“A breathing one,” he snorted. “Competence would be a bonus.”
Hardly a rigorous expectation.
Leah fisted her hands in her lap.
Was the man here to offerherthe position of housekeeper? Her stomach dipped and dived at the prospect.
Gracious, that would be a tremendous step down for a woman such as herself. Her prospects were not so dire as that. Not quite, at least.
And yet . . .
She allowed herself to briefly envision it . . . serving as Fox Carnegie’s housekeeper, knowing snippets of his most intimate details.
Seeing him every day. Having a reason to be near him.
Her foolish, girlish heart skipped at the prospect.
She was thenumpty-estof allnumpties.
Her mother would turn over in her grave were Leah to stoop to employment as a housekeeper, no matter how attractive the gentleman in question.
And so she replied, “For any household servants ye be needing tae hire, ye should speak with Mr. Ashcroft at the Drover’s Inn.”
“The Drover’s Inn?”
“Aye, though I suppose I should have said theOldDrover’s Inn,” Leah rushed to clarify. “Not the one outside Laurencekirk, but the wee one between Edzell and Cortachy where the fields dip low and there is excellent grazing for the drovers coming through the hills from Deeside. Everyone goes tae Mr. Ashcroft. For a thruppence, he’ll share his list of those currently looking for work in the area. He’s very proud of his list and rightly so.”
Captain Carnegie nodded, his gaze taking on a look that Leah would label as . . . speculative. As if her answers had pleased him.
His fingers tapped the outside of his thigh.
If Leah didn’t know better, she would think the man nervous.
But such a thought was absurd.
After two decades of commanding men on the battlefield, what could possibly be nerve inducing about a social call on one such as Miss Leah Penn-Leith?
“Is there aught else I can help ye with, Captain?”
He took in a deep breath and slid forward in his seat, elbows pressing into his knees. “I recognize that you know neither hide nor hair of me, Miss Penn-Leith, but I do have one more rather . . .personalproblem to lay at your feet.”
He speared her with his electric blue eyes. A jolt skittered down her spine.
Oh, dear.
She still found him alarmingly attractive. Her eyes dipped, drawn to the tendons flexing along his throat, to the press of muscular shoulders beneath his superfine coat.
Her heart pounded.
He waited, as if expecting a reply.
She floundered, opening her mouth, unsure whatpersonalproblem Captain Fox Carnegie could possibly have that required her assistance.
Unless it was making a posset, meticulously organizing a still room, or stretching a fixed household budget, she was fairly useless.
“What sort of a problem?” she hedged.
“The sort that only the right woman can solve. Though I am a gentleman of means, not all problems have monetary solutions.”
