He froze in the act of raising his fork. It clattered to the tray and he pushed the dish aside.
“Do you, Aislinn?” he asked. “Do you?”
“Oh, how can you ask me that? Isn’t it obvious?”
He put the tray on the floor. “Come here to me.”
Linn stood her ground. “No. You’ll just get me all… confused.”
“What is there to be confused about?”
Linn’s mouth fell open. “You tell me! I’m still an American lady; I’m still Kevin’s daughter. Those factors seemed very important to you not too long ago.”
Con dropped his eyes. “They become less important every minute,” he said quietly.
Linn held her breath, afraid that he would say something else to qualify that statement. But the silence lengthened in the room. What did he mean? He had changed his mind?
“Do you trust me now?” she asked in a small voice.
He looked up. “I’m trying.”
“That’s not good enough!” she blazed, furious that he could have even the slightest doubt about her after what she’d done for him. “I’m so terribly sorry that I don’t have the right father, and that I wasn’t born in a thatched hut down the lane. Too bad about you and your delicate sensibilities, Connor Clay.”
“Wait a bit,” he began. “You can’t expect . . .”
“Oh, cahn’t I?” she demanded, imitating the broad ‘a’ of his accent. “I can damn well expect plenty. I didn’t come here to take care of you because I’m a volunteer for the Red Cross. I came because...” She stopped and shut her mouth. She wasn’t going to say it.
Con watched her in silence. Then he said, “I didn’t mean to upset you.”
“Of course you didn’t,” she answered evenly. “You never do.”
Con glanced around the room. “You needn’t stay any longer,” he said, not meeting her eyes. “Neil will be here soon. You can go.”
“And you can go straight to hell,” Linn responded without inflection. “I’ll wait for him to arrive. If I leave you alone you’ll probably trip and split your head open before he gets here.”
Con bit his lip reflectively. “Well, as long as you’re going to stay, will you help me to the bathroom? I need a shower. These clothes I’m wearing are about to get up and walk away—and I’ll hear no arguments.”
Linn shrugged, walking to his side and helping him to stand. She held herself stiffly away from him as he hobbled to the bathroom. She released him at the door and was about to turn away when he put his hand on her shoulder.
“You didn’t let me finish before,” Con said. “You have a wonderful facility for misunderstanding what I say.”
“I think I understand very well. You’ve made your position clear and I have my own reservations about our…relationship. So why don’t we just drop it, okay?”
He remained as he was. “But...”
“I said to drop it,” Linn repeated wearily. “Take your shower.’‘
Con moved on reluctantly and shut the door. Linn picked up his tray and started to clear away the breakfast, which he’d barely touched. She heard the rush of water begin behind the door and she carried the dishes to the sink with a heavy heart.
This will never work out, she thought. He wants me but he doesn’t love me. He still can’t forget the past and my father. And I can’t afford to take a chance on a man who might hurt me again. I won’t recover a second time. She made herself another cup of coffee and sipped it slowly, a sense of loss spreading through her like a slow poison.
The cascading water stopped, and then after a short silence the door opened a crack.
“Will you get me a shirt from the shelf there and some pants from the drawer next the bed?” Con asked. “Anything will do.”
Linn selected the clothes and handed them through the door. She pushed it open to reach him and saw him standing just inside.
He was still wet from the shower, his hair in damp, glistening ringlets, droplets clinging to his lashes like crystal beads. Rivulets ran on his arms and chest. A towel was knotted around his waist. He had removed the bandage from his leg, and a freshet of blood stained the towel above his wound.
“Con, your leg,” she said. “You shouldn’t be standing so long.”
“Help me, then,” he said softly. “Come here.”
Linn moved up next to him and he put his arm across her shoulders. His skin glistened wetly, an invitation she couldn’t refuse. Before she knew what she was doing Linn bent her head and licked a trail of droplets from his chest, slitting her eyes like a purring cat.
Con sucked in his breath and pulled her tight against him. His hand slid beneath her hair and closed around the nape of her neck, pressing her close as she kissed him wildly, lost in a tumult of desire.
