Madness (45 page)

“Who could possibly want someone as mad and dangerous as I was supposed to be? But Gabrielle loves me.” He smiled at her, and reached out to stroke her cheek.

She beamed back. “I do indeed, for all time. So just stop fretting now, Lucinda, and concentrate on the baby and your bright future.
 
Anyone who really loves you will understand you were not to blame. Be patient with you.”

“It isn’t about blame, in any event,” Simon said with a shake of his head, mopping her sweating brow. “It’s about trying to help you and understand you, to make sure you have a happy life in the future.

"Anyone who loves you has to take this side of you and help you forget it. Just as Gabrielle helped me forget the hell of Bedlam. I could almost be grateful it happened, for we might never have met each other otherwise.”

Gabrielle stroked his cheek. “Oh, I feel sure we would have. We were destined for one another. We had met in Dorset, or so you said.”

“That’s true, yes, I remember the first time now,” Lucinda agreed.

Gabrielle stared. “What do you mean? How could you—”

Lucinda had a huge labour pain at that moment, and let out a shout that startled them both.

Gabrielle’s eyes widened at the red pool creeping down her sister's partly bare legs. “Oh God, the baby's coming, Simon. What do we do?"

Chapter
Twenty-eight

Gabrielle’s stared in horror as the redness spread inexorably. .“Oh God, what do we do?"

"It's all right," Simon soothed. "You know what to do. You've worked at the clinic. You're trained for this."

"But we're here all alone miles from the nearest doctor and—"

"I know she's your sister, but really, it will be fine. Take deep, steady breaths," he said, rubbing her back in wide circles as she kneeled next to her sister's prone form and raised the hem of her chemise higher.

 
"Gods above, she’s bleeding really badly. I think the baby is coming too quickly. She hasn’t opened up yet fully and something’s torn.”

“Don’t panic,” Simon said calmly. “We will be fine. Really. Blood always looks worse than it is.”

Gabrielle gasped.

“What is it? What?” Simon asked urgently.

“The head! I can see the head!”

“I’m ready, love. Just tell me what you want me to do.”

She gestured to him with a quick incline of her own head. “Come down here to hold it, and I’ll tie off the cord and get her cleaned up.”

He dropped to his knees and did exactly as she asked.

Just then, Lucinda gave one last push.

The baby glided into his huge hands, a perfect fit. Simon laughed in amazed delight, and held the slippery child carefully as Gabrielle worked on cutting the cord and dealing with the afterbirth.

The child gave a watery cry, and then proceeded to look around it as though lord of all it surveyed.

"He's beautiful,"
 
Lucinda said, straining upwards to have quick look before lapsing back onto the pillow with a relieved sigh.

"He certainly is. Well, my lad, I can see you're going to be a good boy for your mama," Simon said to the baby, who to his shocked delight began to gurgle and coo.

"Look at him. So small, but so perfect."

"I know," Gabrielle said with a smile of sheer relief.

"Just like you," he added. "I've never seen you more lovely than you are now."

"Nor you, my love. We did it. Did it together. You really are my hero, darling."

They gave each other a smacking kiss before tidying the baby with some warm water in a basin, which he happily splashed, to their delight, before wrapping him in swaddling and bringing the baby up to Lucinda’s breast.

She bared it to see if he would try to eat, and he promptly latched on, sucked so heartily for a moment that Lucinda gasped in shock, and then feathered down his long lashes and began to drowse.

“Oh, he’s so lovely,” she wept.

“Like his mother, and auntie,” Simon said with a sniff.

“Have you got a name for him?" Gabrielle asked with a loving smile.

“Christopher Simon Randall Howell. I want nothing from that bastard Oxnard, not even his last name.”

Simon and Gabrielle looked at each other.

“Christopher it is then. And thank you, Lucinda. I’m really touched and deeply grateful,” Simon said, bending to give her a kiss on the brow.

“Thank you, thank you both.”

Gabrielle tidied up the last of the dirty linens and made sure Lucinda was as clean and comfortable as could be, and joined Simon at the head of the makeshift bed, where they looked down at Lucinda as she nursed the infant. She was as tender with it as she had been with her little kitten in Bedlam. It seemed a lifetime ago.

