“Ouch! That hair is attached to my head, Lady Claire.”
“Sorry, Papa Charles, but you weren’t ’tending.”
“Um.” He realized suddenly that his soaked breeches would reveal to anyone who cared to look exactly what thoughts he had been attending to. He forced his mind to consider topics that did not relate to Emma in any fashion. Estate management. Ah. That worked like a charm.
He glanced at Emma again. She was studying the ground. At least he assumed that was what she was doing—he couldn’t see her face. Her hideous headgear completely obscured her features. Perhaps a cooper rather than a milliner had fashioned the thing. It certainly did look more like a bucket than a bonnet.
He would just have to contrive some accident to rid the world of its insulting existence.
“Papa Charles, since we didn’t catch any fish, what can we eat for breakfast? I’m hungry.”
“Don’t worry, Lady Claire,” he said. “We’ll just stop in to see Cook. She’s sure to have something tasty.”
“We can’t bother Cook, Uncle Charles.”
“Why ever not, Isabelle? I used to bother Cook all the time when I was your age, didn’t I, Miss Peterson?”
“Yes.” Emma still didn’t look at him. “Well, you did by the time I met you. You were always hungry. I believe Cook called you an imp of Satan, but she gave you the best of whatever she had—the biggest pastry or the ripest fruit.”
“Were you jealous, Miss Peterson?”
Emma glanced at him quickly, then turned her eyes forward. “Of course not, my lord. I was in awe of your ability to consume limitless quantities of food.”
“Ah, but I was a growing boy.”
“I’m a growing girl, Papa Charles,” Claire said, bouncing on his shoulders. “What will Cook have to eat, do you think?”
“Perhaps gooseberry tarts. Mmm. Not exactly breakfast food, but Cook’s gooseberry tarts are splendid.” Cook might not be up to London standards when it came to preparing a dinner for the ton, but she certainly did some things well. He glanced down at Isabelle. She was too quiet again. “Have you ever had any of Cook’s gooseberry tarts, Isabelle?”
“No, Uncle Charles. Mother said we would get fat if we ate tarts, and it is very hard to catch a husband if you are fat.”
Charles felt his jaw drop. “Gammon! You are only nine years old, Isabelle. A few tarts will not land you on the matrimonial shelf.”
“Mother said it was never too early to think about the future. It’s not as if we can live at Knightsdale our whole lives.”
Charles stared at Isabelle, not sure whether to laugh or curse. Had Paul not known what his wife had been telling the girls?
“I’ve had a gooseberry tart, Papa Charles.”
“Claire!” Isabelle said. “Don’t lie.”
“I’m not! I sneaked into the kitchen once and took one. I didn’t like it. It burned my mouth.”
“Well, there’s no need for sneaking anywhere,” Charles said. “We shall walk into the kitchen, wish Cook a good morning, and see if she has anything for us to eat.”
“Are you certain we can, Uncle Charles?” Wrinkles etched Isabelle’s forehead. “Mother said never to bother Cook.”
“Of course I’m certain, Isabelle.” He turned to Emma. Her head was up, her face tight with concern. “Miss Peterson, you are the governess. What do you say? Am I right that we can enter the kitchen with impunity?”
“Of course, my lord.” Emma smiled, but a line still creased her brow. He’d wager that she, too, would scream if she heard “Mother said” one more time. It was wrong to think ill of the dead, but, well, he did not miss Cecilia at the moment.
“See?” he said. “If a governess says so, it must be true. Governesses never want you to do anything fun, do they?”
“My lord!” Emma put her hands on her hips. “You must not malign the noble profession of governess.”
Claire giggled. “But it’s true, Mama Peterson. Miss Hodgekiss never let us do anything fun.”
“Didn’t I let you go on this fishing excursion?”
“Yes, but you aren’t a real governess,” Isabelle said. There was still a note of worry in her voice.
“Well, I am a real marquis.” Charles lifted Claire off his shoulders. “And I say we can go into the kitchen.” He stood as tall as he could and tried to look like the Duke of Alvord did when he was his most duke-ish. “Actually, now that I think on it, this is my kitchen. I am the Marquis of Knightsdale, am I not?”
