Hunting the Hero (17 page)

By sheer force of will, Constantine had not grumbled about her missing their arranged meeting last night when Cunningham had subtly asked if she should be summoned. As the woman had reminded him yesterday, she was here for his daughters and not him. Her time wasn’t wasted if she was with his girls.
 

Yet he had not laid eyes on her all day and curiosity was driving him mad. He’d remained in his study, tending his correspondence in frustrated solitude. But as he’d paused for luncheon, Cunningham had relayed the particulars of what the governess was doing with the children. The butler had sounded aghast that she was seated upon the floor to play with them. Constantine was rather pleased by that news.

But Miss Clark was causing additional work for the staff with her demands, Cunningham had confided. After breakfast she had demanded tea and sweet cakes to be immediately sent up to the nursery. Warm baths had followed and she had spent an hour dressing hair. She had not even begun conducting lessons. The young maid, Cunningham’s niece, had been assisting nurse but had been excused for other duties for the rest of the day, and the man was afraid of what else Miss Clark might be doing.

A smile tugged at his lips. Amongst his set lingered the idea that ladies should have little part in the raising of their offspring. Augusta had defied them all and taken an active part in raising their daughters with little assistance from the servants. The girls must miss that. Miss Clark’s behavior, rather relaxed for a servant, would feel familiar for them.

Many things about Meredith Clark felt familiar. She was easy to be with.

He picked up the most recent copy of the
Times
and scanned the pages, looking for a distraction from the direction of his thoughts. He’d spent too long wallowing in the past or contemplating his former lover today. It was time to move ahead with life before he became obsessed with what he didn’t have.
 

An entry low down on the page caught his eye. As he read it, his eyes widened. Mr. Leopold Randall was appealing to his sister to come home, and to Romsey Abbey no less. The woman would be welcomed with open arms. Constantine gritted his teeth. The nerve of the man to behave as if the abbey was his. He might be the heir, but he was not the duke. When they finally met, he would lay down the law about Randall’s attitude regarding things that didn’t belong to him. Constantine did not support this marriage. When his children were settled and smiling, he would make the trip to Romsey and tell his sister so.

Unfortunately, the trip would most likely be after the wedding.

A nervous giggle caught his attention and he peered past the paper to the doorway. A dark head, Maisy, pretty ringlets bobbing on each side of her head, was peeking at him from the door, waiting to see if he would invite her in. He dropped the paper to the desk and crooked his finger. The little scamp rushed right to him. She was in his arms before his surprise sank in. For the first time in a very long time, his middle daughter wanted him.

He held her against him as tight as he dared. He’d missed the impulsive hugs more than he’d thought possible. When he raised his head and glanced toward the doorway, he saw Miss Clark had brought Willow too; she held Poppy in her arms. But they, too, were waiting at the doorway for an invitation to enter.
 

“Come in. Please, come in,” he urged. He couldn’t remember the last time a governess had brought them to him during the day. “It’s nice to see you all.”

Willow drew closer, stopping to stare at him and Maisy cuddling behind his desk. Constantine opened his arms and his eldest daughter leapt into them, burrowing against him and her sister. “Hello, Papa,” she whispered softly.

He eased back to look at her closely. Today she resembled her mother very much. Her hair was brushed till it shone a bright blond; two plaits were looped about her head to keep the long strands neat. A lump formed in his throat. “Hello, Angel. You look very pretty today.”

His gaze shifted to where Miss Clark stood, arms filled with a wriggling, squirming child.
 

“You had better hand Poppy over, too,” he warned, “or you’ll be in danger of dropping her. Never one to be left out is this little lady. We’ll have our hands full when she’s older.”

Miss Clark said nothing as she placed the child on the center of his chest, between her two sisters. She brushed her fingers over the short curls on Poppy’s head before she turned away.
 

Poppy caught his face in her chubby little hands and rubbed their noses together.
 

He sighed. “You are lovely too, little one. Is that a new dress you’re wearing, Maisy?”

Maisy plucked at it. “It’s my new pretty one,” she said proudly.

“It was mine, but Maisy needs it now,” Willow said quietly. “Miss Clark said she never had a sister to give her prettiest gowns to, but I can show Maisy how to be all grown up.”

He smiled at his daughter, but his heartbeat sped up. Willow was talking a lot more than she normally would. He swallowed past the lump in his throat. “That is very sweet of you.”

When Maisy wriggled free of his grip, grabbed a heavy glass paperweight from the desk, and scurried into the desk well at his feet, he let her go without a word of protest. It had been an age since they had all come and he was pleased to see it did not take long for old habits to resurrect themselves. He hadn’t realized they’d stopped coming, and all it had taken was one day and a very crafty woman to tumble his world again.
 

He glanced at Miss Clark, surprised to see her frowning at the newssheet spread across his desk. She had even removed her spectacles, proving she did not need them to read. Maybe one day she would stop tormenting him.
 

He laughed at the idea and tickled his eldest beneath her chin. “There is no need to grow up too fast. You’re all the perfect size for sitting on my lap.” Including Meredith Clark.

He hugged Willow again and rejoiced when her arms tightened about his neck. She held him a long time, only releasing him because Poppy was selfishly pushing her away.
 

He reached into his desk drawer and withdrew a scrap of paper and stick of lead. “Willow used to draw for me,” he told Miss Clark, who had replaced her spectacles and was standing at the window, looking out at the grounds. “I wonder if she would like to today?”
 

Miss Clark did not respond, but his daughter’s eyes lit up with interest. She nodded enthusiastically, hurried around the desk, and climbed onto a chair placed across from him. It wasn’t close enough, but Miss Clark was quick in offering assistance. She drew the chair closer and lingered until Willow was settled. That left him with only Poppy to entertain. The little scamp touched his face, his cravat, and the bright, shining ruby pin holding it in place. Without further ado, she embraced him, a little whimper of sound leaving her lips.

