by Merry Farmer
Sure enough, within seconds of skipping away from the house, she yelped and dropped like a sack of flour into one of his flower beds. Nick shook his head and tossed his rake aside, musing to himself that he wouldn’t mind if she dropped into his actual bed. He had a feeling she’d be everything he’d ever dreamed about and more between his sheets.
The thought had him hotter than he should have been as he strode up to the edge of the chrysanthemum bed, where she was just pushing herself to stand. His heart beat faster at the sight of her raised eyebrows and half-opened mouth, as though she couldn’t decide whether or not to laugh at herself.
“All right, Poppy?” he asked, unable to keep the smile off his face or out of his voice.
She squeaked and looked up at him, likely embarrassed to be caught. But instantly her expression changed to a wide, dreamy smile, and those blue eyes of hers shone. A look like that could keep a man’s pride going for weeks.
“Oh. Nick. I didn’t see you.” She blinked and glanced around. “I’m so sorry I squashed your garden.”
Nick chuckled and bent to scoop her up in his arms. She might not have been a lithe and dainty thing, but he could still pick her up as though she weighed nothing. And frankly, he liked the feel of her in his arms. So much so that he delayed putting her down for as long as he could.
“The flowers can take it,” he said, walking to the side of the gravel path. On second thought, he didn’t think he’d put her down at all.
Poppy looped her arms around his neck and glanced down at her skirt, then around at the ground.
“Looking for something?” he asked.
“My shoe. I don’t know where it went, but it’s most certainly not on my foot.”
Nick craned his neck to look at her feet, poking out from under her skirt. One was clad in a ratty old shoe with fraying laces, the sole separating from the upper. The other was in nothing but a stocking.
He heaved a pretend dramatic sigh. “Now Poppy, what have I told you about those shoes of yours?” he asked, walking her to the wooden bench resting against the wall of the house.
“That they’re too big for me and in disrepair, and that I would do well to spend some of my wages to buy a new pair,” she answered, making big, guilty doe-eyes at him.
The look was so sweet that he felt blood rush straight to his groin. If he didn’t put her down soon, she’d feel it too. So he nestled her on the bench, then started back to the bed to look for her shoe.
“So why haven’t you been to the cobbler yet?” he asked over his shoulder.
“Well,” she began with a sigh. “First Delly needed two new pairs of stockings so that she could take that job in the shop in Falmouth. Then Beatrice needed a couple yards of fabric for new school dresses. She’s growing like a weed these days. Then Angela broke her tooth, and Mama insisted on taking her to that fancy new doctor who only doctors teeth all the way up in St. Austell.”
Nick listened, a strange, uncomfortable feeling growing in his chest. He found her missing shoe easily, noting that the lace had snapped clean through, and straightened to bring it back to her. “You can’t hand over all of your wages to your mum, you know,” he said, taking a seat next to her.
“But Mama knows best,” she said with an authoritative nod. “And I couldn’t possibly sleep at night with new shoes and the knowledge that Angela’s tooth would be forever broken.”
She was so good that it turned him inside out. And as she struggled to get her worn and mangled shoe back on, she glanced up at him with an obvious sort of adoration that made him want to take her in his arms and shelter her from the world. Girls looked at him fetchingly all the time. He was attractive and well aware of it. But none of the women who had thrown themselves at him over the years did so with as little artifice as Poppy. None of them but Poppy had him looking back with just as much admiration. And it was always the good girls that turned into wildcats when you finally got them on their backs.
Of course, with Poppy, a quick tumble wouldn’t be enough. Her kind of sweetness demanded promises of forever. Promises he would gladly have given her right that very moment. If he could.
“Why don’t you let me buy you a new pair of shoes,” he said. “It’s the least I could do.”
In fact, it was likely the most he would ever be able to do, and it tore him apart.
Poppy blushed, finished tying her shoe, and straightened her skirts. The fact that she’d had her skirts hiked to her knees without a single hint of flirtation or the slightest idea that it could be construed as seductive only squeezed Nick’s chest tighter. “I couldn’t do that, Nick,” she said in a voice so low it was almost a whisper. “You need to save your money for something you want.”
