The Fire's Center

by Shannon Farrell

  Riona, still in her ruined dress, was surrounded by a host of sympathetic women.

  Lucien had to shout above the din to catch her attention, and Riona smiled gratefully at her rescuer.

  "Excuse me, ladies, but I think you will all agree that Miss Connolly has had quite enough excitement for one day."

  "Won’t you stay to supper, both of you?" Mrs. Allen offered graciously.

  "Really, Mrs. Allen, thank you, but no. I'm sure Riona is completely worn out after her exertions," he countered, with a tight smile which barely contained his suppressed fury.

  Mrs. Allen beamed. "Of course, Dr. Woulfe."

  But Lucien’s anger at Riona gave way to concern as he could see her hands shake as she attempted to pick the cup up off her lap and put it down on the small table beside her.

  She’s exhausted, has hardly any sleep, and has been working in this terrible heat all day, he thought, relenting in his anger.

  "Come, my dear," he said, taking her hand firmly in his own, and then supporting her under the elbow as she stood.

  He tucked her cloak around her and then said his goodbyes and he hurriedly led her to the door, worried lest she pass out in front of everyone.

  He could feel that she was none too steady on her feet, and thought she resembled a fragile china doll, so white and frail did she appear.

  "One foot in front of the other, that’s right, that’s my girl, keep smiling," he encouraged in a whisper.

  "Are you going to be sick?" he asked more loudly once they were safely out into the foyer, as he hurried her toward the door and to the waiting carriage.

  She shook her head numbly, and clung onto him until at last she was safely in the coach.

  Her head lolled on her shoulders, and Lucien scolded Riona, "Why didn’t you simply say you didn’t feel well and leave?"

  "I didn’t want to cause a scene," she wailed tearfully, the tensions of the day finally beginning to take their toll.

  "There, there, now, Riona, it will be all right," Lucien soothed as he pulled her to him for a quick kiss before they arrived in front of his house.

  Lucien swung Riona up into his arms and brought her straight up to his bathroom, where he began to shout for hot water, while he undid her cloak and began to unfasten her dress.

  "Really, I can do it myself," she protested, embarrassed to be reminded of what had taken place between them the night before.

  "Fine, then, I’ll go get something else for you to put on," he offered.

  A few moments later he reappeared with his heavy dressing gown, which he handed her as she hid on the other side of the open door.

  Then he went back to fetch his own summer-weight dressing gown, as the first of the servants began to fill the tub with scalding water.

  "Just leave them there. I’ll do it. And bring some soup up here to my room for Miss Connolly," he ordered, before locking the bathing chamber door behind them.

  He poured in some hot and added cold from the tap, and then tugged the dressing gown off her practically lifeless limbs, and placed her in the tub.

  Once in the steaming water, though still weak and numb, she began to feel a bit better. Lucien tried to rub some life into her cold arms by scrubbing them with a flannel, recalling how much he had loved being bathed as a child.

  But Riona was no child, he thought as he lathered her breasts, and then made her dip down under the water so he could wash her hair.

  Lucien worked in silence for about ten minutes until at last he asked, "Any better?"

  "I’m finally warm again," Riona admitted in a tiny voice.

  "You shouldn’t be overdoing things. You’ll be no use to me if you go around collapsing. You should have sent for the carriage and come home."

  "How did you know where I was?" Riona asked quietly.

  "I should probably have guessed, but at any rate, Antoinette told me you’d made quite a scene," Lucien said frostily.

  "Antoinette wasn’t even there," Riona mumbled with a frown.

  "I know. But word got out quickly about what you had said, especially about Dr. O’Carroll. All I can say, Riona, is that I really don’t know what possessed you."

  "I’m sorry. You must be furious with me."

  Lucien gave a tight smile. "I was, Riona, but I think the truth has to be told at some point. I for one refuse to defend him. His actions were unconscionable. But I don’t know what the committee will say about him being dismissed."

  "But surely if he stole--"

  "I had thought to keep that part a secret. Simply say he had mistreated a patient," Lucien informed her quietly as he pushed her shoulders forward slightly and began to scrub her back.

  "Are you sure you want to do that?"

  "I don’t want him to start making any wild accusations. I know you're innocent, but not everyone else can be so certain."

  "How can you be so certain? I could have stolen them in the morning when I got in early," she countered.

  "Believe me, I did check. Not because I don’t trust you, my dear, but to make absolutely certain that O’Carroll wouldn’t have any grounds for any accusation. After all, I'd hardly like to bring out that fact that we had spent the entire night together, now would I?" Lucien said almost angrily

  "No, of course not," Riona said, going rigid with tension.

  She dipped her hair under the water to rinse it, then sat back and leaned her head against the edge of the tub.

