Magic by Tami Hoag Page B

as she tried to extricate herself from the subject as quickly as she could without being rude. “We played a lot of clubs, managed to get on a couple of PBS folk music shows.”
    “That’s wonderful.” Jayne smiled. “I just love folk music. It’s very spiritual. So visual and honest in its images. Don’t you agree, Addie?”
    Addie’s lips pinched into a white line. “Drivel. Opera is the only pure form of vocal music.”
    Jayne never missed a beat, turning back to Rachel. “You said ‘we.’ I take it you have a partner?”
    “Had,” Rachel said shortly. Her fingers tightened on her fork in anticipation of the comment her mother would surely make.
    “Feckless little ferret.”
    “Mother, please …”
    “Addie, I love your hair in that style. What do you call it?” Bryan asked.
    Addie scowled at him. “A braid. Honestly, Hennessy, there are times I wonder if you aren’t mentally deficient.”
    “Well, the color is marvelous,” he went on, grinning as he speared vegetables with his fork.
    Addie’s attention shifted between Rachel and Bryan, between unpleasantness and inanity. Bryan’s wink won her over, and she turned toward him with a pleased look. “You think so?” she asked, stroking the frazzled braid that lay over her shoulder. “I’ve been thinking of dying it. I saw a color on television called Sable Seductress.”
    “Oh, no. Blondes have more fun. Take it from me,” Bryan said, winking at her again.
    Addie blushed and turned toward Jayne. “He’s such a flirt.”
    “Always has been, Addie,” Jayne said. “His whole family is that way. Why, it would make you swoon to see all those men together. They look like something out of Gentleman’s Quarterly .”
    “Where is that Australian tonight?” Addie demanded, her mind already drifting from the topic of Bryan.
    “Reilly’s in Vancouver shooting a movie,” Jayne said, automatically glowing at the thought of her husband.
    Bryan managed to steer the conversation in Jayne’s direction for the remainder of the meal. He coaxed her into speaking at length about her husband’s acting career and her own budding career as a director. As curious as he was to learn more about Rachel and her past, he wasn’t eager to have Jayne prize the information out of her there at the dinner table, where Addie could carve it all up for ridicule.
    He’d been willing to do the carving himself less than twenty-four hours earlier, he reminded himself. But that had been before he’d had the chance to observe Rachel. That had been when his only knowledge of her had come from Addie’s cutting remarks and the obvious pain behind them. Now he had seen Rachel. He’d seen—and felt—the turbulent tangle of emotions she was struggling with. He’d watched her look for the slightest sign of forgiveness or approval from her mother, and he’d seen the hurt flash in her lavender eyes when her hopes had met with cold disappointment.
    He had accepted his own decision to help Addie and Rachel as best he could. And with that acceptance had come a subtle shifting in his feelings toward Rachel. The beginnings of protectiveness were coming to life inside him. Every time Addie inflicted another small cut with the razor edge of her tongue, the faint urge to take Rachel in his arms washed through him. He ignored the feeling on a conscious level, on a level where he was still not ready to involve himself completely, but it was there just the same.
    Finally, Jayne scraped her chair back from the table and gave everyone an apologetic look. “I hate to say it, but I’ve got an important meeting tonight. I really have to be running along. Thanks so much for inviting me, Addie.”
    “You invited yourself,” Bryan said, a grin teasing the corners of his mouth as he rose from his chair.
    Jayne made a face at him. “Don’t get snippy. I brought the biscuits, didn’t I?”
    “So you did,” he conceded graciously. “And they were delicious.”
    Jayne bent, kissed the