I want you, Nick thought to himself. I’d give the world for you, shoes and all.
“What if I found a serviceable pair of shoes second-hand?” he asked.
Poppy hummed uncertainly and stood. “I could probably find something worthwhile in the church donation box.”
Her words felt like an arrow in his heart. She shouldn’t have to rely on charity. She should have the finest things money could buy, and he should be the one giving them to her.
He stood, his smile kind and fond, but showing no hint of how deep his feelings truly ran. “What if I speak to Lord Peter or Lady Mariah for you? I’m sure they would give you something much better than those old clod-hoppers.”
Poppy laughed. She pressed a hand to her mouth and glanced down at her feet, tapping her mangy toes together. “Clod-hoppers. I like that. It makes it sound as though I go bounding through the fields like a rabbit.”
He laughed with her. She was so artless it hurt. Being so close without being able to touch her hurt ten times more, though.
“Well, as long as you promise to be careful and not to hop right into any more flower beds any time soon, I guess I’ll let it go this time,” he said. He couldn’t resist raising a hand to brush a bit of dirt off her cheek, not that his hands were particularly clean.
“I promise, Nick,” she said, glancing up at him with that look that pierced his soul. “I should probably get back to work now. There’s so much to do with the shake-up in staff between here and London.”
“I bet there is,” he said. “We wouldn’t want Mrs. Wilson wondering where you are when she needs you, would we?”
For a moment, she looked downright terrified. “We most certainly would not.”
“Run along then, little rabbit,” he said with a wink.
She blushed, and for a moment, a look that was far away from the innocent girl that most people thought she was filled her eyes. She didn’t let it linger, though. She turned and headed off for the house at a fast clip, turning to wave at him as she rounded the corner.
Nick waved back, but his smile dropped when his hand did. If he could go back five years and shake some sense into the young and foolish man he’d been, he would do it in a heartbeat. He’d warn himself not to let a pretty face turn his head and cause him to make promises he wouldn’t want to keep. He’d shout at himself not to get down on one knee and propose to Mavis.
Chapter 2
Happiness came easily to Poppy, and for the next few days, she floated through her duties and chores with a bubbling sense of contentment in her heart. Nick had been so strong when he’d lifted her out of the flower bed. His smile had been so warm and jovial. The fact that he cared enough to offer to buy her new shoes had her sighing and staring off into space with visions of him tying the new shoes himself. Down on one knee. Perhaps with a ring. She didn’t even need a ring, all she needed was Nick.
A sudden clatter and smash yanked her out of her daydreams, and she jumped when she realized the bowl she’d been mixing potpourri for Miss Victoria’s room in was lying smashed at her feet.
“Look at that, you daft girl,” Mrs. Harmon said, shaking her head and marching over, broom and dustpan already in hand. “You need to keep your head out of the clouds and on your work or more than a bowl will be broken.”
“Sorry, Mrs. Harmon. I’m so sorry.” Heat flooded her face as she bent to pick up the larger pieces of broken crockery, along with handfuls of dry flowers.
“Don’t worry,” Mrs. Harmon sighed. “I’ve known you long enough not to give you any of the good bowls to work with. That one probably had it coming anyhow.”
“It was probably crafted in the era of Napoleon and Wellington.”
Poppy gasped at the voice that had made the comment, leaping to her feet—and kicking a large shard of the bowl halfway across the room, where one of the kitchen maids tripped over it. “You’re back,” she squealed, leaping over the mess she’d made to throw her arms around Ginny.
“We’re back.” Ginny hugged her in return, laughing along with her.
“Did you have a good time?” Poppy asked, breathless with joy. “What was Brighton like? Was it as exciting as I’ve always been told it is? Did you and Harry bathe in the sea? Did you eat ice cream? Did you see the Pavilion?”
Ginny laughed, resting her hands on Poppy’s shoulders to keep her from bouncing. “We did eat ice cream and see the Pavilion. It’s too cold to swim right now. And although we got out some, we spent most of our time indoors.” Her eyes sparkled.
