“Oh, Harry’s not my charge... well, he is in a way. You see, he’s my cousin. And the nannies have all quit our household, so I’m left all alone with the seven children until my family returns.” She wiped a stray lock off her brow and then put her arms forward to show him her rolled-up sleeves. “I was trying to bathe the littlest ones.”
He noticed that her finely made gown was wet in several spots. “It seems they bathed you.”
“What? Oh, yes. They did give me a thorough soaking.” She laughed gently while shaking her head in obvious exasperation. “Harry was the last, but now I’ll have to bathe him all over again.”
“Don’t let me delay you.” He attempted to hand the squirming bundle back to her, but before he could manage it, Harry decided to leave him a remembrance.
What was the expression? No good deed ever goes unpunished? Gabriel watched in horror as an arc of liquid shot from the naked imp onto his shirt front, planting a disgustingly warm, yellow stain on the once immaculate white lawn fabric.
He didn’t know whether to laugh or rage. He’d been undone. Brought to his knees by an infant and an incompetent guardian.
“Oh, dear,” the girl said, closing her eyes and groaning. “I’m so sorry. So very, very sorry.”
So was he. He ought to have listened to Ian, but not because the Farthingale women were dangerous. It seemed all Farthingales were dangerous. Young. Old. Male. Female.
The family and their servants were to be avoided at all costs.
“We’ll pay for the damage, of course,” she continued in obvious distress, her eyes remaining firmly closed, as if not seeing the damage would somehow make it go away. “We’ll replace whatever needs... er, replacing. Please have your tailor send the bill to Miss Daisy Farthingale. I’ll make certain it is paid at once.”
Gabriel’s heart stopped beating. Yes, it definitely stopped. And then it began to beat very fast.
“You’re Daisy?” he mumbled, his tongue suddenly as numb as the rest of his body. Not that he cared who she was, or what Ian had warned. He wasn’t afraid of any female, certainly not this incompetent slip of a girl.
She opened her eyes and graced him with a gentle, doe-eyed gaze. “I am.”
Very well, Ian was right. She was a force to be reckoned with, but so would any woman be with glistening blue eyes, pink cheeks, and cream-silk skin.
“Sir, may I be so bold as to ask who you are?”
“I’m late, that’s what I am.” He plunked Harry in her arms and hastened to his grandmother’s house.
END