The Girl is Not For Christmas - Emma V Leech Page 0,73

she accept him, if things were truly desperate? For once, she could not face the truth but shied away from it, clinging to the impossible hope that lingered with her attending her aunt’s party. She did not allow herself to think about the likelihood her aunt might send her packing the moment she got there, or that she would simply look like a rustic old maid in a dress three seasons out of date and be a figure of ridicule, or that no man would give her a second glance. Instead she clung to her impossible dream of finding a kind man who would be generous enough to give the children the life they deserved. In her quiet, private moments she dreamed of other things too. She dreamed of what she really wanted for herself, a dream so extraordinary she might as well have King riding up on a unicorn and carrying her off to fairyland where they could live happily ever after in a castle in the clouds. Inevitably these dreams made her cry and she ended up feeling cross and out of sorts, scolding herself for being such an utter ninny. It didn’t stop her from indulging in her ridiculous imaginings, though, and longing for a man who might be in the same house, but was so far out of her reach he might as well live on the moon.

“Fancy a game of cards?” Walsh asked, waving the pack at King.

King turned from his position at the bedroom window and scowled. “No.”

“Chess?”

“No.”

“Gelly made some shortbread this morning—”

“I’m not bloody well hungry,” King snapped and then scrubbed his hand over his face. “I beg your pardon, Walsh.”

“Don’t trouble yourself,” Walsh said with a shrug.

King groaned and went and sat on the bed. He put his head in his hands. He’d tried to occupy himself, to keep his mind quiet by entertaining the children. He was of little enough use to Livvy, but at least he might give her a bit of peace by keeping them busy. Strangely, it had been no hardship either. He wondered whether he’d always eschewed children before now because he’d met none like these before, or if he’d just not given them a chance, for they were rather entertaining. He seemed to have a quite undeserved heroic status in their eyes, too, which was both flattering and daunting.

Harry’s worship, he well understood. He was a boy on the cusp of manhood and King was obviously a man of the world, the kind of man an impressionable boy like that might choose to emulate. Even Susan’s newly acquired infatuation was something he could comprehend. He was, after all, male, had all his limbs, hair and teeth, and that seemed all that was required for a susceptible girl to form an attachment. So he treated her with kid gloves and made very certain they were never alone together.

The younger children, though…. The girls had him playing piano for them to dance to, and demanded endless games of ludo and chess and cards, and had gifted him with dozens of pictures. Many of them were drawings of him, wildly out of proportion with a head like a sun and legs almost to his neck, and a beaming smile. In his favourite one, which Jane had done that morning, they were all in a line, hand in stick-like hand, with him and Livvy side-by-side in the middle of the picture. He had kept them all, placing them carefully under his folded shirts.

George though, George adored him and seemed to view him as a combination of moveable climbing frame and personal court jester. Even little Birdie had deigned to be held, and cooed and giggled at him, tweaking his nose with her tiny hand and messing up his cravat. King had never experienced the like of it. He told himself it was all a crushing bore, and he would be glad to get away, to get back to London, to his life and his friends and… and it was the most damnable lie.

There was something here, in this place, with the children and Livvy and Spargo and Gelly. It was a home, filled with people who loved and cared about each other, no matter that they bickered and argued and drove each other to distraction now and then. Ceci and Charlie were a part of it too, albeit on the periphery and on their own terms, dancing in and out of the scene like bit players in a theatrical. That