The words were meant to be playful, but James could tell by her expression that she liked the sound of that. Without any remark, she turned. Grasping her skirts with both hands, she determinedly plowed a path through the snow until they met a more well-trodden trail leading to the sledding hill.
James lifted the little girl from his shoulders and set her down. She was off and running before her feet met the ground.
“Oh!” Prim cried, setting off after her daughter, but James held her back.
“She’ll be fine. Let her go,” he said. There were only a dozen or so children and a handful of adults gathered at the top of the hill. The toddler streaked with purpose toward a stalwart looking woman in a plain gray coat and started tugging at her skirts. “Your nanny, I presume.”
Prim stepped forward, then back and forward again before she stilled at his side. All three children were piling onto the long sled, fighting over who got to be in front.
“Ellis will want to go too fast. I should—”
“Let them be children,” he finished firmly, holding her by his side before she could set off. “Let them have fun. If they get a few bumps and bruises along the way, it’s all a part of being a child.”
“Is this part of allowing me to prove how capable I am?” she asked, throwing his words back at him.
“Capable and overly protective are two different things.”
“Mr. MacKintosh...,” she began, once again brimming with the exasperation he was becoming so familiar with.
“James, please. Or Jamie, if you like,” he said. “If I’m going to court you, you might as well call me by my name.”
Clearly, she’d doubted he would come around to accepting her proposal. Relief and happiness shown in her eyes as they glazed with moisture. She blinked it away and offered a dramatic eye roll.
“I’m beginning to think if you were to court me, you’d drive me mad.”
Still, it pleased him to please her. Besides, her lips puckered just so, and as he’d been the previous night, James was struck by the urge to kiss her. Would she be as icy as the snow around them? As prudish as she played at being? He might have thought so not long ago but now he rather doubted it.
Her mouth softened, her already pink cheeks growing rosier under his slow perusal. “Why do you look at me like that?”
The corner of his mouth kicked up at the naiveté of her question. “Why do you think?”
She gaped like a fish for a moment, though with far more charm. Squeals of delight spared her the need to answer, and they turned back to watch the children take their first run down the hill. The older boy was at the front of the sled with the toddler sandwiched between him and another girl, both holding tight to his waist. Beside him, Prim tensed and gasped as they hit a rut and bounced off the ground, but the boy righted them and they drifted to a halt at the bottom of the hill.
Immediately, they bounded to their feet and started to climb up again.
“They’ll be at it for a while,” he said. “Would you care to walk?”
Prim shook her head but then nodded. “Not out of view though.”
“Of course not.”
Taking his out-held arm, she frowned up at him. “I assume you’re mocking me again.”
“Would it be because you’re imagining things or because your overprotective behavior deserves a little mocking?”
She only gawped at him. “Why I...?”
“You’re doing exactly what you’ve accused your brothers of,” he said, for no other reason than to rile her up. “Mollycoddling them.”
“But I am their mother,” she pointed out, obliging him with the show of bluster he was hoping for. Her bright eyes snapped with indignation as she tossed her head.
Her regal posture might have cowed a lesser man, if it were not for the fact that her pert nose and the tips of her ears were bright red with the cold.
“Children, even small ones, need some rough play now and then,” he said.
“Yes, I’d heard that before...”
Smugly, he nodded.
“...then promptly dismissed such nonsense as asinine,” she added, but he could sense a hint of banter in her tone. “You know nothing of childrearing, Mr. MacKintosh.”
“I know more than you might imagine.”
James guided her along the shoveled pathway at the top of the hill. They paused to watch the children as they reached the top of the hill and piled on the toboggan once more. Without any squabbling this time. Their faces bright with the thrill to race down the hill again.
“Speaking of childrearing, if you’ve shown your brothers even a small dose of the what for I’m now certain you’re well-practiced at, I’m surprised you haven’t yet brought them to heel.”
Prim shook her head. “For several months now, I’ve made a concerted effort to express my displeasure with them.”
James laughed aloud at that, the picture of Prim smacking their knuckles like an incensed school marm. “Expressing your displeasure? Mrs. Eames, you might think by being stern and somber you’re somehow making your point, but I hate to be the one to tell you, men aren’t that subtle. If you want something, you need to tell them...flat out.”
“I have tried that.”
“Perhaps you need to add a touch of volume to the lecture then,” he said. “You think you have it bad? My only sister has ten older brothers, but she never fails to let us know—quite vocally—that she’s knowledgeable enough to form her own opinions.”
“So, she screeches like a harpy and you let her have her way?” she asked, surprise clear in her voice.
“Absolutely not,” he chuckled. The children were again trudging up the hill, their laughter mixing with that of the dozen other boys and girls as one sled after another skated down the hill. “We fight her tooth and nail every step of the way. She’s our helpless baby sister, after all.”
Prim groaned theatrically. “You offer me no hope for the future.”
His chuckle turned to an outright laugh. “But I am. My sister is a force of nature. The Marchioness of Aylesbury and the head of the Ladies Golf League of Wimbledon. She does exactly as she pleases at all times. Despite our brotherly domineering.”
