Cara Colter - His to Command - the Nanny - A Nanny for Keeps

Since it was undoubtedly the hot item of gossip in the village shop, Jacqui wasn’t exactly surprised to hear that. They were, no doubt, panting for an update from their woman on the inside.

‘I was expecting to find Mrs Talbot here. The plan was for Maisie to stay with her while her mother’s away.’

‘Really? It’s news to me. She went to New Zealand, you know. To stay with her sister.’

‘Mr Talbot told me she was away.’

‘Paid for everything, he did. She went first class.’

‘That was generous of him.’

‘Possibly,’ she said, not committing herself one way or the other, although what doubt there could be, escaped Jacqui.

‘She didn’t say anything about Maisie coming to stay?’

‘Well, no. Miss Sally doesn’t make arrangements that far ahead.’

Jacqui frowned. Far ahead? ‘When did Mrs Talbot go to New Zealand?’

‘Last November.’

‘But that’s five months ago.’

‘That’s right. She took her time. Went by boat for part of the way. She got there in time for Christmas though.’

‘Oh.’

‘No point going all that way for five minutes, is there?’

‘Er—no. Is she due back soon?’

‘Not that I heard. In her last letter she said that as long as Mr Harry is happy to stay and keep an eye on things, she’ll stay on for a bit.’

‘And Mr Ha…Mr Talbot’s happy, is he?’

‘Well, I wouldn’t say happy, exactly, but he’s in no hurry to leave. It’s the nearest thing he’s got to a home.’

It was?

She bit back the question hovering on her lips. One step further down that path would be gossip.

‘I don’t understand why Miss Talbot sent Maisie here. She must have known her mother wasn’t here to look after her.’

‘Lives in a world of her own, that one. Always has.’

‘Even so, it’s hard to see how anyone could have made such a mistake,’ she prompted, putting on the kettle. ‘Can I make you a cup of tea?’

‘Not now, thank you. I’m just going to give the chickens a bit of do. But I’ll have one when I come back if you like. It’s perishing out there this morning.’ She gave Jacqui a look that suggested she was two jumpers and a pair of long johns short of dressed and headed for the door.

Disappointed—she didn’t approve of gossip , but she had been hoping for a cosy chat around the teapot and some answers to any number of questions that had kept her awake half the night—she said, ‘No problem.’ Then, ‘Before you disappear, could I ask you something?’

‘You can ask,’ she replied, warily. ‘I can’t promise you an answer.’

‘It’s just that Maisie hasn’t brought any outdoor clothes with her. There are none in her room and Mr Talbot doesn’t seem to know whether she keeps spares here.’

‘Well, why would he?’

Jacqui was beginning to understand why a thwarted two-year-old might throw a tantrum. It was the same inability to communicate. Obviously there was an answer out there…she just couldn’t seem to frame the right question.

Old enough to know that throwing herself on the floor and drumming her heels—no matter how tempting—was not a constructive response to frustration, she tried again.

‘Actually, I don’t know. I don’t know anything.’

Maybe humility was the answer, because Susan said, ‘Well, he’s always off gallivanting to some foreign place or other, isn’t he? Never a word for months, years even, then he just turns up.’

Just her luck that their visits happened to coincide…

Much as she’d have liked to pursue this further, Susan was already heading for the mud room. ‘Do you know?’ she asked, a touch desperately.

The woman thought about it for a minute, then shook her head, reinforcing the message with a simple, ‘No.’

Blunt, but at least direct. ‘Maybe I could look around and check for myself,’ she suggested. ‘Where would be a good place to start?’

‘I told you, she doesn’t keep any clothes here.’ With that she reached into the mud room and unhooked a coat. ‘Her last nanny always packed everything she needed.’ The criticism was unspoken, but it was scarcely veiled.

‘I didn’t have that luxury. I’m having to manage with what I was given. Pink taffeta and wellington boots it’s going to have to be.’

‘I suppose you could take a look in the old nursery,’ Susan said, relenting as she took a headscarf from her pinafore pocket. ‘You might find something of Miss Sally’s in there. It’s up the stairs, and…’ she thought for a moment ‘…five doors down.’

‘Thank you, Susan.’ She smiled. ‘I expect you’ll be ready for a bacon sandwich when you’ve sorted the hens. To go with your tea.’

The woman grinned. ‘Go on, then. If you insist. I’ll be about half an hour.’

Which gave her plenty of time to scout the ‘old nursery’.

She climbed the first flight of stairs and, as instructed, turned right through an arch and immediately found herself in a wide corridor, lit on one side by a series of windows that must have offered a fine view when it wasn’t obscured by ground-level cloud.

The polished floor was bisected by a Turkey runner and the inner wall furnished with antique chests and some fine pictures, serving to remind her that, despite her first impressions, this was a substantial house. Slightly shabby on the outside, maybe, but very much what had once been called a ‘gentleman’s residence’.

Shame about the gentleman in residence she thought, counting the doors until she came to the fifth. It was near the top of a fine flight of stairs. The premier position in the house and scarcely where she’d have expected to find the nursery, but she shrugged and, opening the door, walked in. Since it was early and the hill fog, still clinging close to the house, made the rooms dark, she reached for the light switch.

An ornate overhead light fitting sprang into life and she immediately realised that she’d been right. This wasn’t a nursery, but the master bedroom and furnished in high style by the ‘gentleman’ whose residence this had been some time back in the Regency. Elegant, expensive and with an impressive four-poster bed dominating the room.

She turned, her intention to immediately withdraw. And found herself face to face with Harry Talbot, standing in front of a chest of drawers, apparently looking for underwear.

Bad enough that she’d walked into his room without even knocking, but then there was the small fact that he’d just stepped out of the shower and was naked but for a towel slung carelessly about his hips.

As he spun to face her it lost its battle with gravity.

He made no move to retrieve it and, despite opening her mouth with every intention of apologising for having blundered into his room, she found herself quite unable to speak.

He was beautiful.

Lean to the bone, hard, sculptured, his was the kind of body artists loved for their life classes. Even his hair, thick and heavy, had sprung into thick curls down which droplets of water ran in a slow, sensuous trickle. She watched one fall onto his shoulder, run down his chest until it became part of him.

He represented the perfection of Michelangelo’s David .

Which made the scars lacerating his back, scars which he hadn’t moved quickly enough to hide from her, all the more terrible.

Without thinking, she reached out, as if to touch him, take the pain into her own body. Before her fingers made contact, he seized her wrist and in one swift, savage movement thrust her out of the room.

Then he said, ‘Stay there. Don’t move.’ He didn’t wait to see if she obeyed him, but shut the door in her face.

She didn’t need him to tell her to stay put.

While all her instincts were to run, hide, her legs were beyond movement. Her entire body was trembling and she covered her mouth with her hand as if to stop herself from screaming.