“I know, Grandma.” The little girl sighed. “But Ms. Darling was scared. So, we have to make sure she understands how good Hades is at his job.” Although the man’s gray eyes didn’t seem to change at all, I saw how one corner of his mouth lifted. “And where is Malek? He should be watching over Ms. Darling’s door if she’s having nightmares. Malek!”
In just a few short moments, a Doberman more than half my size came bounding into my room. Mrs. Knight scoffed, but Hades stepped aside like he knew the dog was on a mission. It halted right in front of Franny and sat, tongue hanging out.
“Good boy,” Franny praised. “Now, make sure you watch over Ms. Darling too. Do you see her there?” She pointed to meand then motioned as if aggravated with my hesitation to come over. “He doesn’t bite, Ms. Darling. At least not the people I don’t want him to. Put your hand out and let him get to know you.”
Franny was always confident in her commands and impressed me with how she acted well above her age. Even still, I wasn’t too sure about the dog. He stood only a couple inches shorter than her and sat at her side as if he were guarding his favorite treasure.
A wrong move with a powerful animal like that could be disastrous.
“Ms. Darling, heart-in-pinkie promise.” Her eyes held mine, and that’s when I stepped forward without a second thought.
“Franny, honestly, the dog in bedrooms is uncouth.”
“Grandma,” she said, mimicking her tone, “don’t get crabby over a house pet who only wants to protect us.”
Both the girl and the woman stared one another down, but the younger generation had the advantage. She must have learned from the best and then studied to become better than the best. Her grandmother tsked and then waved them on. “Are you seeing me out before I leave?”
I pet the dog, not sure the question was directed at me. Instead, I was finding comfort in how he leaned into my touch and didn’t bite me, because I wasn’t sure if Hades or the grandmother would.
“Are you ready for a tour, Ms. Darling? Daddy said you need one.”
“Yes, well, it’s quite early.” I glanced at Hades and Archer. “Are you both normally up this early?”
Hades shrugged. “I’m up at five every day. Franny wakes at around six thirty for breakfast with her father and Mrs. Knight.”
So, she was here every morning completely done up? And I stood there in cartoon pajamas. Great.
“Okay.” I dragged out the word because I wasn’t sure what to do next. “Well, we should start lessons earlier then. I can be ready at seven tomorrow.”
“You can come to breakfast too,” Franny offered.
Her grandmother was quick to jump in, though. “Franny, Ms. Darling obviously needs extra rest. She can eat with Rosy later.”
The tension in my shoulders unwound with the out she gave me. “Right. I’ll just eat with Rosy.” Away from this woman and her cold son. I didn’t belong at that table, not at all.
“Should we get on with the tour now?” I glanced at the imposing man standing in a black suit, and then at Archer. There was no way he’d gotten dressed like that for a tour. “You must have other things to do today.”
Mrs. Knight gave me a thin smile and nodded. “Well, I do, and I don’t need a tour of my son’s home. It was quite nice to meet you, even if you were much too loud for waking hours this morning. I intend to have Franny for tea with our friend, Valerie, on Wednesdays and Fridays at four p.m. Please make note of that in your schedule.”
She gave Franny a hug and told her she’d be there for breakfast again in the morning. Then she turned to Hades and murmured, “Leash that dog outside, would you?”
“No, ma’am,” he said back, and she walked off with atsklike she dealt with Hades’s insubordination all the time.
She disappeared down the hall without so much as a goodbye to me. “Youmustbe trained in combat because I would never tell that woman no,” I muttered, breathing out a sigh of relief now that she had disappeared.
The corner of his lips raised at my comment, but that was all. Like a British soldier standing guard, he wasn’t giving much away. “If you’re ready, we can make the kitchen the first stop on the tour so you can grab something to eat.” He spun on a heeland started down the hall so quickly that I stumbled to keep up with him.
“You two know each other?” I fell into step with Archer, and he nodded.
“Well enough. Jameson brought a lot more of us on when everything changed.”
I hummed, trying to remember that it wasn’t my place to ask questions, that I was a teacher and a nanny, not anything more. Even still, the question bubbled up. “What changed?”
“We moved here after Grandpa died,” Franny announced, and then she sprinted all the way down the hall, her pink binoculars bouncing over her shoulder the whole way.
Her words took a second to digest as I pieced together the timeline of her losing her mom and then her grandpa, Jameson losing his wife and then his father.
Moving on might have been survival for him after two pillars of his life disappeared suddenly. His statement made more sense now, made my heart ache for him.