A thoughtful moue turned down her lips. “Is she married? Does her husband allow this?”
“Aylesbury allows nothing. It pleases him to see her stand up for herself.” Just as it pleased James to see Prim in her rare moments of self-confidence and conviction. He shook off the comparison. “He likes to see her set trends rather than follow them. By all accounts, he’s quite proud of her.
Prim sighed with a sorrowful shake of her head. “She’s a fortunate woman. My husband might have given me due credit for my intelligence in the end, but he considered my involvement with the National American Women Suffrage Association little more than a source of embarrassment.”
“He knew?”
“Yes, but he was forever finding reasons for me to not attend meetings or rallies,” she said. “He believed political thoughts would cause me to neglect my home, lessen my devotion to our children, forget to mend his stockings. He’d probably blame me for burnt biscuits as well.”
“He sounds like a fair arse,” James said succinctly.
“He could be,” she allowed.
“I hope you didn’t believe him. I can see you’re a doting mother.”
But he could tell by the way she cast her eyes down at the ground that she did. At least, to some extent.
So, he had been an arse. James led Prim farther down the path, certain they had a while before the children’s enthusiasm began to flag.
“Let me tell you something, Mrs. Eames.” The words grated in his throat, strangled by the anger he experienced on her behalf. “There is not a lady in my family—and there are many—who isn’t an admirable mother, but nor is there one of them who hasn’t forged a life of achievement for herself outside the home. They run charities and missions. One of my sisters-in-law will one day be a countess and marchioness in her own right. T
wo of them run vast estates and business concerns in their children’s interest. Never let anyone tell you that you can’t do the same.”
Prim blinked up at him, her eyes held wide at the vehemence in his words. She looked gratified by his declaration of faith. It shouldn’t be so easy to please her like that. Truly, had no one ever given her fair credit before?
“Perhaps I should relocate to Scotland then,” she quipped, though the jest fell flat.
James shook his head, a trifle disgusted with the society that suppressed such a lively spirit. He pulled her to a stop, glowering down at her.
“Perhaps you should, lass. Scottish lads have enough confidence in their manhood to enjoy women with spirit without taking independence and intelligence as a threat.”
“Even if that show of independence and intelligence proves to be a social embarrassment?” she asked.
“Ah, but there would be no embarrassment, you see?” he said. “In truth, we consider it a rather attractive quality. We don’t subdue our women but take satisfaction in meeting our match. And find such a challenge arousing, as well...”
Though already pink with the cold, Prim’s cheeks reddened even more. “What a thing to say.”
“What?” James found himself amused by her discomfiture. “That a man might find arousal in a woman of spirit? Or that implication that I might be experiencing the same with you?”
Her gaze fled him. The red of her cheeks engulfing her whole face. Her throat worked as if she were swallowing back words, though whether they were in retort or admonishment, he couldn’t be sure.
“You couldn’t possibly,” she croaked out at last.
James raised her chin with one finger, forcing her to look at him. “Oh, couldn’t I?”
Chapter 11
The best protection any woman can have... is courage.
~ Elizabeth Cady Stanton
“Mrs. Eames?”
Prim resisted the urge to leap away from James as Nanny came around the tree line. Despite their relative isolation, there was nothing improper about their proximity.
“Yes, Nanny?”
“Master Ellis wanted you to watch him, if you might.” Nanny peered between her and James, bright with curiosity, but Prim responded with a stern look of her own. She had nothing to be embarrassed about. There was nothing to see, nothing possibly could have been overhead.
But those softly spoken words were seared into her mind.
Oh, couldn’t I?
Was he implying that he was physically stirred by her? By her...what? Presence? Looks? For all the words baffled her, Prim warmed from head to toe. The back of her neck burned, the hollow between her breasts, and the inside of her thighs. Something she hadn’t felt in a long while curled low and hot in her belly.
“Mrs. Eames?” Nanny repeated.
Prim cleared her throat. “Of course, I will.”
She started back to the top of the hill, aware that James fell in step behind. Not offering his arm, but allowing her to lead the way. She was glad for that. Touching him, even his arm right now, would have been awkward. What did one say after such an admission? Her mother had never taught her how to respond to conversation of that nature. Mostly because it never happened.
Thankfully, her jumbled thoughts were diverted as they came back in sight of the hill.
Ellis yelled, “Mama, watch me!” and dove belly down onto the waiting sled and took the hill. Headfirst.
“Good Lord,” she whispered, her hand to her heart. Luella and Hazel were jumping up and down, clapping their hands.
Behind her, James chuckled. “Boys will be boys, Mrs. Eames. I wish I’d done that as a lad.”
And diverted even more.
“You never went sledding?”
“There was rarely enough snow where I grew up to make much of a go of it. Even when there was...” His eyes dimmed and for a moment Prim caught a glimpse of something forlorn and lonely before he shook his head, once again filled with boyish delight. “It does look like a grand bit of fun, doesn’t it?”
He was watching Ellis slide to a halt, looking a tad envious now. “Do you want to try it?” She meant it as a jest but Prim nearly laughed aloud at the excitement on his face. “You do, don’t you?”
His grin was sheepish. “Perhaps. I won’t, of course.”
