His to Command: the Nanny: A Nanny for Keeps

‘I’m sorry. Really. Of course Selina Talbot will reimburse you for the cost of your holiday—’

‘You’re very free with her money.’

‘If she ever wants domestic help from this agency again, she’ll pay up with a smile.’

‘Yes, well, since this particular circumstance isn’t likely to be covered by my holiday insurance she’s going to have to, but my missed flight is the least of our problems right now, wouldn’t you say? There’s a little girl here and no one to take care of her.’

‘You’re there. And since your holiday has been wrecked, you could do worse than see the job through.’

Well, surprise, surprise.

She didn’t even offer to try and find a replacement. Not that it mattered, because she’d promised Maisie that she’d stay.

‘And how long is that going to be?’

‘I don’t actually know. I told you, this was just a delivery job, but I’ll speak to Selina tomorrow. Until then, I’m in your hands, Jacqui.’

‘The giant is not going to like it,’ she said. ‘He doesn’t like company.’

‘Giant? This is the man you wouldn’t leave Maisie with? Are you going to be all right there? Maybe you should take Maisie to the nearest hotel until I can check him out with Selina.’

‘Maisie wants to stay even though she doesn’t like him, which suggests he’s grouchy rather than dangerous…’ Her voice petered out as she remembered his eyes, his hands, the touch of his shirt against her cheek and swallowed. There was dangerous, she thought. And then again there was dangerous…‘We’ll stay out of his way as much as possible while you sort something out with Selina.’

‘You’re a star, Jacqui. I’ll make sure your worth is reflected in the hourly rate.’

‘Oh, no, you don’t get me that way. I’m on holiday. I told you six months ago that I would never do this for money ever again and I meant it.’

‘But—’

‘But nothing. Just concentrate on getting hold of Selina Talbot and find out what in the world she was thinking, what she’s going to do about her daughter and, even more important, when she’s going to be home. In the meantime I have to go and break the good news to Harry Talbot that he has house guests.’

‘I owe you, Jacqui.’

Yes, you do, she thought as she clicked off the phone and looked up to find Maisie standing in the doorway, her face alight with joy as she held up a wriggling bundle of black Labrador puppy for her to see.

‘Look, Jacqui! He’s so cute!’

‘And beautiful,’ she said, crouching down beside the child and stroking his silky head with her finger. ‘You match.’ Her reward, as she let the puppy snuffle at her fingers, was to have Maisie lean trustingly against her. Her arm, of its own volition, reached out to encompass both child and puppy. ‘What’s his name?’

‘I don’t think he has one.’

‘Well, maybe you should give some thought to that,’ carefully unfurling her arm and standing up, to put a little distance between them. ‘But he’ll be missing his brothers and sisters.’ And there was no point in putting off giving Harry Talbot the bad news. ‘Meantime, I have to speak to Mr Talbot.’

‘He’s gone back down the cellar.’ She carried the pup back to the kitchen and placed him in a basket containing a number of wiggling look-alikes. ‘He’s fixing the boiler, I expect.’

‘Is he?’

‘It’s a waste of time. Grandma says it’s definitely on the blink. It’s why she…’ Maisie stopped.

‘Why what, Maisie?’

‘Why she’s going to buy a new one.’

‘Oh, right.’ But, grateful for this temporary reprieve, she said, ‘In that case perhaps we’d better not disturb him again. I’ll just go and fetch our things in from the car.’

‘You could drive round to the back to save carrying them. It’s what everyone else does.’ Then, looking up from the wriggle of puppies, ‘I thought I should tell you that in case you didn’t ask.’

‘Smart thinking, Maisie.’

‘You can put it in the coach house if you want.’

‘Maybe I’d better wait for an invitation from Harry, first.’ She’d see how he reacted to the fact that she’d moved in before she started getting really pushy and helping herself to garage space. ‘I won’t be a minute. Don’t move from that spot while I’m gone. And don’t touch anything.’ Then, as Maisie opened her mouth to protest, ‘Except the puppies.’

‘No, Jacqui.’

‘Promise.’

The child looked up and smiled, and in that instant Jacqui knew that her fate was sealed. She wasn’t going anywhere until Maisie had done with her.

‘I promise,’ she said.

Harry Talbot lifted his head as he heard the sound of a car starting, attempting to squash a lick of guilt as the throaty roar proclaimed only too loudly that its exhaust had suffered in the journey up the lane.