Gabrielle shivered for a moment, and prayed for the souls of Spence and Kit. She hoped this new Christopher would have a much better ending than the last poor baby.

“We really are a little family now,” Simon said, beaming as proudly as if the child were his own.

“So you have no regrets about not finding your rightful family?” Gabrielle asked softly.

Simon smiled at her, and she noted there wasn't a single shadow in his golden gaze.
 
“I
have
found them. They’re all right here with me, or waiting back for us at Barkston House. You told me yesterday that I was more than enough for you, that I filled your life. Don’t ever doubt that you do the same for me, my lovely Gabrielle. It’s all been so new and sudden and, well, wildly passionate. But this is love, pure, solid and simple.” He looped his arm around her waist and held her close in the way she loved, one that made her feel as if they fit perfectly together. And as if nothin could ever separate them, not even death.

“Thank you for helping. Like Antony said the first time we ever met, you’re always a useful man to have in a crisis.”

He drew her into the circle of his embrace fully now with his other arm. “You know there isn’t anything I wouldn’t do for you or your sister. There may come a time when I shall have to prove that to you—”

She shook her head. “You never have to prove anything to me, darling. And yet you’ve proven your love time and time again.”

Lucinda cuddled the baby to her and sighed. “Tired now. Why don’t the two of you get some rest as well?”

“You don’t mind?”

“Not at all, Sister. Go on, off you get behind the screen, and give him a big kiss for me.”

Simon laughed. “You can do it yourself. I won’t be offended.”

“One for me and one for baby."
 
She smacked her hand twice, and blew. "Good night, Simon.”

She rolled onto her side, with the baby slumbering happily beside her, and closed her own eyes.

Gabrielle and Simon did their best to scrub themselves, Lucinda and the baby, and the whole area clean, lest the owners of the house come home and find their lovely drawing room looking like a hospital.

When they were satisfied that all was as orderly as they could manage in the circumstances, she checked her sister one more time, and then joined Simon on their pallet bed behind the screen.

He curled his body into hers and sighed as they relaxed at last after all the stress of the day.

A moment later he whispered, “I know we really ought not to make love with your sister and baby so close, just on the other side of the screen, but well, can I sleep inside you?”

“Do you think we can—”

“I’m willing to try if you are.”

He lifted the hem of her chemise, pulled her tightly to face him, and glided into her with all of the thrilling glow of love their joining always produced.

She gasped and rotated her hips, but he shook his head. He rolled her partly onto her back so that she was pinned to the pallet by his hard body. He wrapped one of his legs around the calves of both of hers.

“There, perfect.”

She began to clamp her muscles down onto him, just as she had read about in the book Eswara had given her. He gasped in surprise.

“Oh, no, we shouldn’t. I didn’t mean—”

“Just let it happen,” she urged throatily.

A few more tight clenches from her ring of muscles had him flowing like a river, and she right along with him, the sensations only ebbing when Simon felt as though he had been drained dry.

“Thank you, my love. That was Heaven,” he rasped against her ear. “But now, we really need to sleep.”

They both peered around the screen, but Lucinda was breathing evenly, as was the baby.

Simon was almost sure the infant was making a sound like a cat purring. Or was it his own pleasure humming through his body? He mentioned the thought to Gabrielle.

“It’s both,” she said with a loving smile. "it’s all we could ever have hoped for. A wonderful, healthy baby, and Lucinda purging her demons from the past so she can really get well."

"Aye, that bast—"

She sushed him with a kiss, and then began to trace his handsome mouth with her fingers. "It's over now, my love. What he did was terrible, but hate breeds hate. Out of all that dark hell, a bright new life has come into the world. Let's just take it as the gift it is, without trying to be agents of revenge."

"Aye, you're right, of course." He kissed her on the cheek, and then asked, "How did you ever get to be so wise?"

She smiled up at him, her eyes glowing. "From the wisest man I ever met, who gave me the gift of knowing what it is to truly love and be loved. Thank you, Simon, for everything. For tonight, and all our past nights."

"And for all the nights to come," he said with a grin.

"Indeed. I can't wait. But for now, we need to rest. So good night, darling.”

"Aye, sweet dreams, my dearest love."

He settled his weight a bit better, still pressed deeply within her. He wrapped his whole body around hers like a blanket once more, and let sleep finally overtake them.