‘…but even as a child, Sally—Selina—had a tendency to assume her wish was her mother’s command. She never did learn to ask nicely like everyone else. Perhaps when you look the way she does you don’t have to.’
‘But—’
‘Nevertheless, on this occasion she’s going to have to put her social life on the back burner and for once play at being mother for real.’
‘But—’
But she was speaking to a closed door.
Harry Talbot closed the door and collapsed briefly against it, the sweat trickling down the back of his neck nothing to do with his recent battle with a recalcitrant boiler.
Damn Sally. Damn Jacqui Moore. Damn everyone…
He straightened, took slow, deep, calming breaths and turned to face the door, anticipating further irate jangling on the bell, but whatever game his family thought they were playing, he wasn’t joining in.
Taking care of Sally’s menagerie of rescue animals was a small price to pay for solitude. They didn’t talk. Didn’t ask questions. Didn’t stare at him, wondering if he’d lost his mind.
Maisie was something else.
That woman was something else.
The bell, unexpectedly, remained silent, but he didn’t fall into the trap of believing, hoping, that they had gone. She hadn’t started her car and once she’d phoned her office for instructions he knew that Miss Jacqui Moore—who, in clinging jeans and a skimpy top that clung to curves that Mary Poppins could only dream of, looked nothing like the nannies that had graced his childhood nursery—would be back demanding refuge for her charge and a little civility for herself.
She’d have to make do with one out of two. And that only as a temporary measure.
Meanwhile he wasn’t going to hang around waiting on her convenience. He had a boiler to fix.
Behind her the car door squeaked open and Jacqui turned just in time to see Maisie carefully avoiding a puddle as she eased herself to the ground.
‘Maisie, stay in the car—’ She needed to think. No, she needed to call Vickie. She’d have to get someone out here to take over from her…
‘I have to go to the bathroom,’ the child said. ‘Right now.’
With some children that would mean RIGHT NOW! With others it was more in the nature of an early warning. Although she suspected that Maisie was a child who thought that everything she wanted should be handed to her RIGHT NOW, she was counting on the fact that she wouldn’t wait until the last moment to announce her need for the bathroom. She wouldn’t take the slightest risk of spoiling her pristine appearance.
Or maybe that was simply what she hoped, putting off the evil moment when she’d have to confront the giant again.
She regarded the bell pull with misgivings. Given the choice between giving it another tug and instructing Maisie to cross her legs, she’d have chosen the latter course. Unfortunately this wasn’t about her. She was going to have to be brave. Soon…
‘Just hold on for a second or two, Maisie,’ she instructed, aware that any sign of weakness would be taken advantage of, then, pushing a strand of damp hair off her cheek and shivering a little as the cold mist seeped into her clothes, she dug her mobile out of her bag and punched in the office number. Before she bearded the giant again, she wanted to speak to Vickie and find out what the heck was going on.
‘And I want a drink,’ Maisie added, taking no notice of the instruction to stay put.
‘Please,’ she corrected automatically.
Maisie sighed. ‘Please.’
‘There’s some juice in my bag on the front seat—’
‘A hot drink.’
Little Princess, 2—Dumb Adult yet to score.
But the child had a point. She was beginning to feel the need of a cup of something warming herself. And now the idea had been put into her head, she’d welcome a comfort break, too.
‘Look, just give me a minute, will you? I need to make a phone call and then we’ll sort something out.’
Maisie shrugged and she turned her attention back to the phone.
‘Come on, come on…’ she muttered impatiently, getting clammier and colder by the minute. ‘You really should wait in the car, Maisie; it’s colder up here and your dress will go all limp in this weather,’ she said, appealing to the child’s priorities.
When there was no reply she looked around and was just in time to catch a flash of white frock disappearing around the side of the house.
CHAPTER TWO
‘OH, HECK !’
Jacqui had no choice but to abandon the call and take off after Maisie, vaguely registering a huge paved courtyard with a stable block on the far side as she rounded the back of the house.
She finally caught up with Maisie just as she stepped through the back door, which, despite the weather, was standing wide open.
‘What are you doing?’
‘No one ever uses the front door,’ Maisie said, matter-of-factly.
‘They don’t?’
‘Of course not. I’d have told you if you’d asked me.’
And, completely untouched by the mud that seemed to be clinging liberally to her own shoes, her dress as fresh as it had been when they left the office, Maisie walked into the house as if she owned it.
Jacqui, given no choice in the matter, followed her through an extensive mud room littered with boots, umbrellas and an impressive array of waxed jackets that looked as if they’d been handed down for generations—they probably had—and into a huge farmhouse kitchen warmed by an old-fashioned solid-fuel stove.
There was a large dog basket beside it, companionably shared by a buff-coloured chicken, feathers fluffed up to keep in the heat, and two, or possibly three, silver-tabby cats. They were so entwined—and so alike—that it was impossible to tell. A large, shaggy and depressed-looking hound was lying beside it, drying his muddy paws.
But for the chicken, she might have been tempted to lie down and join him. Instead she turned to Maisie and said, ‘You know, sometimes it’s better not to wait until you’re asked. Just in case the person who should do the asking doesn’t catch on to the fact that there’s a question.’
Jacqui stopped herself. Clearly this was not the kind of conversation that your average nanny had with six-year-olds in their care.
But then she was no longer a nanny.
And Maisie, who was not exactly your average six-year-old, responded with a casual shrug. ‘You didn’t listen when I told you I knew the way,’ she pointed out. ‘I didn’t think you’d listen about the door.’
Why, Jacqui silently appealed to whatever deity was responsible for the welfare of lapsed nannies, was there never a midden handy when you needed one?
‘Come on.’ And, not hanging around to debate the matter, Maisie opened another door, leaving Jacqui with no choice but to abandon the warmth of the kitchen and follow the child into a draughty inner hallway from which an equally draughty staircase—the kind constructed for servants to use in the days when people who lived in houses like this had servants—rose to the next floor. ‘It’s this way.’
‘What is?’ she snapped as the cold emphasised the dampness of her clothes. Then, closing her eyes and reminding herself that Maisie was only six, that she was the adult and needed to get a grip, said, ‘Sorry. I didn’t mean to snap.’
‘S’OK.’
No,