He’d promised his aunt he’d get it sorted while she was away. And he would. Just before she came home. The last thing he wanted was the neighbourhood dropping by, being neighbourly. He’d even persuaded the postman to leave the mail at the shop for collection.

Dammit, he had come here to avoid company. Be alone. Was it too much to ask?

He slammed the wrench into the side of the boiler and then slammed it down and headed for the stairs. If Jacqui Moore drove back down the lane with her exhaust bouncing around, there’d be nothing left of it when she got to the main road.

But by the time he’d reached the front door, there was no sign of her or her car.

He listened, but couldn’t hear the sound of her retreat either, which, despite the muffling effect of the mist, surprised him. He should have felt relief, but instead walked to the gate, half expecting to find her stopped a few yards down the lane.

No relief, just guilt. Tomorrow. He’d do something about it tomorrow. And in the meantime he’d call the garage in the village and have them look out for her and offer assistance.

One of the dogs—a lanky, cross-bred creature with pretensions to deer hound—joined him, in expectation of another run.

‘Forget it, mutt,’ he said, returning to the house, grabbing his collar to stop him taking a short cut through the front door. ‘Round the back with you. Susan will kill us both if we trail mud over her polished floor.’ He pulled it shut and then followed the dog around the back.

He came to an abrupt halt when he saw the VW pulled up in the courtyard. He should have realised it was too good to be true.

Jacqui Moore, alerted by the dog, who’d rushed over to her looking for a fuss, straightened from the back seat as if caught out in a guilty act. Forgetting, for a moment, that his intention had been to stop her, that he was intent on an errand of mercy, he said, ‘What the hell do you think you’re doing?’

Which was stupid, because he could see what she was doing. She was unloading the car.

‘Would you mind not using that language in front of Maisie?’ she replied, passing the child a small white bag.

‘I’m so sorry,’ he said, moving closer, calling the dog to heel before both females were covered in mud, further delaying their departure. ‘I’ll rephrase the question. What the hell do you think you’re doing?’

Jacqui leaned into the car, ostensibly to pick up the matching white holdall, but in reality to gain breathing space.

She understood that Harry Talbot didn’t want them cluttering up his life. She understood and was sorry to be such an annoyance, but her first concern was Maisie. She hated confrontation as much as anyone, but since it was clear that she wasn’t being offered a choice, she might as well get it over with. The sooner he realised that she couldn’t be bullied, the sooner he’d stop.

‘Take your bag inside, Maisie, and stay in the warm,’ she said. And only then did she give her full attention to Harry Talbot. It wasn’t that difficult. The grey wool shirt hung loosely from his shoulders suggesting that he had, however impossible it seemed, actually lost weight and muscle. That he’d once been even broader than he was now. The washed thin denims he wore still clung to powerful thighs, however, and stretched over a hollowed stomach that only emphasised…

‘Well?’ he demanded, bringing her sharply back to reality.

She swallowed. ‘Well, Mr Talbot,’ she said, trying to erase the errant thoughts from her mind. ‘This is a car and this is a bag and what I’m doing is taking the latter out of the former.’

Sarcasm, Harry realised, had been a mistake.

He’d known it from the moment he’d opened his mouth. Regretted it the moment he’d opened his mouth. The fact that she was blonde, with curves in all the right places, didn’t make her dumb.

Despite a full lower lip that drooped enticingly and the kind of earthy sex appeal that sent out a siren call to man’s most basic instinct, she was still a nanny and nannies didn’t take nonsense from anyone. As if to confirm it, she gave him a look from grey eyes as cool as her mouth was hot, leaving him in no doubt that she wasn’t in the mood to take any from him.

‘Why?’ he demanded. It was a fair question.

‘Extraordinary,’ she replied, shaking her head, so that her misted hair swung in a soft invitation to touch. How long was it since he’d touched a woman’s hair…?

He curled his fingers tight against his palms, but she was already leaning back inside the car to pick up a second bag.

‘You don’t look stupid,’ she said, turning to him as she straightened.

He wasn’t about to debate it. He’d already had all the conversation he could handle.

‘You can’t stay here.’

She smiled. ‘There! I was right. You knew the answer all along.’

‘I mean it.’