None of the adults present were partaking of the sport. Prim knew he’d appear foolish in their eyes if he were to act so immaturely.
“You’ve been telling me all this time how I need to speak up for what I want? Wouldn’t it be rather hypocritical of you not to do what you want?”
* * *
James heard the dare in her voice. His prim, proper Mrs. Eames encouraging such a thing?
“You think I won’t?”
Her brows rose, a smirk touching the corner of her mouth. No, she didn’t.
“Mama! Did you see me?”
The boy raced up to them, towing the sled by its rope behind him. His light brown hair stood out at divergent angles from beneath the brim of his cap, his face was red, as he panted with the effort of his climb...or the exhilaration of his play.
“I did, Ellis,” Prim answered softly, but after a quick peek at James, added, “Well done. That was quite brave of you.”
The boy’s grin was jubilant, but he looked at James as curiously as the nanny had. “Who’s he?”
“Manners, Ellis,” she scolded. “This is Mr. MacKintosh. Mr. MacKintosh,”—of course the sweet ‘James’ of moments before was gone—“this is my son, Ellis, and my daughter Luella.”
James held out his hand to the lad, who blinked at it in surprise before shaking it.
“Will you sled with us, sir?”
He shot a look at Prim. “I thought I just might.”
* * *
A half hour and several trips down the hill later, James had gained the adamant approval of the Eames children, and a persistent shadow in young Ellis. When they finally left Pilgrim Hill and began a slow walk back toward 5th Avenue, he had a child on each hand while Prim trudged ahead with a sleepy Hazel in her arms.
Ellis’s enthusiasm hadn’t dimmed at all. He kept up a steady stream of chatter all the while as he skipped along by James’s side.
“Do you like baseball, Mr. MacKintosh? I love baseball. I play sometimes with my friends at school. Do you play? I play third base or sometimes first base. George Davis plays third base. He plays for the New York Giants. Number forty-four. Do you like them? I love them. My uncle Jeremy took me to the World Championship game a couple months ago at the Polo Grounds. It was great! The Giants versus the Orioles. Mr. Davis has the biggest mustache I’ve ever seen. I’m not sure how he can even breathe. Why don’t you have a mustache, Mr. MacKintosh...?”
On and on it went, without even a breath’s space for him to answer. But the incessant babble didn’t bother him as it surely perturbed Nanny, who muttered a dozen pleas for him to ‘cease his nonsense’ from behind them as they walked along.
In fact, he found the whole thing somewhat soothing.
Comfortable.
The thought should have troubled him more than it did.
* * *
“Thank you for a wonderful afternoon, Mr. MacKintosh,” Prim stopped at the gates of the park facing 5th Avenue and turned to him, offering her hand.
Gone was the tidily groomed gentleman who’d met her an hour before. In his place was a man, his hair shaggy and curling around his face, his tie gone, and his collar missing. He looked wonderfully masculine. And as happy as she.
It had been such a lovely time. She hated to have it end. James had taken the hill more than once. After his first solo trip, he’d brought the children with him one at a time, openly enjoying himself.
His glad surrender of his dignity had prompted a few of the other men to join in the fun, much to their children’s delight. As none of the ladies had partaken, Prim hadn’t given in to the impulse to join in either.
She almost wished she had.
In her wild
est dreams, she couldn’t imagine Fletcher ever lowering himself to play like a child or with one—in public or private. James wasn’t the type to lecture about knowing one’s own mind. He did what he wanted and damn the opinion of others.
She did admire that about him.
“I’ll accompany you to your door.”
Her front door was clearly visible across the street, no more than a few yards away. With her hands full as they were and Nanny’s energy visibly sapped, it was kind and expected of him to offer, but she was uncertain of who was still within. She wasn’t prepared to face another lecture regarding the absolute inappropriateness of keeping company with James MacKintosh.
Not quite yet, and certainly not in front of her children.
The time to openly reveal their “courtship” would come soon enough.
“We can manage,” she said firmly, motioning for Nanny to retrieve Ellis and Luella, who both protested being torn from his side.
They liked him but she wasn’t surprised. She was fast discovering there was much to like in James.
Still, she could see he meant to argue. He was a gentleman after all.
“Are you sure you want to do this?”
“Do what?”
“Proceed with this courtship?” he asked, his brogue low and intense. “If the point is to show your brothers you can live your own life?”
The original point had been only to gain some freedom from the concentrated courtship of Mossman Leachman. However, Prim refrained from pointing that out now. James’s idea sounded like a far superior one.
Besides, if she did nothing more than merely create a temporary distraction, what would have changed in her life when James tired of the game and moved on? Mossman would step right back in, her family’s pestering would recommence, and she’d be right back where she started, none the better.
But if she began to stand up, take firm hold of her own life. If she showed them all she was determined enough to make her own decisions then, when James did turn her aside, she would be in a better place to do as she liked.
That was what she needed and what she should strive for. Her simple statement at breakfast regarding James’s suit had startled all her brothers into silence. It shouldn’t have. Wouldn’t have, if she’d taken some action before.
A Question Worth Asking Page 8
