“What is your policy on crows?” she asked seriously.
The marchioness blinked. “Crows? Like the black bird? Ah–”
“My daughter is joking,” Mrs. White said, wrapping an arm around Daisy’s waist and squeezing. Hard. “Quite the prankster, that one. Please excuse her.”
Daisy frowned. “I wasnotjoking. I can leave Sir Vincent for an afternoon, but not an entire week. Who will prepare his food? What about his water with lemon? He requires fresh squeezed. Cecily forgot the lemon once, and….” As she prattled on about Sir Vincent’s strict nutritional requirements, Mrs. White smiled weakly at Lady Hollibrook.
“Children,” she said.
By her tone, it was both a statement, a question, a noun,anda verb.
“I’ve three myself,” Lady Hollibrook said with a wink, and the two mothers walked into the house together, leaving Violet, Rose, and Daisy to follow behind.
* * * *
In a move that surprised absolutely no one (or at least, it wouldn’t once her absence was discovered), Daisy did not follow her mother and Lady Hollibrook dutifully inside.
Instead, she walked right up to the doorway and then turned sharply to the left, her feet carrying her nimbly over the edge of the marble portico and into a thicket of bushes. Ducking and weaving her way between spiky branches of evergreen, she popped out on the side lawn, cast as swift glance to her left and right, then picked up her skirts and darted toward freedom. She’d seen the stables on the way up the drive, including the attached paddocks that housed dappled mares and spindly-legged foals.
A few grooms roamed the stone courtyard, caps tucked low over their brows to guard from the sun as they raked through the stone and unloaded hay from a nearby wagon. Only one glanced briefly at Daisy as she skipped past, but then he went right back to his work, unwilling to meddle in the eccentric affairs of the nobility.
“This is cleaner than our house,” she marveled as she stepped into the barn and was met with an impeccably swept aisle, loafing stalls filled to the brim with sweet-smelling straw, and horses with hides that gleamed. An inquisitive chestnut dipped his head over his half-door, ears tipped forward and nostrils flared. Smiling with undisguised delight, she held out her hand for him to sniff and then gently patted his neck.
“What a handsome gentleman you are! Yes, I’m talking about you. And you know it, don’t you?” She laughed when he gave a loud snort and peeled back to his top lip to reveal his teeth. “Have you sired some of those beautiful colts and fillies outside? I bet you have. What fine racers they’ll grow up to be. The fastest in all of England! Why, I bet that–”
“Whoever is blabbering on out there,” came an unmistakably irritated male voice from further down the barn aisle, “could you kindly shut your trap. Some of us are trying to sleep.”
“Sleep?” Daisy said, pivoting away from the chestnut. “It’s almost noon.”
“A perfectly fine time to take a nap,” the voice replied.
“No one else is sleeping,” she pointed out.
“A regrettable error on their part. Now go away.”
But Daisy was intrigued. After giving her new friend a last pat on his muzzle, she went in search of the source of the grumpy voice…and after silently opening the door to a tack room, where polished bridles and saddles were arranged in neat rows, found a man lying on his back on a trunk, a wet cloth draped over his eyes.
“What are you doing?” she asked curiously.
On a gargled yelp, the stranger jolted and tried to sit up simultaneously.
It did not go well for him.
Blinded by the cloth, he misjudged the dimensions of the trunk and ended up tumbling off the side, landing hard on his bottom with an audiblethumpand a blistering curse that Daisy was quite sure she wasn’t supposed to hear.
Struggling between laugher and concern, she bit the inside of her cheek to hold back the former and tiptoed close enough to stand over him, her shadow falling across a countenance that was rather notable now that it didn’t have a wet rag on top of it.
All lines and rugged angles, with a tousled mop of ebony curls above prominent brows and a nose that was a touch too large for his face. His full mouth was pinched in a scowl and his gray eyes sparked with anger as they raked across her, leaving a trail of smoke-tipped frost in their wake. Lifting himself onto his elbows, he glared with such force that it was a wonder the hay in the courtyard didn’t catch fire.
“Go,” he growled, “away.”
If Daisy were susceptible to brutish tactics of intimidation, she might have scampered off with her tail between her legs. But if an injured fox, snapping with fear, didn’t make her run, then a surly scoundrel certainly wasn’t going to do the trick.
“Who are you?” she asked, a reddish curl springing free from her coiffure as she tilted her head. “Not a stable hand, your clothes are too fine. The butler, maybe?”
“I’m not the bloody butler.” More cursing ensued while he heaved himself to his feet and then Daisydidfeel a tad daunted when she found herself the recipient of six solid feet of grumbling, glowering male.
Still, she bravely soldiered on, even going so far as to lift her chin as she said, “Then what is your name?”