‘I know you do, and I’m sorry, truly. But the car is damaged, Maisie is tired and, as you’ve already said, you can’t manage her on your own.’

‘That’s not what I…’ He stopped, suddenly aware of a yawning chasm opening in front of him. If he declared himself more than capable of looking after one small girl—this small girl above all others—she’d walk away and leave him to do just that.

He’d come to High Tops for solitude. Peace. To seek some kind of future for himself. She had to go and take the child with her. Now.

‘Didn’t you say something about catching a plane?’ he enquired.

‘There’s always another plane.’ Then, putting out a hand as if to touch his arm, reassure him, ‘Don’t worry, Mr Talbot, we’ll keep out of your way as much as possible.’

He moved before she could make contact. ‘This is intolerable. I’ll speak to Sally, make her see reason.’

‘You’ll have to stand in line,’ she replied. ‘There’s a queue. But no one will be speaking to your cousin until tomorrow. She’s on her way to China.’

‘China?’

‘Where the silk comes from.’ They both turned to look at Maisie, who was standing in the doorway, and once she had their full attention, she gave a little shrug and said, ‘That’s what Jacqui said when she was on the phone, anyway.’

‘You were listening?’ Jacqui asked her, not angry, not accusing the child of something bad, just distractedly; Harry suspected she was trying to remember what she’d said that she wouldn’t have wanted Maisie to overhear.

‘No.’

Maisie looked up at her, a picture of innocence. Something he’d seen her do a hundred times. She’d been listening…

‘I was waiting until you’d finished, that’s all.’ With that, she turned and flounced inside. The dog followed her.

‘When is Sally due to arrive,’ he asked, reclaiming her nanny’s attention, ‘in China?’

‘I have no idea,’ she said, adding a carrier bag to her load, which she held in one hand as she shut the car door. ‘Tomorrow some time, I would imagine. She might pick up her messages earlier if she has a stopover. Of course it’ll be the middle of the night here so she’ll probably wait until the time zones connect before she calls.’

Harry doubted that the difference in time zones would stop his cousin. It would be the sure and certain knowledge that if she called home she’d be expected to do something about the mess she’d made, rather than consideration. That and the fact that the longer she delayed, the more likely it was that someone else would have sorted it out for her by the time she did call. He didn’t say that.

He said, ‘In other words I’m stuck with the pair of you for the night.’

‘Thanks for the welcome,’ she said and smiled. It wasn’t a nice smile. Not the kind of smile that would make a person feel warm inside, a smile acknowledging how hard this was for him. It was a smile that suggested, in the fullness of time, he’d regret being so thoroughly ill-mannered. ‘And the tea. That at least was lukewarm when I drank it. What time do you have dinner?’

‘Whenever you feel like making it, Miss Moore. Tea is about as domestic as I get.’ He didn’t bother to cross his fingers at this blatant lie. He just wanted her to go and he didn’t care what he had to do to make it happen.

She stared at him. ‘Did someone programme you?’

‘I’m sorry?’

‘So am I, but we’ll let that pass. I mean did someone take you into a laboratory and fit a chip, preprogrammed with chauvinist cliche´s, into your head?’

‘Is that necessary?’ he enquired. ‘I’d always been led to believe that it was genetic.’

‘That’s just something mendacious men made up to avoid doing their share of the housework.’

‘Possibly,’ he admitted. ‘Although my personal theory is that it was made up by pathetic women to excuse their inability to control them. No matter how hard they try.’

Her eyes, he noticed with interest, had heated up to the colour of molten silver, but that was the only indication that her temper was on a short fuse.

‘I only asked what time you eat,’ she continued, with impressive outward calm, ‘so that we won’t disturb you. You are, of course, more than welcome to join us for nursery tea at five o’clock.’

‘You won’t find any fish fingers in my freezer.’

‘No? Well, I’m sure we’ll manage.’

He shrugged. ‘Maisie has a room of her own in the east tower,’ he said, resisting his natural inclination to take the bags and carry them up for her. The worse her opinion of him, the more likely she was to keep out of his way. ‘She knows where it is. You can have the room next door. Don’t get comfortable, you’re not staying a minute longer than necessary.’

‘Extraordinary! I’d have said we didn’t have a thought in common, but do you know that’s exactly what I promised Maisie?’ He must have frowned be-cause she added, by way of explanation, ‘That I’d only stay until we could find someone she liked to take care of her.’ And she smiled again, as if she knew something that he didn’t.

