He tensed, not liking the impersonal way his grandmother spoke of Pandy. “I’ll thank you not to refer to Pandy thus. Andif any lady wants to marry me, then living in a house with my daughter is the price she will have to pay. I’m not sending my daughter away as if she’s a shameful secret.”
Grandmother’s lips thinned. “Sheisa shameful secret, Brandon. By her very birth, she is a tremendous scandal, and no woman of virtue is going to countenance her presence here in your household.”
He clenched his jaw, gripping the gilt arms of his chair so tightly he feared they might snap. “Pandy is not responsible for the circumstances of her birth, and I’ll not allow her to be punished for them. She is to remain here, with me. I refuse to send her away.”
“Little wonder you have yet to find a bride,” Grandmother lamented. “Your time grows thin, Brandon, and with this nonsensical insistence upon keeping your natural child in your household, I expect to hand the keys of Wingfield Hall over to your cousin Horace soon.”
“I am courting a lady I would very much like to make my duchess,” he ground out, frustrated, “a woman who will be pleased to share a household with an innocent child who deserves a loving home, having been ruthlessly abandoned by her own mother mere months ago.”
Not that one could aptly name what he had been doing with Lottie as courting. Their present relationship was complicated. They were lovers in secret, polite acquaintances in public. As far as she or the rest of London knew, he might be courting any of the young debutantes he had obligingly danced with at balls. But that was all a ruse to hide his true aim, not just from polite society, but from Lottie herself.
He didn’t wish to frighten her off until he was sure he could persuade her that marrying him would be nothing like marrying Grenfell had been.
The sudden cacophony of excited barking interrupted his tête-à-tête with Grandmother, heralding the arrival of Cat and, perchance, Pandy too. At least, he thought rather wryly to himself, the interruption during this visit with his grandmother would be caused by his daughter and not a naked opera singer wearing his dressing gown.
“What in heaven’s name is that commotion?” Grandmother asked, frowning.
Before Brandon could answer, the doors to the drawing room burst open to reveal a grinning Pandy racing into the room, the barking spaniel at her heels.
“Sweet angels, child, what is that you’re holding?” Grandmother demanded of Pandy, sounding horrified.
That was when he realized his daughter was clutching a pig trotter in one grimy hand as if it were the greatest prize she had ever obtained. Also, likely, the reason for Cat’s frenzied barking.
“Me and Cat is playing chase-chase,” Pandy declared proudly. “She hided the trotter in the garden, and I dugged it up.”
Grandmother extracted a handkerchief from her reticule and held it to her nose, looking ashen. “Whatisthat wretched smell?”
“Likely the pig trotter,” Brandon guessed, eyeing the dirt-encrusted trotter, which was quite pungent now that a whiff had reached him. “Pandy, how long has that trotter been buried in the garden?”
“I dunno,” she said, shrugging dramatically.
Cat barked, clearly unhappy with being kept from what she wanted most in the world. Brandon could empathize. Only, it wasn’t a rotten old pig trotter buried in the garden that he longed for. Rather, it was a stubborn, beautiful goddess who had been so badly hurt by her scoundrel of a husband that she was determined never to marry or love again.
Brandon took in the spectacle unfolding before him. There was the eager spaniel, who continued to shift restlessly and bark, her eyes fastened upon the trotter Pandy held out of reach. Then there was his daughter, her cheeks flushed from her madcap dash from the garden with Cat on her heels, oblivious to the dirt streaking her hands as she wielded her prize aloft. And last, his grandmother, handkerchief pressed to her nose, eyes wide, the pallor of her skin ominous. He couldn’t blame her. The trotter did smell quite terrible.
“Pandy girl, where is Miss Bennington?” he inquired lightly. “Was she not watching you in the garden?”
“I’m faster’n Miss Bennington, and so’s Cat,” Pandy pronounced. “Her couldn’t catch us.”
Dear Lord.He could only imagine the poor woman racing through the maze, frantically trying to find a fleeing dog and a small child.
As if on cue, Miss Bennington appeared at the threshold to the drawing room, dashing into a quick curtsy.
“Your Grace, madam,” she greeted breathlessly, looking shamefaced. “Forgive me for the interruption. Miss Pandora, please accompany me to the nursery at once.”
“What ’bout this?” Frowning, Pandy waved the trotter about.
A piece of something fell to the Axminster, and Cat promptly ate it with a delighted chomp.
Grandmother groaned.
“Oh my goodness, whatever can that be?” Miss Bennington asked, peering at the dirty trotter. “And what is that horrid scent?”
“It’s the pig trotter,” Brandon offered.
The nursemaid’s eyebrows went up. “Oh dear. I am so sorry, Your Grace. Miss Pandora is not usually so spirited at this time in the afternoon. I thought to take a turn in the gardens, that fresh air would prove a boon, and Cat was sitting at the door…”
Grandmother made another choked sound.