Poppy giggled, pressing a hand to her mouth. She might have been a flighty rabbit, but coming from such a large family, she knew exactly what Ginny and Harry had been up to. Her thoughts flew instantly back to Nick, to the way his arms had felt around her, the heat of his body so close to hers, and the softness of his lips when he talked to her. Her fantasy of him tying her shoes switched to one of him stroking his hands slowly up her legs, over her knees, along her thighs….
“We’d better clean up this mess,” Ginny laughed. “The smell of lavender is overwhelming.”
“Oh.” Poppy twisted to look at the pile of dried flowers and broken crockery on the floor. “Yes, we’d better.”
She and Ginny moved back to the mess. Mrs. Harmon had left the broom and dustpan for them, so together they were able to make quick work of the disaster.
“We can save most of these flowers, if we pick the pottery out,” Ginny said as they moved the mess to the table. “I’ll help, and you can tell me all about what I missed while we were gone.”
“You missed so much,” Poppy gasped, grabbing Ginny’s arm. “Mr. Snyder and Mrs. Wilson have been talking about who from Dunsford House is coming here and who from here is going to London, Lady Mariah is having all new uniforms sewn for us all, and Nick has been absolutely lovely.”
Ginny’s eyes were already bright and interested, but her smile grew when Poppy mentioned Nick. “Lovely, is he?”
“Very lovely.” Poppy leaned in closer to her and whispered, “I think he really likes me. Although I don’t know how or why.”
“Because you’re sweet and charming,” Ginny answered. “Everybody loves you.”
“Not everybody.” Poppy smirked and peeked over her shoulder to where Mrs. Harmon was muttering to herself as she kneaded bread dough.
“Mrs. Harmon adores you,” Ginny went on. “But she’ll never let on.”
“Well, regardless,” Poppy sighed. “Nick has been lovely.”
“So I hear.”
“And, well, the other day, I was talking to Lady Mariah and Miss Victoria about how I don’t think I’m truly cut out to be a maid—”
“You said that to them?” Ginny’s brow flew up.
“Yes?” Poppy suddenly questioned whether she should have said anything to her betters at all. “I told them that what I really wanted to be was a wife and mother.”
“I can see that.” Ginny’s shock melted into a smile, and she continued picking through the flowers and pottery. “Did you mention Nick?”
“I might have.” Poppy blushed and glanced down. “But it isn’t my place to go asking a man to marry me. It should be the other way around, shouldn’t it?”
“Well,” Ginny began slowly. “Yes. Technically. Although I’m beginning to think there’s no harm in being honest about your feelings.” She gave Poppy a pointed look that said more than words could.
“True. I wouldn’t want to be like you and Harry. Not that there’s anything wrong with the way things turned out between the two of you,” she rushed to finish.
Ginny laughed, joy lighting her expression. “Everything turned out perfectly.”
“That’s what I want too.”
“Then perhaps you should look for ways to make your dreams a reality.”
“You know, I think I will,” Poppy said with a nod.
The flowers and shards were sorted as much as they were going to be, and when Poppy got up to fetch another bowl, Ginny stood as well. “I need to get a few things from my old room and move them over to the stables. But I’ll be around later to talk, if you’d like.”
“I’d love that,” Poppy said.
The smile remained on her face as Ginny left the kitchen. She continued with her work, wondering if she would ever have the nerve to ask a man to marry her, to ask Nick to marry her.
“Mrs. Harmon,” she asked after several minutes of contemplation, mixing the potpourri absentmindedly with her hands. “Do you think that it’s ever right for a woman to pursue a man?”
Mrs. Harmon snorted and shook her head. “No,” she said. “It’s not in the natural order of things. Men are the ones who must make the advances, and it’s up to women to wait and accept when they come along.”
Poppy blinked and turned fully to her. “You’ve never been married, have you? I mean, the ‘Mrs.’ is just part of your title, right?”