He ignored the smile and said, ‘I’m glad to hear it. Give me your keys and I’ll put your car in the coach house.’

‘Oh, right,’ she said, clearly caught off balance by such unexpected thoughtfulness. ‘Well, thank—’

‘Nothing that old should be left out overnight in the cold and damp. I’ll take a look at your exhaust while I’m about it. I wouldn’t want anything to delay you in the morning.’

CHAPTER FOUR

JACQUI was shaking so much from her confrontation with Harry Talbot that her legs were jelly as she climbed the stairs.

Thankfully, Maisie was skipping along happily in front of her, leading the way up a second flight of stairs to her own special bedroom and not in the slightest bit bothered, apparently, at the lack of welcome. And hopefully not fully understanding the less than edifying exchange between them.

What on earth had she been thinking?

She’d always known that the giant wasn’t going to be happy about them staying, although even she hadn’t been prepared for quite such a hostile response.

Not that she’d exactly helped matters.

If Harry Talbot had been a wasp’s nest, she would have been the idiot poking it. Which wasn’t like her at all.

Usually she was the soul of tact. Was always prepared to see the other person’s point of view. Even to the point of being walked all over—witness the way Vickie Campbell had stitched her up like a kipper…

Pouring oil on troubled waters was something she usually managed without thinking, but Harry Talbot’s attitude made her see red, and instead of pouring the oil she’d set fire to it and tossed in a couple of metaphorical hand grenades for good measure.

It was within her job description to stand up to him, if necessary, for Maisie’s sake. Unfortunately she’d done rather more than that.

Not that it was entirely her fault. He had seriously provoked her.

She couldn’t have made it plainer that she didn’t want to stay, but honestly, from the way he’d looked at her, anyone would have thought she’d planned the whole thing just to annoy him.

As if she’d really choose to abandon a holiday in the sun—no matter how cheap and cheerful—in order to stay on some cold, fogbound hilltop in a less than spring-like English spring with a bad-tempered bigot.

‘This is my room,’ Maisie announced, opening the door, forcing her to push Harry Talbot to the back of her mind and concentrate on the job in hand.

Jacqui instantly saw the attraction; understood why the child would want to stay despite Harry Talbot’s miserable attitude. The room, at the top of the tower, was pure princess fantasy, from the lace-draped little four-poster bed and matching looped-back curtains, to the hand-painted furniture, where flora in all shades through mauve to deepest purple had been relieved by a green tracery of stems and leaves.

And Harry Talbot must have fixed the boiler because the room was warm and, despite the miserable weather, the bed didn’t feel in the slightest bit damp.

‘It’s lovely, Maisie. Did your grandmother do all this just for you?’

‘Don’t be silly. My mother got in a decorator.’

Of course she did. Go to the back of the class, Jacqui told herself, slapping at her own wrist as the child flounced across to the window.

‘You can see Fudge’s field from here.’

Jacqui, fully prepared to heap admiration on some fat little pony, followed her, but the mist pressed against the glass, obliterating the view.

‘It’s not very nice out there.’ Maisie frowned. ‘He’ll be cold.’

‘Won’t he be tucked up in the stables, where it’s warm and dry?’

‘Maybe. Can we go and make sure?’

Jacqui would have rather stayed away from the outbuildings. Harry Talbot had said he’d look at her car and she had no wish to run into him until he’d had a chance to forget some of the things she’d said. Until she’d had a chance to forget them, come to that. But somehow she didn’t think that Maisie was in the habit of taking ‘no’ for an answer.

‘Well, all right, but I think you ought to change first. Have you got anything more…’ she baulked at the word ‘sensible’. It seemed unlikely that Maisie knew the meaning of the word, but not even the most thoughtless mother would allow her child to ride in a frilly frock and satin shoes ‘…suitable? You know, for riding.’

Even as she said the word she had an image of little Bonnie Butler in Gone With the Wind, dressed in a velvet riding habit and ostrich feathers. Or had she just imagined the feathers…?

‘Trousers, for instance?’ she offered, more in hope than expectation, unzipping the child’s holdall to look for herself.

The white voile dress, she discovered as she unpacked—shaking out dress after dress and putting them on the mauve satin padded hangers she found in the wardrobe—was, by Maisie’s standards, restrained.