  At last Riona opened her eyes and looked at Lucien. "I'm sorry, I seem to do nothing but outrage everyone around here."

  Lucien laughed sourly. "Are you trying to say you didn’t do it all on purpose?"

  "No, not really," Riona confessed. "I wanted to shock them a bit, but it all— I don’t know, Lucien, it all got out of proportion somehow."

  "Well, perhaps it’s no bad thing, after all, Riona," Lucien said reluctantly. "If the women’s committee’s plans are anything to go by, it could be just what we need to really help the poor. And more help for the health of the poor, particularly women and children, can’t be a bad thing."

  At last Lucien was certain Riona was completely clean. He wrapped her in a towel, and put his dressing gown over it. The he picked her up, and brought her into his room, where he pulled down the covers and laid her in the bed.

  Then he noticed that Niamh had brought the soup as he had requested. "Can you eat this soup, or do you want me to feed you?"

  "I’ll eat it myself, Lucien. I shouldn’t be in your room putting you to so much trouble."

  "Trouble?" Lucien snorted. "You can use that word with me after all that’s happened today?"

  Then he shook his head and said a bit more gently, "Eat your soup, Riona. I’ll be out in a few minutes."

  True to his word, Lucien scrubbed himself vigorously, and after gathering all their filthy clothes into a heap for the maid to take away, he approached the bed again.

  "Very good. You’ve finished everything." He smiled encouragingly.

  "Lucien, I’m sorry about Dr. O’Carroll and Mary Smith, and checking his bag for the stolen medicines, and interfering at the clinic. I was only trying to help," she apologised quietly.

  "And what about scaring the wits out of half of the respectable ladies in Dublin?" he said with mock severity.

  "I’m sorry, Lucien, truly. I’m very grateful for you coming to my rescue." She sniffed tearfully.

  Lucien thawed towards her completely then. "Please Riona, don’t upset yourself. You’re exhausted. In any case, I can’t really blame you for any of it. Things happen sometimes, and the point is that you've proven to me that you can cope in a crisis.

  "So at the risk of alienating all my correspondents, who will have to once more put up with my appalling handwriting, I'm offering you the position of clinic manager. With the proviso that you do not assist with the medical patients unless there's absolutely no one else, and that you attend lectures as soon as I can arrange them for you."

  Riona gaped at him. "Really? Do you mean it?" she asked in
awe.

  He nodded and smiled at her delighted expression. "I do. I shall leave all the day to day running of the clinic to you, while I take care of the patients. Duty lists, everything, will all be your responsibility from now on. The only thing I have to do is go through that short list again, and hire some more doctors. I'll go down and write to the next choices on our lists, Menteith and Somerville. I'll also send a note around to Briggs asking for his side of the story this morning, why he didn’t turn up when it was his shift.

  "I shall also have a talk with Ursula before I dismiss Dr. O’Shea, although from what Angela and Breda at last confessed to me, Dr. O’Shea is not to be trusted around any woman under the age of eighty.

  "Now, will you be all right on your own for a few minutes while I go write those letters?" Lucien asked, the concern evident in his voice.

  "Yes, fine."

  "Here is a book of poetry to while away your time. And no, Riona, you're not allowed to look at that book on obstetrics. You’ve had enough experience of that for one day," he teased, but his eyes still looked distant as he stared down at her.

  Riona reached out to take his hand. "Thank you for being so kind to me."

  "Thank you for being so reliable, even if you do frequently surprise me." He patted her hand briefly, then went down to the study to write his letters, which he instructed Bob the manservant to take around to each of the men.

  "If you don’t mind my asking, sir, Riona is all right, isn’t she? She looked in such a terrible state when she came in..." the young man trailed off in embarrassment

  "Yes, she’s fine," Lucien said with a small frown.

  "That’s good. I’ll tell Mrs. Kinsella and the others it was nothing," Bob said, looking relieved. He disappeared down the back stairs as fast as a happy puppy.

  Lucien was pleased to see that everyone in the household seemed to like her. He imagined that with anyone else there might have been a great deal of resentment and petty jealousy. But Riona seemed to have an uncanny knack of fitting in almost anywhere, Lucien reflected as he mounted the stairs.

  When he peeked his head around the door of his chamber, Riona looked as though she was just about to doze off.

  Lucien stepped into the room quietly, trying not to disturb her as he moved to turn down the lamp, but she put the book down and looked up at him.

  She looked so tiny in the huge canopied bed, the urge to protect her was overwhelming. He stroked her hair back from her face.

  "All right now? Are you warm enough?" he asked softly.

  "Still a bit cold," Riona admitted.

  "Well, I’ll turn down the lamp, and let you get some sleep," said Lucien, reaching out to lift the globe and blow out the light.

