The carriage slowed to a halt and he gave a silent sigh of thanks when his driver threw the door open.
The servant smiled at Charlotte. “My lady.”
Charlotte placed her fingertips in his gloved hand. “Why, thank you ever so much, Alan.”
Weston blinked. He’d been schooling his children on being kind and appreciative to the servants since they were old enough to speak. Cordelia, however, had been nasty and vile to the staff and had seemed to view their presence as if there to please her and not much more than that. She had left a nasty imprint on Charlotte and Daniel.
“Did you just say thank you?” Daniel called after his sister as he hopped out of the carriage.
Weston climbed out with a murmur of thanks for the servant.
“Of course, I did.” Charlotte patted the side of her bonnet in a manner better suited to a seven-and-twenty year old woman and not his seven-year-old mischief-maker. “One must be kind to the servants. After all, imagine how very difficult life would be without them.” She spoke the words as though reciting them back from memory.
As Weston and his children made their way through the peacefully empty grounds of Hyde Park, their bootsteps disturbed the untouched soft blanket of snow. His breath stirred puffs of white in the cool air, a silent testament to the madness in visiting Hyde Park in this godforsaken cold. With frozen ice treats, no less.
He glanced down at his children. They trudged slowly, he lightened his stride so that his small children were better able to match his pace.
Charlotte wrinkled her nose. “It’s cold.”
“Well, this was your idea,” Daniel groused, nudging her in the side with his elbow.
“Be careful, Daniel, or you’ll drop them. Papa, tell him he’ll drop them.”
Weston eyed the two ices in his gloved hands and for the briefest moment, considered stuffing the ice cream into his ears to drown out the constant bickering between his children. It had become a good deal worse in the years since his wife’s death. In his attempt to prevent them from further hurt after their mother’s betrayal and death, he’d allowed them to become hoydens, running wild, their ill-behaviors unchecked. Guilt burned in his belly as he confronted the accuracy in Lady Patrina’s earliest charges against them.
Yet…as they continued on through Hyde Park, off toward the Serpentine, he glanced down at Charlotte. She’d thanked his driver when she’d only just recently viewed Alan and all the other members of his staff as mere servants. What would have caused such a radical change in his…? They walked about a slight crest and a red-cloaked figure pulled into focus. The breath went out of him as Lady Patrina shoved back her hood. She smiled at his children and raised a hand in greeting. Then her gaze moved to his. Their stares locked and Weston froze, at the sheer beauty of her, warm and effervescent amidst a cold, iced-over world.
“Lady Patrina!” Charlotte squealed and hurtled the short distance over to the young lady’s side.
Not something. Someone had wrought this change in Charlotte. He’d wager Lady Patrina’s influence accounted for his daughter’s kindness toward Alan. He stopped before her. She continued chatting with Charlotte.
His daughter gesticulated wildly, her words running together. “Muscadine, but I said you most certainly preferred…”
Patrina laughed and leaned closed, and lowered her voice to a not-so-conspiratorial whisper. “I don’t think one can truly have just one favorite ice.”
“We got you muscadine,” Daniel blurted and then kicked the snow as if embarrassed to have been pleasant and agreeable to a young lady.
Patrina turned her attention to his son. “Well, muscadine is quite my favorite. It is ever so delightful.” She winked at Charlotte and then raised her gaze to Weston. “Isn’t that right, my lord?” Merriment danced in her eyes.
You are delightful.
He expected to be horrified by his almost moon-sick fascination of the young lady, but he’d never before known a woman like her. Young ladies did not fawn over young children or escort said troublesome mites home when they became separated from their nurse. Most young ladies would have placed the child in a carriage, with a servant, and sent them on their way.
That is if they’d so much as noticed the misplaced child in the first place.
“Papa?” Daniel nudged him in the side.
“Hmm? Oh…er, yes.” Weston cleared his throat and resisted the urge to tug his cravat. “Delightful. It is delightful,” he finished lamely. Wordlessly, he handed Charlotte’s burnt filbert ice over and his daughter took it with eager fingers, all the while he remained fixed on the faintest cleft just under Patrina’s full-lower lip. The oddest desire to place his lips to that slight indentation filled him.
Patrina angled her head and studied him.
Weston held out a hand. She hesitated and then placed her fingertips in his. “Lady Patrina.” He bowed his head and held out the glass he’d purchased from Gunter’s. “Your muscadine ice.”
She stared wistfully at the sugared treat and then wet her lips like the kitchen cat about to swallow the canary and accepted the glass with its small silver spoon tucked in the softening treat.
“Papa, can we play?” Charlotte pleaded.
He waved his hand. “Take care to avoid the river,” he instructed. Though one of the coldest winters since the Thames had last frozen, one could never be certain of the ice’s thickness.
Daniel and Charlotte sprinted off. They waved their spoons about the air, they way they might a vicious rapier, yelling playfully at one another between bites of their ices.
Weston and Patrina stood at the frozen water’s edge in companionable silence. How very unlike Cordelia and most other Society misses who seemed to think it their responsibility to fill all voids with useless chatter. “She misses her mother,” he finally said.
“I imagine she does.” She fiddled with the glass in her hands. “My father died when I was just a girl and even now, not a day passes that I do not think of him.”
Weston captured his chin between his thumb and forefinger. He should not ask for intimate details about her life. Such prying posed a threat to his carefully maintained world where his children were not hurt by those outside the folds of their family.
“What do you think about?”
She lifted her shoulders in a little shrug. “I wonder about the foods he liked. Did he detest chocolate the way I do?”
He glanced at the ice treat in her hands. “It is fortunate then I didn’t come bearing chocolate ice.”
Patrina widened her eyes. “Oh, no!” she said hurriedly. “I would have still been appreciative. I…” The rose hue of her cheeks from the cold, darkened to the shade of holly berries. “Oh, you’re teasing me.” She didn’t sound at all upset by the truth of that.
He gentled his expression. “Yes, I was.”
Patrina toyed with her spoon. She dipped the tip into her grape-flavored treat and took a bite of her ice.
“You detest chocolate? I rather imagined no one disliked chocolate.”
“I do,” she said around her spoon. She took another bite of her ice. “It is too sweet. I prefer a bowl of raspberries and strawberries.”
As she spoke of the delectable summer fruit, he dropped his gaze to her bow-shaped, bright red lips. Desire surged through him. A longing to explore the sweetness of her mouth. He fought back a groan.