She’d even packed a pair of tiny designer fairy wings for those extra-special occasions. Embroidered and beaded in silver and the inevitable mauve. Very pretty, but not, by any stretch of the imagination, sensible.

There were no jeans. Not even a pair of designer jodhpurs or handmade boots, which would have been more Maisie’s style. No trousers of any kind, in fact. No boots. No hard hat. Not even a pair of mauve, sparkly waterproof wellington boots to keep her feet dry. Just more pairs of satin slippers to match her frocks.

‘There are wellingtons and coats in the mud room,’ Maisie offered. ‘You just try them on until you find stuff that fits.’

‘Right, well, I’ll just put my bag next door and we’ll go and sort something out.’

‘Next door’ hadn’t had the benefit of a decorator any time in the last fifty years if the faded floral wallpaper was anything to go by. But it was warm and, if the comfort was shabby, it was genuine.

She’d search out the linen cupboard and make both their beds later.

Petting the pony—since no matter what Maisie’s views on the subject, she wouldn’t even be sitting on him without a hard hat—obviously, was far more important.

Ten minutes later they were walking across the courtyard. Jacqui, well shod in ankle boots, declined to join in Maisie’s hunt for a pair of wellies that fit, but she had borrowed a waxed jacket so old that all trace of wax had pretty much worn away.

The smallest one in the mud room was still too big for Maisie. With the sleeves folded back it did the job, but Jacqui had to stifle a smile at the sight of her stomping happily across the courtyard in a pair of slightly too large green wellington boots, a froth of white skirt sticking out from beneath the jacket, sparkly tiara still perched atop her dark curls.

Maisie Talbot might be precocious, but she certainly wasn’t dull.

‘Where are you two going?’ Harry Talbot appeared in the entrance to the coach house, wiping oily hands on a rag.

‘Maisie wanted to say hello to Fudge.’ Why did she have to sound so defensive? ‘Her pony?’ she added when he didn’t appear to know what she was talking about.

‘That’s what he’s called?’ His expression suggested that never had pony and name been more aptly matched. ‘All right. Just don’t go wandering off in this mist. It’s easy to get disorientated.’

‘I don’t suppose there’s any chance of you getting lost, is there?’

She knew she shouldn’t have said that even before he stilled. Said, coldly, ‘Is that your idea of a joke?’

If it was—and she wasn’t prepared to examine exactly what her comment was meant to be—it had fallen distinctly flat, because he certainly wasn’t laughing.

‘Yes…No…I’m sorry.’ And she was. ‘Really.’

He used his head to indicate the far end of the yard. ‘The pony’s in the end stall. Don’t give her sugar; she’s old and her teeth can’t take any more abuse. You’ll find some carrots in a net on the wall.’

Maisie ran on, but Jacqui stayed put. Nothing could wipe out what, in retrospect, seemed a deeply callous remark that was completely alien to her nature, but she refused to give him the satisfaction of running away.

‘What’s the verdict on the car?’

‘I’m no mechanic but I’d say your exhaust has taken its last journey. I’m just going to give the garage a call. Don’t worry, I’ll put it on my account.’

‘Thank you.’

He shrugged. ‘I think you’ve probably suffered enough at the hands of the Talbot family for one day.’ Then, ‘Hadn’t you better go and make sure that Maisie doesn’t get trampled by her pony?’

‘It wouldn’t dare,’ she said.

And finally got what might just have been a smile from the man.

For a moment neither of them moved.

‘I’d better go and give the garage—’

‘I should go and keep an eye—’

He moved first, peeling away and striding back to the house without another word. She watched him for a moment, then, jerking her hormones back into line—they had no taste—she went after Maisie.

‘Did you find something? For Maisie’s tea?’

Jacqui looked up from the sauce she was gently stirring on the stove. She hadn’t seen Harry Talbot since he’d left her standing by the coach house. Hadn’t been much relishing their next encounter, but he didn’t look as if he was about to do anything particularly ogre-like.

If she could just stop herself from saying something stupid long enough to get him on her side…

‘Yes, thank you. I’m making spaghetti carbonara for both of us.’ Then, ‘Well, penne carbonara. It’s easier for little ones to manage.’

His eyebrows rose. ‘Nursery tea has certainly improved since my day. The best I could hope for was macaroni cheese.’