Rules for Reforming a Rake (25 page)

She cast him the sweetest smile and kissed him on the cheek. “Sorry, my lips slipped.”

He returned her kiss with a thorough one of his own, pressing his lips against her slightly open mouth and not ending it until Harry began to slap his nose. Only then did he ease back with a grin. “Sorry, mine too.”

Daisy’s face was a delightful shade of crimson.

He heard the twins giggling and cheering down below and heard a chorus of gasps from the nannies, who were no doubt shocked by his behavior. He expected they were relieved as well. After all, those nannies were charged with the care of the children. “Can you make it down on your own, Daisy?”

She nodded, smiling at him again.

He struggled to ignore the ache she roused in his heart. How many of Lady Forsythia’s rules had she broken in the last five minutes? Never climb a tree. Never risk your life to save a child stuck in a tree. Never kiss a rakehell in a tree.

Never kiss a rakehell under any circumstances.

He held her back a moment to kiss her again.
The hell with rules.
“Not sorry for this kiss. My lips didn’t slip. I meant to do it. You were the brilliant one.”

She rested her head against his chest and laughed. “We’d better get off this tree before we give our audience more of a show than anyone bargained for.”

Gabriel climbed down first, the boy now clinging tightly to his neck. Once on the ground, Harry continued to cling to his shoulders and began to sob against his shirt. “I want my Papa. Papa! Up there! Up there!” He tearfully pointed toward heaven.

Gabriel hugged the boy, hoping to soothe him, but it was to no avail. “Harry, you can’t reach him by climbing a tree. It’s too dangerous. Your papa would never want you to get hurt, but he knows how important it is for you to see him. Do you wish to see him?”

The boy’s eyes rounded in astonishment... and hope. For that reason, Gabriel had to be very careful about what he said next. “There’s a place, one place that’s very special to your papa. It isn’t far from here. I’ll take you there if your mama will give me permission.”

The boy nodded.

“And when you’re in this special place, you’ll find him looking back at you. And if you want to hear him, all you have to do is close your eyes and listen very carefully. Do you think you can do that?”

The boy nodded again.

“Because if you close your eyes and listen, you’ll be able to hear your papa right here.” He pointed to the boy’s heart and tapped it gently.

Harry shut his eyes tight, then pounded on Gabriel’s heart before opening his tear-filled eyes and smiling.

“There’s a good lad.”

The small crowd around him had turned silent as he spoke to Harry, but when the boy smiled at Gabriel and began to giggle, Dillie stepped forward and offered to take him from Gabriel’s arms. Harry wouldn’t let go. “No! Very thpecial! Want to go!”

“Go where?” Lily asked.

“Thpecial,” Harry said.

Dillie stepped back with a sigh. “He’s stuck to you like a barnacle to the keel of a frigate. No one’s prying him out of your arms.”

He glanced up to see how Daisy was doing and saw that she was still struggling with her gown entangled in the branches. Fortunately, she had made her way onto the lower branches so she was in no real danger even if she slipped. “You girls will have to help your sister down.”

They laughed.

“She doesn’t need our help,” Dillie said.

He frowned and was about to insist when Daisy swung down from the tree, landing as gracefully as a gentle swan gliding onto a crystal lake.

She knelt to put on her slippers, then rose and smoothed out her gown.

“Well done,” he was about to say, but was drowned out by a string of hysterical female shrieks.

“Daisy! This is all your fault!” Julia cried, leading an assortment of female relatives in a cavalry charge out of the house. The Farthingale men followed close behind.

Gabriel recognized Julia, and Daisy’s uncle George, and her parents, but he hadn’t been introduced to the other Farthingales and had no idea whom most of them were. No matter, they had no right to be scowling at Daisy.

Julia spoke up first, her angry gaze trained on Daisy. “I warned you about putting dangerous ideas into Harry’s head.”

“Foolish ideas,” another elderly women muttered and others agreed.

“He’s just a child and could have died falling out of that tree,” Julia declared with a theatrical wave of her scented handkerchief.

Gabriel’s heart tightened.
Damn them all.
Daisy was the only one who understood Harry’s anguish, the only one who’d tried to fix the problem. She deserved their praise and commendations, not a public scolding.

He moved protectively to her side.