“The Marquis of Knightsdale!” Claire yelled. “Watch out, Cook!”
“I don’t think Cook will like being shouted at, Lady Claire,” Emma said.
“Very true, Miss Peterson. As they say, you will catch more flies with honey than vinegar.”
Claire wrinkled her nose. “But I don’t want any flies, Papa Charles.”
“Don’t be silly, Claire.” Isabelle suddenly sounded very much the more experienced older sister. “Uncle Charles just means you are more likely to get what you want if you ask nicely and don’t order people around.”
“Precisely. Ordering Cook to give us food will just put her back up. We need a more subtle approach.” Charles went down on one knee so he could look both girls in the face. “I’ve found appealing to Cook’s warm heart works very well. You and I, Lady Claire, are a very bedraggled pair after our dunking in the stream. I’m certain Cook cannot resist feeling sorry for us. Do you think you can look pitiful?”
“Oh, yes, Papa Charles.” Claire opened her eyes very wide and turned down the corners of her mouth. Even Isabelle giggled.
“Very good. I will let you take the lead in the pitiful approach. Now, Lady Isabelle,” Charles said, turning and putting his hands on her shoulders. They felt so fragile under his fingers. “I think you might do well to spearhead our charm attack.”
“Charm attack? What do you mean, Uncle Charles?”
“Well, I have noticed that you have the loveliest smile.”
“I do?” Isabelle turned bright pink. Charles grinned.
“Yes, indeed. When you smile, your eyes sparkle in quite a remarkable way. I’m sure if you smile at Cook, she will let us have whatever treats we may like.”
“Really?”
Charles blinked. He had been teasing Isabelle, but now that she was grinning at him, he saw that it was true. She had a beautiful smile. It lit her thin, angular face with an ethereal loveliness that quite took his breath away. He vowed to get her to smile more often.
“I think we’re ready to invade the kitchen.”
Somehow Emma had to persuade Charles to stay at Knightsdale. The girls needed him.
She sat on the bench at the long kitchen table and watched Isabelle and Claire bloom under Charles’s attention. To have any man take an interest in them was wonderful—their father certainly never had—but to have Charles be that man was beyond wonderful. He was charming them just as he charmed everyone. Just as he had charmed her when she was a girl.
Cook had presented Prinny with a bone shortly after they entered her domain, and he was happily gnawing on it in the corner by the fire. Claire had scrambled onto the bench next to Charles. She sat close enough to touch him. She patted his sleeve and rested her head against his shoulder when someone besides herself was talking. Emma suspected she would have climbed into his lap, given half a chance.
Isabelle sat next to Emma, across from Charles. Being nine, she was too grown-up to cling to him physically, but she was clinging to him with her eyes. Emma saw a slight blush spread over Isabelle’s cheeks after one of Charles’s small compliments. She’d wager Isabelle was more than half in love with her uncle. An innocent infatuation, one she would soon outgrow.
Unlike Emma.
Emma sat up straighter. This would never do. Charles was charming, but he was not for her. She was going to shop among the other eligible men, she had decided. Mr. Stockley, for example…
No, she would not think about Mr. Stockley right now. She would just enjoy being here with Ch
arles and the girls.
“Here, Lady Isabelle, have some more bread, do,” Cook said, putting a large slice of fresh bread on Isabelle’s plate.
“Thank you, Cook.” Isabelle’s rare smile lit her face. Cook blinked, then smiled broadly at Emma.
Emma smiled back. She wished she had thought to bring the girls here before. She’d never imagined Cecilia would have kept them from this haven with its sunny, high windows and warm smells of baking. Cook was a plain, cheerful woman, broad of girth and heart. She might not be able to make an elegant French sauce, but she could make a little girl smile.
“And may we have some jam, too, please, Cook?”
Emma had to muffle a laugh at Claire’s ingratiating expression.
“Of course ye may, Lady Claire. And would ye like a taste of my lemon cake?”
“Oh, yes, please.”
“I don’t suppose you have any gooseberry tarts about, do you, Cook?” Charles leaned toward Cook and flashed his own ingratiating grin. This time Emma did not have the urge to laugh—cry, maybe. He was breathtakingly handsome.
