The Nanny's Little Matchmakers (Love Inspired Historical)
Read The Nanny's Little Matchmakers (Love Inspired Historical) Online
Authors: Danica Favorite
A Wife for Their Papa
Polly MacDonald intends to tame Mitch Taylor’s five mischievous children, even though every other nanny has fled. She needs this job—and Mitch’s brood sorely needs affection. Perhaps their widowed papa does, too. But when the children begin scheming to make her their new mother, Polly must resist. She’s seen too many bad marriages to want one of her own.
Mitch has come to Leadville, Colorado, to escape a scandal, not find a wife. After the disaster of his first marriage, he’s sure he isn’t husband material. Though Polly’s tender care is working wonders with his children, Mitch knows he should keep his feelings to himself. But can two wary hearts deny the dearest wish of five eager matchmakers?
“I don’t think Isabella has ever known such tenderness and love before.”
Polly’s heartbeat returned to its original state. At least Mitch hadn’t noticed her foolishness over him. And instead, he’d brought her focus back to where it should have been in the first place—his children. “I imagine it’s been hard, having so many nannies, and with her mother now gone, love is all the little dear needs. And I’m happy to provide it.”
But Mitch didn’t return the expression. Instead, his eyes looked haunted, his brow furrowed. “I don’t think she even had that before.” He rubbed his forehead, then shook his head slowly. “How could I have missed it, all this time?”
“Missed what?” Polly reached forward and touched his arm tenderly.
Oh, if he were only a little boy like Rory or Thomas, she could take him in her arms and hold him. But Mitch wasn’t a boy, and the longing in her heart felt different from how she felt toward his sons. But it didn’t change her wish to somehow make whatever was going on in his mind better.
Danica Favorite
loves the adventure of living a creative life. She loves to explore the depths of human nature and follow people on the journey to happily-ever-after. Though the journey is often bumpy, those bumps refine imperfect characters as they live the life God created them for. Oops, that just spoiled the ending of Danica’s stories. Then again, getting there is all the fun. Find her at
danicafavorite.com
.
Books by Danica Favorite
Love Inspired Historical
Rocky Mountain Dreams
The Lawman’s Redemption
Shotgun Marriage
The Nanny’s Little Matchmakers
Get rewarded every time you buy a Harlequin ebook!
Click
here
to Join Harlequin My Rewards
http://www.harlequin.com/myrewards.html?mt=loyalty&cmpid=EBOOBPBPA201602010002
DANICA FAVORITE
The Nanny’s Little
Matchmakers
As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another.
—Proverbs
27:17
To Shana, thanks for helping my books shine, and for making me a better writer.
Contents
Chapter One
Leadville, Colorado, 1882
T
he door to the Mercantile jangled and Mitch Taylor looked up from the books. Before he could greet the customers, his sister-in-law, Iris, had already stepped into action. A good thing, since the customers appeared to be a pretty young lady and her father. The lady seemed to be a proper miss, in a pale blue gown edged with lace, ribbons and all the fripperies that went with the latest style. Her strawberry blond hair arranged in a similar fashion to those he’d seen back in Denver, the young woman could have graced any parlor with ease. She laughed at something Iris said, a soft musical tone escaping her pink lips and a pretty smile lighting her face.
Mitch turned away. Not only was the young lady young—too young—but he had no business admiring ladies of any sort at this point in his life. He’d never imagined that he’d end up crawling back here.
Here
not being precisely the correct term, as the Leadville store hadn’t opened yet when he’d made the decision to remain in Denver and run his own store while his brother worked to expand the family mercantile empire. Besides, he hadn’t crawled. He’d run.
Hattie was dead.
The words rolled in his mind as he considered them. Hattie was dead. Some days those words still didn’t seem real.
But the ensuing scandal was real enough. He could only hope that it would be a while longer before talk reached Leadville and he would have enough time to—
A crash and a screech from the back of the store made him set his pen down. Mitch took a deep breath, then casually turned in the direction of the noise.
As seemed to constantly be the case, before he could even get to the other side of the counter, one of his children, this time it was Clara, ran toward him. Mrs. Abernathy, their nanny, followed behind.
“You get back here!”
Clara darted behind him and clung to the back of his shirt. “I won’t!”
Even the glowering look on Mrs. Abernathy’s face would not be enough to convince Clara. Experience had taught him that while all of his children were stubborn, when this particular daughter refused to do something, walking to China would be easier than getting her to change her mind.
“What seems to be the problem?” Mitch asked, offering Mrs. Abernathy a smile.
“Everything is the problem.” Mrs. Abernathy’s face had turned an unmistakable shade of red. He’d seen it on a number of nannies, all shortly before they’d quit.
