.
    "Alligator. Every damned man on this plantation knew that beast was there. I was just going out to get rid of it. What in hell possessed you to cross that field?"
    "That's where they told me I'd find you." She sounded defensive and hated it.
    "Who told you?"
    The sharp command of Nicholas's voice did not bode well, but Eavin felt no sympathy for the grinning idiot who had sent her across that field. Without remorse she replied, "The buck-toothed man, your overseer."
    "Jenkins. That does it. I've put up with that bumpkin as long as I intend to. Can you hang on a little longer? I have a stop I want to make before we return to the house."
    Eavin opened her eyes long enough to study Nicholas. His low-crowned hat prevented her from seeing his eyes, but she could read the furious set of his jaw well enough. No one would mistake him for a gentleman right now. She couldn't imagine why she had thought him part of the languid, genteel society he frequented. That indolent image was a masquerade. The real man was clenching the reins with fists of steel.
    "Why would he send me out there if he knew there was an alligator? That doesn't make sense, Nicholas. You had better wait until your temper cools."
    A mocking grin flashed as he turned his head to regard her, but there was nothing of humor in his eyes. "The blacks believe alligators are the tools of devils. I rather suspect that idiot Jenkins thinks the same, only I'm the devil in his mind. We had a rather rousing quarrel this morning. I imagine he thought it would be amusing to see if the devil could save his own woman from the teeth of the beast. It has nothing to do with you."
    Nothing to do with her! Eavin wanted to spit in his face, but she mustered all the dignity she could. "Sure, and I'll tear his eyeballs out if he's after thinking I'm your woman. I'm the one he near to got killed. Let me deal with him."
    Nicholas grimaced at the fierce lilt of Eavin's language. He really ought to set the two of them in a room together and see which one came out alive, but he still had some remnants of civilization clinging to him. He ignored her demand as he approached the storage shed.
    Jenkins was nowhere in sight, but that didn't deter Nicholas. The field hands loitering in the road wouldn't have been there if Jenkins were out doing his job. He had a good idea of what the man was doing and where. Throwing a glance to the proper Irish prude in the saddle, Nicholas wished she weren't with him, but this was something that had to be done now.
    With a jerk of his head, he indicated the storage shed as he commanded the man nearest him. "Drag Jenkins out here."
    He knew he was setting the fox among the chickens. He'd seen enough hatred and slaughter in Santa Domingue to know better than to give a slave permission to lay hands on a white man, but he had too close an empathy for the slaves' plight to deny them this opportunity. He had never caught Jenkins in a transgression, but he was aware of the hatred between his slaves and the overseer, and couldn't pretend something wasn't going on.  
    Eavin jerked at the sound of a woman's screams as the shed door was thrown open. A man's furious yells and the unpleasant thuds of fists followed. She cringed, remembering the fights her brother engaged in.
    Jenkins came flying out headfirst moments later. As he staggered to his feet, the burly field hands sauntered out after him, preventing him from going farther. One of the kitchen servants appeared in the doorway, her cotton dress torn and pulled down off one shoulder, her nappy hair studded with wheat chaff. She watched dispassionately as the men shoved Jenkins toward Nicholas.
    Leaving her frantically managing the horse on her own, Nicholas strode toward the gathering. She gasped at the suddenness with which he struck. The crack of bone against bone and Jenkins sprawled backward in the dirt. When Jenkins rose again, fists raised, Nicholas