“Aye—happen I do, my lord.”
“Splendid! May I have one?” He looked at Emma. “And you, Miss Peterson? Would you care for one of Cook’s gooseberry tarts?”
“No, thank you, my lord.”
“Are ye sure, Miss Peterson?” Cook asked. “I have plenty.”
“No, thank you, Cook. I don’t care for gooseberries, but I will take a slice of your lemon cake, if I might.”
“Not care for gooseberries, Miss Peterson?” Charles asked as Cook went to fetch the tarts. “You have no taste, I fear.”
“Not everyone loves gooseberries as you do, my lord.”
“Well, perhaps that is a good thing. It leaves more for me, doesn’t it?”
Charles took a tart from the top of the plate Cook put on the table. Emma watched him bite into it. He had strong, white teeth, so unlike Mr. Stockley’s yellowed, crooked ones. A little of the gooseberry filling squirted onto his chin and his tongue slid out to capture it. Lud, even his tongue looked strong.
People did not have strong tongues! Though his tongue certainly had felt strong when it had been in her…
Emma took a large bite of lemon cake.
“Would ye like some cold milk, Miss Peterson? Ye look a little flushed.”
Emma shook her head no. Her mouth was too full—and she was too mortified—to get the word out. Charles looked at her and lifted one of his masculine eyebrows.
Masculine eyebrows? She contemplated banging her head against the wooden table to knock some sense into it—or at least the lust out.
“We went fishing, Cook,” Claire said. “Papa Charles showed us how to put the worms on the hooks. Then I catched a fish, but I fell in and Papa Charles saved me, and now he’s going to teach me and Isabelle to swim.”
Cook’s eyes widened when she heard “Papa Charles” and then she beamed at Lord Knightsdale. Charles’s ears turned red. Good—he could stand a little embarrassment. Isabelle added to the story, her voice young and enthusiastic, like a nine-year-old girl instead of a small adult.
Charles had to stay at Knightsdale. He brought fun—adventure and laughter—into the girls’ lives. They had not missed him before, because they had not known him. Now if he left to live most of the year in London—it didn’t bear thinking of. Their hearts would break.
Emma refused to consider if it would be only the girls’ hearts breaking.
“That was capital, Cook, but I think we had better be going.” Charles stood, brushing crumbs from his breeches. “I’m afraid Claire and I are sorely in need of a bath.”
“I don’t need a bath, Papa Charles. I only have baths on Sundays.”
“Or on days when you’ve had a dunking in the stream,” he said.
Claire frowned and stuck out her lower lip. Charles laughed.
“No tantrums now, Lady Claire. Remember the fish don’t like them, nor do I. Go with Miss Peterson, and she and Nanny will get you all cleaned up.”
“I don’t like baths.” Claire crossed her arms, her face taking on a distinctly mulish expression.
“Would you like to use a little of my lavender water?” Emma asked.
It was as if a cloud had moved away from the sun.
“Yes! Then I’ll smell like you, won’t I?”
Emma laughed. “Yes, then you’ll smell like me.”
“And you smell good. Don’t you think Mama Peterson smells good, Papa Charles?”
Charles grinned slowly. “Oh, yes. Miss Peterson smells very nice, indeed.”
Emma swore she flushed from the roots of her hair to the ends of her toenails. “Um, well, let’s go then, Claire. Come, Prinny.” She bent to fasten the dog’s lead back on his collar. No use taking chances with so many strangers in the house.
Charles was still smirking as he stepped aside to let her precede him out of the kitchen. He walked with them up the stairs to the bedroom floor.
“Miss Peterson, I will see you later.”
“What about us, Papa Charles? Will you see us later, too?”
Charles ruffled Claire’s hair. “I will stop by the nursery when I can, imp. I have an appointment with Mr. Coles, the estate manager, and then I have to play host to all these London ladies and gents—that’s why we went fishing so early this morning, so I could see you before my other duties.”
“Please? You have to see if I smell as good as Mama Peterson.”
