Mr. Smithfield - Louise Bay Page 0,5

asked.

I nodded, trying to match her enthusiasm. She’d accused me of being rude last night, and I didn’t have time to look for a new nanny if Autumn decided to throw in the towel. I’d been accused by more than one nanny of being hostile and unappreciative.

“Secret family recipe,” Autumn said as if she’d just served up a Michelin-starred dish.

“Daddy, bear soldiers today, ’member?” Bethany said.

“She’s been talking about soldiers non-stop,” Autumn said. “I’m a little concerned you’re signing her up to some kind of teddy bear army.”

“I’ve promised I’ll take her to the changing of the guard. She thinks the busbies they wear make them look like bears.”

Autumn swallowed a mouthful of pancake. “Changing of the guard? Like Christopher Robin and Alice?” Her face was plastered in sheer delight, like someone had just given her the moon. “Does that actually happen?”

“Of course it does,” I replied. Why would she think it wasn’t real?

“Can I come?” she asked, pouring more pancake batter into the frying pan. “That poem—” She shook her head as if it didn’t matter. “I heard it a lot growing up. I’d love to actually see how it all works. Does the Queen come out?”

I hadn’t expected company today. Weekends were for me and Bethany. I didn’t see my daughter much in the week, so I tried to make weekends count.

“Yes, Autumn, come! Please, Daddy!”

My daughter had me wrapped around her finger. And it wouldn’t hurt to be nice to Autumn so she wouldn’t leave me high and dry and without a nanny. Again. Work was manic at the moment and it was going to get worse over the next couple of months. Autumn was due to stay until the end of July, when all my clients went on holiday and I’d have time to find a new nanny. “Of course, Autumn is welcome, darling. But she might not want to come because we won’t see Her Majesty. Just a lot of busbies and tourists.”

Autumn shrugged, her eyes sparkling like sunshine hitting water. “I can’t wait. What time do we need to leave?”

Instead of disappearing until it was time to go, Autumn pulled out Bethany’s rucksack and started to pack.

“Here,” she said, pulling out a laminated sheet. “I prepared a list of everything we need when we’re going out for the day.”

“You laminated a list?” It was strange having help at the weekend. It had been a long time since Bethany’s mother had left.

She shrugged. “Of course. That way you don’t forget anything. I have one for going to preschool, too. I find it’s best to be prepared in life. It frees you up to deal with the unexpected.”

I wasn’t sure what she was talking about, and I was concerned if I asked her to explain, she’d just confuse me more.

Thirty minutes later, Autumn greeted the cabbie as we piled into the cab. “Thank you for taking us to the Palace.” She did know he was getting paid, didn’t she?

“Tip up. Tip up. Just like Paddington,” Bethany sang to herself as she pulled down the tip-up seat and clambered on. I leaned to fix the seatbelt and my hand collided with Autumn’s. A flash of energy chased up my arm and lit me up from my center, starting in my bollocks. Jesus. I thought when I handed her the spatula last night, the spark of electricity between us had been a fluke. Apparently not.

Autumn gasped as she pulled back her arm.

Had she felt that? It was like some kind of explosion.

“Are you okay?” I asked, not looking at her but finishing securing Bethany in place.

“Yes,” she said, quieter than I was used to. She’d also felt something then.

Autumn was an attractive girl. I’d seen it the first time I’d ever laid eyes on her. I’d stopped noticing women after Penelope left, swearing myself to a life of celibacy. I wanted to focus only on the things that deserved my attention: my daughter, work, and the five men who were more my brothers than my friends. Autumn had interrupted that focus for a split second. But that’s all it had been—a momentary intrusion. She’d been unmistakably striking and beautiful and a little haunting, and something in my physiology had reacted. But that moment had passed. Hadn’t it?

By the time we pulled up on the Mall, I’d put our collision out of mind. Autumn likely had too, with all her chattering on to the cabbie. I was surprised she hadn’t been invited to the man’s thirtieth wedding anniversary coming