Of all things, Mrs. Harmon’s cheeks pinked as Poppy asked the question. “No, I was never married.”
“But did you ever have a beau?”
“That’s none of your business.”
Poppy grinned. If the answer were truly no, Mrs. Harmon wouldn’t have snapped. “The thing is,” she went on, “I think I would be much better suited to life as a wife and mother instead of life as a maid.”
Mrs. Harmon laughed out loud at that. “Yes, my dear, you would,” she said, still chuckling. She stopped, blinked, then turned to Poppy. “Oh, so you’re wondering if you should go out and find yourself a man to marry instead of waiting for one to stumble along and sweep you up, are you?”
“Well, yes,” Poppy answered with a modest blush, focusing on her work. Not that she could remember what she was doing with a bowl full of dried flowers. Did she even have anything to put the potpourri in?
“Then I take back what I said.” Mrs. Harmon marched over to where Poppy stood, opening the cupboard above her and taking out a pair of glass potpourri jars with ornate lids. “You should go find yourself a man as soon as possible. And when you’ve found him, snatch him up and get him to give you a house and a bunch of babies to look after. But tell him to make sure there’s nothing breakable within arm’s reach.”
“Mrs. Harmon,” Poppy laughed. “I’m not that clumsy…am I?”
Mrs. Harmon huffed and sent her a wary look before returning to her bread.
Poppy was still in a sunny mood, though, in spite of Mrs. Harmon’s teasing. If someone who knew her as well as Mrs. Harmon thought she should pursue Nick, then it was almost a given that she should. She thought about how she would go about approaching Nick on the subject of marriage as she divided the potpourri between the jars and screwed the lids on. She imagined ways she could propose as she carried the jars up to Miss Victoria’s and Lady Mariah’s rooms. She practiced sweet words and supplications as she returned downstairs and washed up for lunch. By the time she found a seat at the servant’s table, along with most of the rest of the staff, she was determined to plead her case with Nick as soon as possible.
Until he walked into the servant’s hall and sat a few seats down from her at the long table. He smiled broadly at her and even winked as he reached for a bowl and the ladle for the large pot of stew in the center of the table. Poppy grinned and blushed back, but her tongue was suddenly stuck to the roof of her mouth.
“I’ll be going until Christmas,” Christopher, the new head footman, was in the middle of saying as plates and bowls clinked, silverware tinged, and half a dozen arms reached across the table for bread or cheese or water. “Mr. Snyder isn’t too pleased,” he went on in a lower voice, glancing around to see if the butler was nearby. But only the understaff was present for the meal. “But Mr. Egbert reckons he has a lot he could teach me.”
“You’ve been in contact with Mr. Egbert?” Kitty, one of the newer Starcross maids asked.
“Lord Peter has been in touch with him,” Christopher went on. “And he called me up to his office the other day to say I’d be going to London for a few months.”
A ripple went around the table. “Did he say who else is going or who is coming here?” Clive, one of the footmen who had been at Starcross for years but who had turned down a promotion, asked.
“Not in so many words,” Christopher reported, gesturing with his spoon. “Since there has been more of a turn-over in footmen, I got the idea that more of us will be shuffling around, but he did mention something about one of the maids coming back.”
“Not Jane,” Clive said, his eyes wide and his expression serious. “Please, anyone but Jane.”
Poppy fervently wished that she wouldn’t come back either. Two years ago, she had schemed, along with Lord William, to make Millie Llewellyn’s life miserable when she’d first arrived. And wretched as it made Poppy feel, she’d gone along with Jane’s plans, been her friend, even. She was ashamed to her very core about her behavior now, but she’d been young and foolish and trusted the wrong people. She was grateful that Ginny had taken her under her wing after Jane left, setting her straight and helping her to see who was worthy of being a friend and who was not.
“I heard Mrs. Wilson saying something the other day about Mavis,” Dot, the tiny scullery maid piped up from the end of the table.
“Mavis?” Clive tilted his head to the side. He blinked, then nodded. “Yeah, she’s all right. She can come back.”