“Oh, Con,” she whispered, “you can hardly stand up and still I can’t keep my hands off you.”
“Keep your hands on me,” he said thickly, pulling on her hair to raise her head. “I’ve thought of nothing else since I met you.” He sought her lips with his, backing her up against the tiled wall, and Linn ran her hands over his almost naked body. His muscles bunched and flexed beneath her fingers in response to her loving touch. Her mouth opened under his, and then her head fell back as he moved his lips over her throat, pausing to fit her hips to his and surge against her powerfully with a force that made her gasp aloud.
His towel did little to conceal his arousal and Linn’s hands, which seemed to be acting of their own accord, moved to caress him. He groaned and his arms loosened to allow her access. The towel fell to the floor.
Con sighed as Linn’s fingers closed around him and he pulsed strongly in her hand. She encircled him and moved with deliberate slowness, prolonging his pleasure. Con’s fists clenched.
“You torture me,” he moaned. His chest and shoulders were flushed, his breath coming in shallow gasps. His eyes were closed, as if he feared that she would be too shy to continue if he looked at her.
Linn’s eagerness to please him overcame her ignorance; guided by instinct rather than technique, she put her face against his damp shoulder and stroked him as he clasped her to his body in the curve of one strong arm. His soft sounds of gratification made her bold; she nipped his skin with her teeth and felt the answering pressure of his palm in the hollow of her back. He made a deep noise in his throat, almost a growl, and she hesitated.
“Don’t stop,” he begged. “Please don’t stop.” He opened his eyes and his gaze was so blurred with passion that he looked drugged.
There was a knock on the outside door.
“Oh, no,” Con groaned. “Not now. Ignore it.”
“Con, I can’t. It’s sure to be Dr. McCarthy and he knows we’re in here.”
Linn stepped away from him and he slumped backward, raising his arm to cover his eyes. She could see that he was shaking. She averted her gaze from his nude form, picking up his clothes from the floor.
“Get dressed while I let him in,” she said. Then she saw a terrycloth robe hanging on the back of the door. “On second thought, you’d better put the robe on so he can have a look at your leg.”
Con didn’t respond and after waiting a moment she closed the door quietly behind her. She hurried to answer the persistent knocking, which was getting louder and more demandng.
“Hello, Dr. McCarthy,” she said breathlessly, stepping aside to let him walk past her into the room. “We were expecting you.”
“Were you indeed?” he asked mildly. “It seems to me I might have interrupted something.”
Linn could feel her face flaming and knew she was blushing wildly. “You said you would be back,” she replied meekly.
“So I did. Where’s the patient?”
“In the bathroom. He’ll be out in a second.”
“I hope he hasn’t been running any marathons on that leg.”
“I couldn’t stop him from taking a shower.”
McCarthy nodded sourly. He glanced at the sink full of dishes. “Charming domestic
scene,” he commented dryly.
“I made breakfast,” Linn answered, growing tired of the doctor’s tart observations. “Doesn’t he have to eat to keep up his strength?”
“It would take more than a short fast to deplete his strength,” McCarthy stated. “That boy’s a bull.”
Linn turned away so that her companion wouldn’t see the effect of that last remark on her face. She busied herself rinsing dishes while McCarthy folded his arms and watched her as a scientist might survey an insect specimen. She glanced at him, and then away. The man’s expression was impassive; she couldn’t tell what conclusions he was drawing about her relationship with his patient.
The bathroom door opened and Con emerged, clad in the terry robe.
McCarthy looked him over. “Just as I suspected, a miraculous recovery. You’re amazing, boy. As often as you’re knocked down you spring back up like a jack-in- the-box.”
“You should know, Neil,” Con replied, looking at Linn.
“Come here and let me have a look at that leg,” the doctor ordered.
Con walked to the bed with the doctor’s assistance and sat on the edge. McCarthy crouched on the floor in front of him, and then threw him a dirty look.