He glanced up at Miss Clark and noticed the frown had been replaced by amusement. He winked at her. “I thought we were to meet last night.”

“Forgive me,” she murmured, lowering her eyes. “I hoped you wouldn’t mind the delay too much if you received a visit from your daughters along with conducting our meeting. I became caught up in a story last night and lost track of the time.”

He juggled Poppy so she could see her sisters. “What was the story about?”

“Their mother,” Miss Clark told him, her eyes softening when she looked down upon him. “Nurse was kind enough to recall some events in Lady Grayling’s childhood for us. Your daughters were enthralled and took a little longer than normal to fall asleep afterward.”

“Ah,” he murmured, but he was rather surprised that his former lover, now his children’s governess, had encouraged talk of his late wife. But then, Miss Clark was not particularly sentimental about certain things. She undoubtedly didn’t find mention of Augusta’s life the least bit troubling. “What did nurse have to recount?”

“Oh, lots of things. She mentioned the horse Lady Grayling loved to ride when she was just Willow’s age, the friends she had, and the mischief they occasionally got into when no one was looking. The way she loved her daughters and how she sees so much of Lady Grayling in them.”

Constantine glanced at his daughters and saw that their lips had lifted into smiles, eyes sparkling at the mention of the resemblance. He saw it every day but rarely mentioned it to them. How clever of Miss Clark. She’d discovered in a day how to make his children smile again.

He’d never meant them to forget Augusta. He would try harder to keep her memory alive.

When Poppy began to grizzle, Miss Clark moved to take her. “I believe the young lady requires a rest. She’s had an eventful morning knocking over wooden block towers. If it’s not too much trouble, might we have more? There are not enough for all three to play with at once. And this little miss does enjoy causing havoc.”

“Of course. You may have whatever you require.”

“Thank you.”

Poppy went to Miss Clark easily, Maisy obediently crawled out from beneath the desk, but Willow lingered over her drawing.
 

His eldest wasn’t at all ready to end her visit. The thought pleased him immensely. “I can bring her up in a little while,” he murmured softly. “Let her finish.”

“Very well, my lord.” Juggling her bundle, Miss Clark held her hand out to Maisy and guided her from the room. He watched them go, doing his best not to stare at the gentle sway of Miss Clark’s body, and then turned his attention to his daughter.
 

Constantine craned his neck to get a better view of Willow’s efforts. The rough pencil strokes he remembered from previous visits had smoothed. It almost looked like a dog instead of a lump with sticks. “That’s coming along nicely.”

Willow held the picture out in front of her and eventually nodded. “It’s Mama’s horse. She had a black pony.”
 

“I’m sure she would have loved your picture,” he assured her.

Willow smiled and then she carefully slid the pencil across the desk toward him before looking toward the door, lower lip between her teeth.

He touched her hands and she jumped. “Shall we rejoin your sisters?”
 

As Willow nodded and clutched her drawing to her chest, it occurred to him that the girls had rarely been apart for any length of time. By necessity they were always together, but the surprising thing was he wouldn’t mind spending more time with them. He’d speak with Miss Clark before he went to bed and arrange another, longer, visit. Perhaps they could visit him while Poppy napped.

When they reached the nursery, Miss Clark was bent over the cot, singing softly to Poppy in an effort to lull her to sleep. Maisy watched from another bed, her dolly clutched tight in her arms. Miss Clark’s head lifted and she smiled at Willow’s picture before resuming her lullaby and patting Poppy’s back. Willow scrambled up beside Maisy on her bed and then she too only had eyes for their governess. Constantine could understand the fascination.

No matter how many times he found himself in Miss Clark’s presence, he always detected yet another feature, flaw, or behavior that contradicted what he thought he knew. If she had turned her talents to the stage, she’d have made an excellent actress. As it was, she merely performed for him. Constantine was utterly smitten despite the layers of misdirection.

He backed out the door as quietly as he could, amused by how easily Miss Clark had adjusted to his children’s life. There were few overt signs of the woman he’d first met. Anyone else looking at her now would never suspect her of being new at this career. She handled his children’s care as if she had spent her whole life around the young. It gave him hope that she would stay with them for a long time to come.
 

Perhaps forever.

Buoyed by an optimism he hadn’t experienced in quite some time, Constantine headed for his bedchamber. He’d go for a long ride while the weather held because very soon he might be housebound with a woman he wanted more and more each day. The long cold days of deepest winter had been more enjoyable when he’d had Augusta to share them with, and he wasn’t looking forward to spending another winter alone with his own company.

As he finished changing for the ride, he glanced at the connecting doorway. His wife’s room was exactly how she’d left it. He hadn’t had the heart to pack away her possessions after her death. Up until now, he’d shied from the idea. Yet as he walked to the door and stepped quickly inside before he lost his nerve, he didn’t have the same hesitation.
 

The room had a chilly, unlived-in air, yet he remembered how it had been when his wife had lived. He’d spent many an enjoyable hour on that bed, and only the bedding had been changed from the day of Poppy’s birth. A maid still tended the surfaces to free them of dust. Augusta could sweep in from her dressing room at any moment and not find anything amiss.

But she had died and he had to accept it. Let her go and look to the future. One day he had to marry. He still needed an heir. But that need was exactly the event that had led to Augusta’s death.

He breathed out slowly, letting his mind turn over those last terrible days. The pregnancy had not gone well from the beginning and Augusta had gone into labor in the dead of night. By late afternoon, the physician had suggested he pray. He’d done that, but it hadn’t been enough. As Poppy had opened her eyes upon the world, Augusta had slipped away, so quietly that he hadn’t realized she was gone until the doctor broke the news to him.