Charles grinned. “For a treat like that, I will certainly try my hardest. Perhaps I can steal a few minutes before dinner. Now run along and get your bath.”
Emma and the girls almost made it safely to the nursery. They would have made it easily, if Emma had not stopped to get the lavender water. As it was, they were only a few yards from the nursery stairs when two giggling young ladies emerged from a room right into their path. Prinny barked and lunged forward. The young ladies—Miss Oldston and Lady Caroline—screamed.
“Don’t be scared,” Claire said. “Prinny’s very friendly.”
Lady Caroline sniffed, her full cheeks creased into a frown, her stubby nose turned up in disdain. She bore a striking resemblance to Squire Begley’s prize pig, Ivy—or “That Damn Ivy,” as he was wont to call her.
“I am not scared. I just do not care for dogs, nasty, dirty things.”
Miss Oldston guffawed, her lips turning back to show her sizable teeth. “At least it ain’t a cat, Caro. At least you ain’t swelling up, all red and itchy.”
Lady Caroline turned her displeasure on Miss Oldston. “Really, Amanda, you need to control yourself. You look and sound just like a horse.”
“Better than looking like a pig. If you want Knightsdale’s attentions, you’d better pay less attention to his cakes and cream puffs.”
“Well, he certainly isn’t going to choose a skinny mare like you.”
“Papa Charles is going to choose Mama Peterson.”
The sudden silence that followed Claire’s artless words was thick enough to suffocate someone. It certainly was suffocating Emma. Lady Caroline gaped; Miss Oldston’s already prominent eyes became noticeably more prominent. Emma closed her own eyes briefly, wishing she could vanish into the woodwork.
“Papa Charles?” Miss Oldston said.
“Mama Peterson?” Lady Caroline’s hard little eyes examined Emma.
“Claire, Uncle Charles told you not to call him ‘Papa’ in company!”
Claire shrugged. “I had to tell them, Isabelle.” She looked up at Lady Caroline and Miss Oldston. “My mother and father died in It…”—she paused, clearly trying to get the word right—“in Italy. Uncle Charles is my papa now. And he is going to marry Miss Peterson.”
“Oh, really?” Lady Caroline slowly surveyed Emma’s old dress, shabby pelisse, and disreputable bonnet. “How odd. I must have missed the announcement. Did you hear it, Amanda?”
“Lady Caroline, Miss Oldston,” Emma said, “Lady Claire is only four. She has a very active imagination.”
“Mama Peterson, I did not imagine Papa Charles with you on the blanket.”
“The blanket?”
“We went fishing this morning, Lady Caroline,” Emma said. “Lord Knightsdale wants to spend some time with his nieces, naturally, to become better acquainted with them, as he is their guardian now. And I’m acting as their governess while their usual governess is off attending to her ailing mother.” Emma knew she was babbling. Really, she did not owe Lady Caroline the slightest explanation, but neither could she bear for this gossip to fly through the house party. “I was just taking the girls to the nursery to tidy up after their fishing trip. Lady Claire fell into the stream.”
“I see. How kind of Lord Knightsdale to take an interest in his brother’s orphans, don’t you agree, Amanda?”
“Yes, Caro, very kind.”
“Though I’m certain that will change once he weds,” Lady Caroline said with a condescending little laugh.
“I am certain it will not change, Lady Caroline.” How could this spoiled girl say such a thing with Claire and Isabelle standing right in front of her? Emma wished Prinny were as vicious as she felt at the moment. She would love to let the dog take a bite out of Lady Caroline’s ample backside.
“Oh, Miss Peterson.” Lady Caroline shook her head, chuckling. “Perhaps if you had made your come out, you’d be more aware of the ways of the ton.”
Prinny would have to wait his turn. Emma wanted to take a bite out of Lady Caroline with her very own teeth.
“I may not be intimately conversant with the ways of the ton, Lady Caroline, but I have known Lord Knightsdale since we were children. He would never abandon his nieces.” Physically abandon them for London, perhaps, but never emotionally abandon them. If the girls needed anything, Emma was convinced Charles would see that they had it.
“And you are…intimately…conversant with Lord Knightsdale’s ways?”
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