“Who told you to take off that dressing?”
“I got it wet in the shower.”
“And strained the stitches as well. It’s oozing blood.”
“Is it? I thought it was oozing ink. Will you leave off talking and just bandage it for me? You charge a high price for your services, Neil; I have to listen to all this drivel before I receive treatment.”
“The drivel is part of the treatment. You can’t expect to run about like a madman, getting yourself torn up, without hearing a lecture or two from those who care about you.” The doctor glanced slyly at Linn. “Isn’t that right, Miss Pierce?”
Linn didn’t know what to say.
“I’ll bet this young lady here has been telling you to stay out of those donnybrooks up north, has she not?”
“She has,” Con responded tightly.
The doctor removed a package of gauze from his bag and began unwinding a piece of it. “Well, then, we’re in perfect agreement. She sounds a sensible lass to me.” McCarthy looked up from his work and met Con’s eyes. “Not like some who’d send you into danger for their own selfish reasons.”
Con’s mouth became a grim line but he said nothing.
Linn watched this interchange, bewildered. What was McCarthy talking about? Was someone encouraging Con to resume his former activities? She placed a china cup on the drainboard carefully, lost in thought.
McCarthy finished bandaging Con’s leg, patting the last length of tape into place. “I hate to admit the truth, but despite your best efforts to cripple yourself this looks like it’s healing fine. You should be back up to snuff in no time.” He replaced his things in his bag and glanced around at Linn. “Might you have a cup of tea for me, Miss Pierce?”
“Linn. Certainly. It may be a little strong but I’ll add some hot water to it.”
“Leave it be. I like it strong enough to walk on with lots of sugar.” He turned back to Con. “I’ll help you to the loo, son; you’d best get dressed.”
Con’s eyes flashed between Linn and the doctor as if he suspected some incipient conspiracy, but he went meekly enough when McCarthy offered his arm. The doctor returned for a chair and left it in the bathroom.
“He’s sitting down to shave,” McCarthy informed Linn as he emerged to join her, taking his cup of tea and dropping onto a sofa with it. Linn was nursing another cup of coffee. They sipped in companionable silence for a while before the doctor broke it to say, “So don’t you think it’s time you told me what’s going on here?”
Linn shut her eyes briefly. Were all these people as nosy as Bridie and this man or had she been cursed with unfortunate luck? She felt as if she and Con were performing on a stage, with McCarthy and the housekeeper and half of Ballykinnon as a rapt audience.
“I don’t know what you mean,” she said evasively.
“I think you do,” he replied. “There’s so much tension in this room I feel as if I’m sitting in the middle of an electrical storm.”
“Well, we did have a bit of an argument earlier.” God, she was even starting to talk like them. Pretty soon she’d be nattering about hooligans and donnybrooks too. The vernacular was seductive.
“That’s not the only kind of tension I feel,” the doctor responded archly, eyeing her over the rim of his cup.
Linn would have to be a dunce to mistake what he was implying and he knew she was no dunce. “I didn’t realize that it was so obvious,” she replied.
The doctor choked on his tea. “Obvious! It’s as plain as the whitewash on Paddy’s pig. It may interest you to know that after your grand appearance in the pub with young Conchubor, some of the lads started taking odds. You’re up against Kate as works in the Kinnon Arms. Word has it you’re winning, hands down.”
Linn stared at him, horrified, speechless with shock.
“Aye,” McCarthy went on, entranced with his own narrative, “since you appeared on the place Con hasn’t been seen about the town with Kate. Or any of the other hopefuls, I might add. You’re the frontrunner, to be sure.”
Linn slammed her cup down on the bar. “I’m very glad to hear it! It’s comforting to know that everybody in town thinks I’m yards ahead of the local barmaid in capturing that exalted prize, that man among men, the incomparable Connor Clay!” Furious, she grabbed up her purse and sweater and then whirled to confront the astonished doctor.
