Formidable Lord Quentin (36 page)

She sighed in exasperation and daringly yanked a green coat
tail as the gentleman attempted to squeeze his broad shoulders between the work
bench and the table in an attempt to reach the child. “Honestly, one would
think you’d never seen a child have a tantrum before. Leave her be. She won’t
die of temper.”

Caught off guard by a rear attack, the intruder stumbled
sideways, caught Cook’s chair to steady himself, and knocked over a steaming
teapot. He gracefully managed to catch the pottery before it crashed to the
brick floor, but not before scalding his hand with the contents.

Abigail winced and waited for the flow of colorful,
inappropriate invectives that the child had to have learned somewhere.

The gentleman’s throttled silence was more evocative.
Dragon-green eyes glaring, he carefully returned the pot to the table, clenched
his burned wrist and ruined shirt cuff, and ignoring Abigail’s admonitions,
again crouched down to check on the runaway.

If she had not already noted the family resemblance of
matching cowlicks that tumbled hair in their faces, Abigail would have known
the two strangers were related by the identical mulish set of their mouths.

***

Bumping his head against a kitchen table while holding his
scalded wrist, Fitz tried to recall why he’d thought learning to be an earl
required turning over a new leaf. The moldy, crumbing old foliage he’d lived
under all his life had been perfectly adequate for the lowly insect he was,
although he must admit his impulsive actions in the past might occasionally
give the flighty appearance of a butterfly.

He snorted. In the past? If kidnapping his own daughter
wasn’t flighty, it was the most ill-conceived, absurd, and possibly stupidest
thing he’d ever done, as even the child recognized.

“I want my mommy.” Beneath the table, Penelope stuck out her
mutinous lower lip.

He peered in exasperation at the whining, scrawny
six-year-old bit of fluff he’d accidentally begot in his brainless years, when
he’d thought women would save his wicked soul.

The child had his thick brownish hair and green eyes, so he
knew she was his. The petulant lip and constant demands obviously belonged to
her actress mother—may the woman be damned to perdition.

And yet, he was stupidly drawn to the imp of Satan who so
resembled his neglected childhood self. He suffered an uncomfortable
understanding of her rebelliousness. After all, she’d been ignored for years by
a mother who had run off to marry a rich German and a father who thought good
parenting involved servants. He still preferred servants, but he obviously needed
to find more competent ones.

“I will find you a better mother,” he recklessly promised,
if only to persuade her from beneath the table so he didn’t appear any more
beef-witted than he already did.

“I want
my
mommy!”
Big round eyes glared daggers at him.

“You have a daddy now. That ought to be enough until we have
time to look around and pick a pretty new mommy for you.” What in hell did she
expect him to say? That her mother didn’t want her? There was one truth that
wouldn’t pass his tongue.

“Mommy says you’re a worthless toadsucker. I don’t want you
for a daddy,” she declared.

Her real mother would never have lowered herself to such a
common expression. Understanding dawned. “If you mean Mrs. Jones, she is a slack-brained
lick spittle,” he countered, “and she is
not
your mother. Do you think I’d pick dragon dung like that for your mother?”

He ignored the choking laughter—or outrage—of his audience
in his effort to solve one problem at a time. The child’s mother had chosen the
nanny. At the time, Mrs. Jones had seemed affable and maternal and all those
things he imagined a good mother ought to be. Not that he had any experience
with mothers or children.

He couldn’t remember even
being
a child. An undisciplined hellion maybe, but never an
innocent. What the devil had he been thinking? That he wouldn’t repeat the
mistakes of his father? And his grandfather. They hadn’t been called Wicked
Wyckerlys for naught.

Still, he tried another tactic, plying the silver tongue for
which he was known. “But I need a daughter very much, Penelope, and I would
like you to live with me now.”

No, he wouldn’t, actually. He’d always assumed the child
would be better off almost anywhere except with him. Therein lay the rub. There
was nowhere else for her to go. Perhaps shock at inheriting a bankrupt earldom
had scrambled his wits.

He feared the banty hen breathing down his neck was prepared
to dump the entire pot of steaming tea on him. If he’d learned nothing else in
his life, he’d learned to beware of vindictive women, which seemed to include
all pinched, spinsterish females with time on their hands.

“If you will remove yourself from my table—” Right on
schedule, the hen attacked, kicking at his boots in a futile attempt to
dislodge him.

“I want my mommy,” the child wailed in a higher pitch,
rubbing her eyes with small, balled-up fists. “You
hate
me!”

“Of course I don’t hate you,” Fitz said, too appalled to pay
attention to the hen. “Who told you that I hate you? You’re all the family I
have. I can’t
hate
you.”

Sensing she’d shocked a genuine reaction from him, Penelope
wailed louder. “You hate me, you hate me, I hate you, I hate you—”

“If you will give her time to calm down . . .” the increasingly impatient voice intruded.

He didn’t listen to the rest of her admonition. “Do the
theatrics usually work with Mrs. Jones?” he asked, deciding on a nonchalant
approach that generally shocked furious women into momentary silence.

At his unruffled reception of her tantrum, Penelope stared, taken
aback. Fitz crooked an eyebrow at her. At last, a little control over his
battered life.

“While this is all very entertaining,” the little hen behind
him clucked, “it will not get dinner cooked.”

He winced at the reminder of the utter cake he was making of
himself. So much for impressing the household with his usual currency of
sophistication and charm.

The hen ducked down until Fitz was suddenly blinking into
delectable, blueberry eyes rimmed with lush ginger lashes. A halo of strawberry
curls framed dainty peach-and-cream cheeks. Whoa, was that lusciousness what
she’d been hiding beneath her ghastly hat? His gaze dropped to her ripe, rosy
lips, and he nearly salivated as he inhaled the intoxicating scent of cinnamon and
apples. He must be hungrier than he’d thought.

Ignoring him, she looked pointedly at Penelope and barked like
a field sergeant instead of in the syrupy voice he’d anticipated. “Young lady,
if you will refrain from caterwauling like an undisciplined hound, you may wash
your hands and take a seat at the table.”

Apparently expecting to be obeyed, the pint-sized Venus
stood up, and her unfashionable but sensible ankle boots stalked away from the
table. Fitz stared back at his daughter. Over their heads, he could hear the
exquisite little lady commanding her troops.

“Cook, I believe we will need your burn salve. And sir,” she
kicked his boot heel just in case he didn’t realize he wasn’t the only man in
the room, “if you will step outside a moment, we will have a little talk while
the salve is prepared.”

“Just keep remembering, she eats sweets, not people,” he
whispered to Penelope before backing out to face his punishment.

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