She gazed at him, startled. “My family won’t hurt me.”

Perhaps not physically, but their words could be as wounding. He saw the pain reflected in her beautiful eyes whenever she looked at her parents and met with their disappointed gazes.

“Gabriel’s right,” Lily said as she and the children gathered to her side. “It’s time we all took a stand on Harry’s behalf. He’s been neglected far too long.”

“Yes, far too long,” Dillie said, curling her hands into fists.

Daisy sighed. “Honestly, you’d think we were about to battle Huns.”

“Sometimes this family can be worse than Huns,” Lily muttered.

Julia reached for her son to tug him out of Gabriel’s arms, but the boy refused to be drawn out. “No! Want Papa! Papa!”

“He isn’t your papa,” Julia insisted, reaching for him again.

“No! Take me to Papa! Papa!” He pointed to his heart.

Julia began to cry.

“This is your fault, Daisy.
He
wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for you,” Daisy’s mother said, holding back her own sniffles as she comforted Julia, but not before she shot Gabriel a glower.

Gabriel was used to such glares. Indeed, he’d endured far worse and would endure far more dangerous encounters within the next few months.

“Be thankful Lord Dayne was here,” Daisy said, turning to point at the towering oak.

“Harry only climbed the tree because you told him Harrison was up in heaven,” Julia hotly retorted.

“And you told him nothing,” Lily answered in Daisy’s defense. “The boy was terrified, confused, and crying out for answers. We all ignored him, except Daisy. You should be thanking her.”

“Thanking her? When her inattention allowed him to climb up there in the first place,” one of the family members, a man the others referred to as Rupert, accused.

Gabriel struggled to contain his anger.

“It isn’t Daisy’s fault,” young Charles said. “Harry was napping with Aunt Julia.”

Julia took a step back. “What if he was? I had the door closed. I... I must have fallen asleep, but someone had to have let him out.”

“Indeed,” Daisy’s mother said. “He couldn’t have turned the knob all by himself. He isn’t tall enough.”

“I know how he did it!” Charles bounded into the house and ran back out moments later with an object in his hand. “He used this!”

Julia gasped. “What are you doing with my footstool?”

Daisy’s father let out a weary sigh. “Now we know how he got out of Julia’s room, but how did he make his way out of the house?”

Dillie stepped forward. “I might not have properly closed the front door. Lily and I, with the nannies, of course, took the other children out to play. We were running in and out of the house and...”

“The point is not to cast blame, but to attend to Harry’s problem,” Daisy said as Dillie’s voice trailed. “Lord Dayne has a solution. I think you ought to listen to his idea.”

“Thpecial place,” Harry said, as though understanding the nature of the conversation and adding his opinion. “Want to go now.”

Julia frowned. “What does that rakehell know about children? His talent is in breaking up families.”

Daisy stepped forward with her fists clenched. “Julia! That’s uncalled for.”

“Indeed,” Daisy’s father said. “I think this... er, special place has merit. Would you care to tell us your idea, Lord Dayne?”

Daisy’s mother appeared horrified. “John! You can’t take his side! Hasn’t Julia suffered enough?”

“This isn’t about her suffering, Sophie,” he said, his manner gentle as he spoke to his wife. “It’s about Harry’s. I think we’ve ignored the boy long enough. Go on, Lord Dayne. We’re listening.”

***

Daisy had never visited Uncle Harrison’s regimental headquarters before, though her father and Uncle George had often spoken of the place with pride. Gabriel also seemed familiar with the headquarters, which surprised her at first, but upon reflection she decided nothing about Gabriel surprised her.

“Will you look at this place,” Lily said, enthralled as they entered the massive stone building near St. James’s Palace.

Daisy, little Harry, and the twins had accompanied Gabriel and their Uncle George.

Julia refused to join them for fear of reviving too many painful memories.

To Daisy, entering the barracks was like entering a fortified castle complete with heavy iron gates and sentries standing on alert. Soldiers drilled in the courtyard, the metal of their sabers and belt buckles gleaming in the sun.

Daisy wrapped her cloak about Harry’s little shoulders, for there was a slight chill to the air despite the sunshine. She hurried inside, keeping the boy securely in her arms. He appeared to be content but curious.

