His home was simple and functional, not the sort to make a rich man jealous, but it was his. He’d saved enough to purchase the deed from his former employer five years ago, and he took pride in caring for what was his.
He assisted his companions from the sleigh, retrieved the picnic hamper with his mother’s treats from the backseat, and handed it to Mistress Gallagher. “See Miss Gracie inside while I tend to the horse. I willna be long.”
When he entered the cottage, Miss Gracie stood next to Mistress Gallagher as she stirred the embers and placed kindling on the glowing coals. The homey scent of woodsmoke filled the small space.
“I’ll take over the fire while you help Miss Gracie change,” he said.
Mistress Gallagher startled and spun around to face him.
He hitched his thumb toward his chambers off the kitchen. “Just let me find her something dry to wear first.”
Mistress Gallagher took the girl’s hand in hers and followed him to his room. He could feel her gaze on him as he retrieved a shirt and plaid from a rustic wardrobe, tossing them on the bed. “The shirt might swallow the lass, but it’s better than standing ‘round in wet clothes.”
“Thank you,” Miss Gracie said as he closed the door behind him. While the womenfolk tended to their business, he built up the fire and swung the kettle over the flames in case Mistress Gallagher preferred tea to the lukewarm chocolate he’d pulled from the hamper.
When the door creaked open, Miss Gracie tromped out of the room with a wide smile. His shirt hung all the way to her ankles, and a pair of his woolen socks—four times too big—flopped against the floorboards as she crossed the kitchen.
Mistress Gallagher followed, carrying the lass’s wet clothes and laying them close to the fire. His plaid draped over her arm. “I hope you don’t mind that I borrowed a pair of socks for her.”
“You were rummaging in my drawers, eh?”
Her face flushed pink as she held up the plaid to inspect it, successfully blocking his view of her. “What an interesting pattern.”
“It’s the McTaggart clan colors,” he said.
She wrapped the plaid around Miss Gracie’s shoulders without meeting his gaze. “Your family has its own colors. Imagine that. If the Chapmans had colors, it would be different shades of gray. The colors of poverty.”
“Who are the Chapmans?”
“Oh!” She smiled sheepishly. “I’m not supposed to tell anyone. It’s part of the agreement with Lord Thorne, but Lady Thorne trusts you, so… Gallagher is not my name. My father was a Chapman.”
Fergus’s brows dropped low over his eyes. “Why do you call yourself Gallagher?”
“It’s a long tale, but the shortened version is that Lord Thorne chose it when he made arrangements for mine and Gracie’s names to appear on the manifest for the ship arriving from Dublin. Lord Thorne didn’t know my family name, so I suppose he chose something Irish.”
The story of Miss Gracie arriving from Ireland with her chaperone, Mistress Gallagher, to live with Lord and Lady Thorne was a fabrication. There was no socially acceptable way to explain that the girl had been living with a courtesan before coming into the Thornes’ home, so Lord Thorne had found another way to account for her presence.
“I want to travel on a real ship,” Miss Gracie said, “not a pretend one.”
Mistress Gallagher smoothed her hand over the lass’s golden curls. “The ship is real, and if anyone asks, we sailed from Dublin. Some secrets aren’t to be shared with anyone except family.”
The lass cocked her head to the side, her gaze traveling back and forth between him and Mistress Gallagher.
“I think we make a good family—Helena, Sebastian, you, and Fergus.” She smiled at Fergus. “But you should marry Edith so she doesn’t have to be a Gallagher anymore.”
“Gracie!” Mistress Gallagher snatched the picnic hamper from the floor where he’d placed it and carried it to the kitchen table. “What is in here?”
Fergus’s gaze remained on her as she made a show of unpacking the food his mother had prepared. Her rigid back was to them as she mumbled to herself. “We have bread, cheese… Oh, this looks good.”
Miss Gracie crossed her arms and raised her brows at him. “You know it’s high time you chose a wife and began filling your nursery.”
His grunt of surprise turned into a chuckle. “You’ve been spending too much time in the kitchens, lass. You’re beginning to sound like my mother.”
The prospect of making Edith Gallagher—eh, Chapman—his wife didn’t fill him with horror, so he didn’t pretend otherwise. It wasn’t anything he’d given thought to, but perhaps the lass recognized something he and Mistress Gallagher hadn’t yet. She wasn’t hard on the eyes. She was bright. And she wasn’t a relation. He couldn’t say the same about many lasses.
“Fruited nut cake!” Mistress Gallagher’s voice was filled with wonder as she glanced back over her shoulder. “Did you tell your mother I like fruited nut cake?”
He shrugged, warmth stealing into his face. “I dinna believe I mentioned your fondness for it, so much as suggested she should bake the cake.”