“If and when he comes out of the inner sanctum, you can tell him that I’m through playing nursemaid. If he gets stabbed or shot, clubbed or beaten or falls down a well, tell him to call Kate Costello. I’m sure she’d appreciate the chance to improve her standing from number two.” Linn stalked out of the cottage and shut the door behind her so hard that it rattled on its hinges.
Linn charged back toward the house at a breakneck pace, burning with humiliation. So she’d been providing free entertainment for the townspeople with her fascination for Bally’s most interesting resident. Newly arrived from America, a pretty young woman sharing the estate with the virile local celebrity was sure to arouse comment. And she had given them plenty to talk about, Linn reflected miserably. She wasn’t good at hiding her feelings; her behavior with Con during their visit to the pub had been enough to establish her as a contestant for Kate’s erstwhile boyfriend. What a fool she’d been making of herself. She felt ill when she considered what everyone must think of her.
The phone was ringing when Linn opened the front door of the main house. She considered ignoring it but she had never been able to dismiss the summons of that insistent bell, no matter how much she wished to be left alone. Ned curled about her legs in greeting as she picked up the receiver.
“Hello,” she said resignedly.
“It’s Bridie, dear. How are you?”
Linn responded to this question by bursting into tears.
Bridie’s heartfelt sigh came over the wire. “I thought as much. When I didn’t hear from you this morning early I knew you two would be mixing it up. Is Con all right?”
“Yes.” Linn sniffed.
“Then what ails you?”
Linn picked Ned up from the floor and buried her face in his fur. He purred, making a sound like a miniature outboard motor. “Everything,” she responded dramatically.
“Ah, well, in that case you’d best come and have dinner with us this day,” Bridie stated, her kindly voice tinged with amusement. “We’ll have a chat and you can tell me all about it.”
Linn hesitated. “I don’t know...”
“Yes, you do,” Bridie replied firmly. “I won’t be back until Monday morning, and by that time you’ll be floating away on a river of tears. It’s no good feeling sorry for yourself, I say. Now get yourself ready and my Terence will be by with his cycle to pick you up. I’m sending him off right now.”
The suggested
method of transportation sounded vaguely suspect but Con and his car were out of the question, for different reasons.
“All right,” Linn said.
“Good girl. And don’t forget to feed that cat, now; he’ll be terrorizing the birds.” The line went dead.
Linn went to the kitchen. She opened two cans of cat food and placed the contents of both tins into a bowl. She refreshed the water in Ned’s other dish and watched as the prospective diner marched up to the food, sniffed it disdainfully and stalked off with his tail in the air. Linn shrugged. He would get hungry later.
Bridie’s Terence turned out to be a handsome, silent teenager who roared up the drive on a motorbike and waited with the patient detachment of a royal servant while Linn clambered up behind him. She put her arms tentatively around his middle, and then clung tighter when he surged forward suddenly. They flew down the path, spraying gravel, and traversed the four miles to downtown Bally with Linn hanging onto Bridie’s offspring for dear life, absorbed in mental prayer. Trees and buildings passed in a blur; Linn finally closed her eyes and abandoned herself to fate.
The bike lurched to a stop and Linn opened one eye cautiously. They had halted in front of a row of attached stone residences fronting Bally’s main street. Though all of the houses were actually one long, low building, the individual apartments had been painted different pastel colors to separate them into distinctive little homes. Terence locked his bike to a rack outside a flat that was painted daffodil yellow and shoved open the front door.
“Ma,” he bawled, so loudly that Linn jumped. It was the first word she’d heard out of him.
No answer from inside.
Terence put his hands on his hips and tried again. “Ma,” he yelled, “your lady’s here.”
Bridie appeared in the doorway, wiping her hands on her apron. “That’ll do, Terry; you needn’t wake the dead.” She smiled at Linn. “Come in, lass. We’ll have a cup of tea.”
Terence, who apparently felt himself dismissed, flashed Linn a grin of dazzling beauty and loped off down the street.
“Be back for tea at half three,” his mother called after him. “Miss the time and you’ll starve. I’m not scouring the countryside for the likes of you.”
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