Seven Minutes in Heaven(19)

Ward had been instructed by the best—his father’s title ensured that—so he swept a bow and kissed her hand.

His lips brushed her skin and he caught that elusive scent again. Sweet berries, warm woman . . .

“What did you just say, Mr. Reeve?” a confused voice asked.

Had he spoken aloud?

Ward straightened with the urgency of a soldier on review. “I’m most grateful for your forbearance and generosity,” he said, probably laying it on too thick.

But she smiled at him again, so it seemed not.

It was demoralizing to realize just how much flummery a man might babble in order to see that smile again.





Chapter Seven





The following day

Fawkes House

Wheatley



Ward’s butler, Cyrus Gumwater, was not the imperious, stately butler whom one might expect in a great house. Instead, he was a failed inventor, going on fifty and surly to boot. He was tall and lanky with ferocious black eyebrows that seemed to go upward and sideways, in vague harmony with his hair.

Ward had come across Gumwater’s design for a “flying aerial machine adapted for the Arctic Regions,” and considered that he had saved the man’s life when he persuaded him that butlering was preferable to landing face down in a pile of snow.

These days, Gumwater spent his free moments making things for the house, like an improved pickle fork, and a portable holder for multiple umbrellas, even though Ward had only one umbrella.

If that.

Inventions aside, Gumwater was a fine butler, and managed to keep Fawkes House running as smoothly as a well-tuned clock. It was the house Ward had bought for Mia, because betrothed gentlemen were expected to buy a big heap of stone and set up a nursery. Lucky him: if he ever did get married, he had the house, and the nursery was already full.

“Miss Midge has arrived,” Gumwater said now.

“You may show her in,” Ward said, looking up from a diagram of a steam engine.

Mrs. Snowe had followed through on her promise and dispatched the new governess directly. He had the feeling that she never broke her promises.

Unlike Mia.

Not that it was relevant in the least.

“Miss Midge is refreshing herself after the journey.” This was followed by a meaningful pause, so Ward put down his quill.

“She is one of those women,” Gumwater stated.

Ward raised an eyebrow.

“A managing woman. She demanded fresh goat’s milk for breakfast every day.”

“Surely you can obtain some? I suppose we could keep a goat, if need be.”

Acres of land had come along with the house. They could have a herd of goats. They could even house them in the picture gallery—what was he supposed to hang up there? A portrait of his late mother cuddled up to her fifteen-year-old lover? Or the grandmother who was suing him on the basis of immorality?

When Gumwater scowled, his brows turned into one line, like the hedge around the kitchen garden. “Goat’s milk is not the issue. She asked for the whereabouts of the tennis court, and when I told her that it was in some disrepair, she announced that it would have to be up to snuff by tomorrow or the day after, latest.”

“I think Mrs. Snowe mentioned tennis,” Ward said.

He was surprised by how often he’d found himself thinking about Mrs. Snowe. Yes, she was lovely. Beautiful, even. And luscious. Even thinking about the way her gown clung to her rounded hips made him—

Really, it was preposterous. He should go to London and do what every other unmarried gentleman did: pick out an opera dancer and set her up in a house in Knightsbridge.

He wouldn’t pick an opera dancer with a mop of red curls because that would be . . .

No.

Gumwater was nattering on about the tennis court, and Ward was starting to get the general idea of his complaint. Unlike Miss Lumley, who had been tearfully submissive to the household structure, Miss Midge meant to challenge it.

She and Gumwater had already skirmished, and Gumwater had lost.

An odd name, Alithia Midge.

It made him wonder what Mrs. Snowe’s given name was. Likely it was something flamboyant; in his experience people who grew up on the outskirts of society had grandiose names.

Georgette, perhaps. Marguerite. Wilhelmina.

Rosamund. That would be appropriate, in keeping with the color of her hair. An extravagant name would suit her. Something more exotic than the names given to high-born ladies.

“Mia,” for example, was short and ladylike, just like his former fiancée. Another reason he was lucky to have escaped that marriage. He would have developed neck cramps kissing his wife.

Georgette Marguerite Wilhelmina Snowe—or whatever she was called—was tall for a woman. She made him think of a wildflower with slightly ragged, velvety petals and a deep perfume.