While Gabriel and her uncle spoke briefly with the commander, she and her sisters stood in the entry hall, passing time by peering out the windows and watching the soldiers as they continued their drill. Harry also looked on, fascinated by the display of military precision.

“I think we ought to purchase Harry his own set of tin soldiers,” Dillie said in a whisper.

Daisy and Lily nodded in hearty agreement. “Ah, here come Gabriel and Uncle George.”

Gabriel introduced them to Colonel Croft, the regimental commander, a gruff but jovial man. “I insist on giving you a personal tour. Especially you,” he said, saluting young Harry.

The boy responded by tugging on his moustache.

After an exchange of pleasantries the commander escorted them on an extended tour, guiding them through the gate house, the mews, the dining hall, the chapel, several meeting rooms, the dungeon—fortunately, it was not occupied—and finally into a stately hall with dark oak paneling and dozens of paintings lining the walls. “I believe this is the room you had in mind, sir,” the commander said to Gabriel.

Gabriel nodded.

Harry had taken it all in, as though understanding every word issuing from Colonel Croft’s lips. Even now, as they walked through the portrait hall, his eyes were wide as saucers, taking in every detail, the large windows, the brightly polished dark wood, the decorative swords and shields hanging between portraits of the regiment’s commanding officers.

“And now that we’re here, you must excuse me for a moment,” Colonel Croft said. “I’ll return shortly.”

While her sisters and her uncle lingered over the swords and shields, Daisy accompanied Gabriel to the far end of the hall, pausing before a portrait of her uncle, Harrison Farthingale.

“Painted shortly before the regiment shipped off to Spain one last time,” Gabriel murmured, taking little Harry from her arms. Their hands touched as they made the exchange, and Gabriel, to her surprise, gave her hand a little squeeze.

It wasn’t a flirtatious squeeze, just an acknowledgment of something special between them, almost a thank you for helping him unite father and son, though he’d managed that on his own. She had tried for months without success to make her family listen and had never thought to bring Harry to his father’s regimental headquarters. Yet this place more than anywhere else captured Harrison’s essence, his sense of honor and duty which extended beyond family, to king and country.

“That’s your papa,” Gabriel said to Harry, holding him in his arms with a casual ease that evoked a sigh from Daisy. There was something quite exquisite in the way he held the child, quite caring and fatherly.

The loss of Harrison Farthingale had struck their family hard. They’d all mourned him, but watching Gabriel, the kindness and patience with which he dealt with little Harry, somehow eased that pain and simply conquered her heart. She turned away to wipe a stray tear from her eye before it fell upon her cheek. If one tear fell, she knew others would follow in a pitiful, gushing stream. She refused to have Gabriel think of her as a blubbering ninny.

“Take a long look at him,” Gabriel said to Harry, but he spared her a concerned glance. “Do you see how he’s smiling at you?”

As Harry nodded, Colonel Croft returned with a box in hand. “Here it is, Lord Dayne. The medal and ribbons you requested.”

Daisy stared at Gabriel in confusion. “Medal and ribbons?”

He nodded and opened the box with one hand, dug out an ornate gold cross hanging on a red ribbon, and handed it to her. “A replica of the Cross of St. George, the regiment’s highest award for valor. It was awarded to Harrison on one of the early Peninsular campaigns.”

She stared at her uncle’s portrait, then turned back to the medal. Julia had the original safely under lock and key at their townhouse, for the medal had jewels encrusted on it, several diamonds among rows of smaller sapphires. A drawing of it was pinned to her uncle’s chest in the portrait.

“Harry’s too young to be entrusted with the real one,” Gabriel said as she continued to stare at the portrait. “Your aunt will keep it safe until he comes of age.”

In the meantime, the lad would have the replica to wear. She ought to have thought of it herself. Indeed, why hadn’t her father or Uncle George considered it? She glanced down the hall to where her uncle stood with her sisters and caught him looking back. His remorseful gaze spoke volumes. In truth, she expected that Julia, her parents, and the rest of the Farthingale elders were feeling quite ashamed for their dismissal of little Harry and his loss.

Gabriel tweaked the boy’s chin. “See, Harry. Just like your father’s.”

The boy looked at his medal, then up at his father’s portrait and the one displayed on his chest. His face lit up with the brightest smile. “Just yike Papa’s.”