  Lucien was about to step away from the bed when she took his hand and said in a small voice, "Please don’t go, Lucien."

  "Really, Riona, you need your rest," Lucien whispered in the dark.

  "I’m much better now, I promise," she said boldly.

  Lucien hesitated for a moment, torn between his own desires and concern for her well-being.

  Riona sensed his hesitation, and said, "I’m not asking you for anything, Lucien, except to hold me close until I fall asleep."

  "There is certain no harm in that," he laughed with a lightheartedness he didn’t feel.

  He pulled the covers down on the other side of the bed, and tucking his dressing gown around his legs comfortably, he pulled the covers up over both of them.

  Cradling her head against his shoulder, they both instantly drifted off into a dreamless sleep.

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Early the next morning, Riona stirred against Lucien’s huge frame, stretching like a contented cat. Their legs had become entangled in the middle of the night, and the skirts of her dressing gown were now riding up to her waist.

  Lucien, snuggling up against the lovely soft form in the bed beside him, stroked Riona’s warm curvaceous body under the woollen fabric of the dressing gown, and drowsily opened his eyes.

  My, but she's breathtaking, Lucien thought as he kissed Riona.

  She laced her fingers in his hair, and soon he had divested them of both their dressing gowns. They lay naked, sprawled among the covers, enjoying a feast of the senses neither had ever dreamt possible.

  Warning bells went off inside Lucien’s head, but he couldn’t help himself. After all, Riona seemed a more than willing partner, exploring him all over, as she claimed with an impish grin, in order to further her knowledge of the male anatomy.

  "In that case, my dear, you won’t mind me furthering my knowledge of the female anatomy," Lucien countered, spreading her legs wide and exploring her until she breathlessly pleaded for him to take her.

  Lucien couldn’t be sure who was taking and giving as their pleasure mounted to indescribable heights. He feasted his eyes on every inch of her.

  From looking he moved to touching, caressing, possessing, and even attempting some of the more athletic positions he had once seen in an erotic book they had been passing around the men’s club.

  Riona felt slightly shy, but only because she was concerned about pleasing Lucien, and in one of their quieter moments, she admitted as much to him.

  "You have no worries on that score. You please me very much, as you can plainly see," he whispered, moving her hand lower down his abdomen to prove his words.

  Her sapphire blue eyes widened.

  Lucien stared at her with his unusual golden ones for a brief second before saying, "Will you do something for me, Riona?"

  "Yes of course, if I can," Riona assented readily.

  "Kiss me," Lucien requested softly

  "What?" Riona stared, startled.

  "Don’t think about it, just do it, Riona. I want you to kiss me."

  Riona sensed it was some sort of test, and summoning up all her imagination, she kissed him ardently on the lips.

  Any doubts Lucien might have had about making love to Riona fled at that moment. He rolled her under him and joined with her in an ecstasy of passion that sent them both soaring to the heavens and left them completely spent.

  It was about nine the next morning when Riona finally opened her eyes, and by then Lucien was already up and nearly dressed.

  "There’s some hot water in the basin for you, my dear, and breakfast is on its way up."

  Riona drowsily reached for her dressing gown, which Lucien had laid at the foot of the bed, and tugged her arms into it.

  "What time do you have your first patient, and when you want to head for the clinic?" she asked sleepily, shoving her heavy auburn tresses away from her face to look at him.

  "You’re staying in bed today, my girl, after the scare you gave me yesterday. I won't have you overdoing things," he said as he helped her put on the robe, then brought her the breakfast tray when it arrived a few moments later.

  Riona bristled visibly. "I can’t sit around all day doing nothing like, like...."

  "Like what?" Lucien prompted coolly.

  "Like your mistress!" Riona blurted out as she pushed the tray away slightly.

  "Too late for regrets now isn’t it, Riona?" Lucien said, his nostrils flaring. "But you're right, it was a foolish thing to have let happen. I blame myself. I took advantage of your position in this house, of your trust in me, for the past two nights. Surely you must see it cannot possibly be allowed to happen again."

  Lucien stepped away from her as though he had been burnt.

  Riona kept her mouth clamped shut, terrified she would be sick. After all they had shared, Lucien was now telling her what a mistake he had made?

  "I'm of course, an unsophisticated country bumpkin, and such matters are beyond me," Riona said, rising from the bed stiffly. "I’ll leave you now, sir."

  Lucien grasped her by the shoulders, appalled at her pallor and her obvious shock at his seemingly callous words.

  "Riona, I have a responsibility to you and your family to look after you, don’t you see? I’ve already harmed you, and you might even be
with child already. Can’t you understand, I led you into it. I, well, I used the close friendship we have to get under your guard, to get you to do things no respectable woman should ever..."

  Riona shot him a murderous look then, and shook his hand off her as she headed for the door.