Mitch pinched the bridge of his nose and took a deep breath. Could he find a way to convince her to stay?
The young lady he’d been admiring came into view, covered in flour.
No. Even before Mrs. Abernathy opened her mouth to utter the fateful words, Mitch knew nothing would keep her. He supposed he should make the effort, but with this being the second nanny in the space of a month, he’d need all of his energy to convince another woman to come work for him.
“I see,” he said instead.
“Those children are out of control.” Mrs. Abernathy gave him a sharp look as the flour-coated woman approached.
“I know,” he said quietly. He could feel Clara relax behind him. She, too, knew that their nanny was a few words from giving notice. For Clara, as well as the other children, this would be another victory.
The flour-coated woman smiled at him. “You must be the father of the little darling who welcomed me to the store.”
Iris rushed over. “Polly, I am so sorry. You see—”
Polly held up a hand. “It’s not your fault, Mrs. Taylor. But I think there’s a young lady who owes me an apology.”
She looked at Mitch firmly, but not unkindly. Not like the many people who’d been terrorized by his children. He’d liked to have said that such occurrences were rare, but in truth, they’d left Denver not just to escape the scandal of his wife’s death. He also needed respite from talk of the antics of the Taylor Terrors, as his children had been dubbed by society.
Most people, when they saw his children coming, ran the other way. Perhaps people running away was a small exaggeration, but not by much.
Polly squatted down in front of him. “Come on out now, young lady. I realize that you’re new in town, but in Leadville, we don’t go throwing flour at strangers. That might be what you did where you used to live, but here, that’s not our custom.”
She spoke gently, sweetly. Without the rage of so many of the others who’d insisted that Mitch do something about his out-of-control children. Even her eyes. A bright blue that matched her dress, they looked almost...nice.
Clara didn’t budge.
Polly rose and looked him in the eye, then stuck out a hand, which he shook. “Polly MacDonald. I can see why your daughter might be a bit shy, but she does owe me an apology.”
Then her blue eyes twinkled as she pointed to a figure peering around a barrel. “Although we could say that our little mishap with the flour was my own fault, since I was so inconsiderate as to be paying too much attention to the dried fruit and not realizing I was stepping into a battle between these two.”
Rory. Mitch sighed again. Of course it was Rory and Clara. The two of them hadn’t stopped bickering since Rory had the misfortune of being born seven minutes after his sister. A fact she wielded like a weapon in establishing superiority to her younger brother.
“You see! They are positively out of control,” Mrs. Abernathy said with the kind of self-righteousness Mitch had resigned himself to hearing from everyone who met his children. “I’m sorry, Mr. Taylor, I really am. But your children are too wild for the likes of me. I never thought I’d say that about any child, but there is clearly something wrong with them. They belong in an institution.”
Had he not heard it dozens of times before, he might have been insulted. Instead, he smiled politely and nodded. “Thank you for your service, Mrs. Abernathy.”
“I beg your pardon!”
Mitch turned toward Polly, the woman his children had just doused in flour. The kindness had melted from her face, replaced with a level of fury he’d expected from the flour incident.
“There is nothing wrong with those children. I cannot fathom why you would make such a horrible suggestion as to put them in an institution. I hope Mr. Taylor docks whatever wages you have coming to you. Whatever is wrong with these children, it’s not a deficiency in them, but in the kind of care they are receiving. You should be ashamed of yourself.”
Then Polly squatted down again. “Please come talk to me, little one,” she said in a much gentler tone. “I won’t hurt you, I promise.”
“Well, I never!” Mrs. Abernathy stomped away. Mitch wasn’t sure if he was glad to see her go or not. He’d have liked to have thought there was truth in Polly’s words, that had he had a better nanny, his children wouldn’t behave so terribly.
But he had been through an awful lot of nannies.
Clara came forward. “I’m sorry,” she said quietly. “I didn’t mean to hit you. I was trying to get Rory back.”
“Rory,” Mitch said, indicating his son should join them. “I believe you also owe Miss MacDonald an apology.”
Which is when it occurred to him. Clara had actually apologized. Never in all of his life had he heard his children apologize. At least not without threats of bodily harm, missing supper and the like.
Mitch looked over at the young lady. “It is Miss, isn’t it?”
She gave him the kind of dazzling smile that would have struck him in the heart were it not firmly encased in stone. It had been a long time since he’d allowed himself to be swayed by a pretty face.
“Indeed it is.”
“I’m Mitch Taylor. I apologize for not introducing myself sooner. I was caught up in the situation.”
He placed his hand on Clara’s shoulder. “This is my daughter Clara, who is ten, and that’s her twin, Rory.” Then he looked around. “Where are the others?”
Dutifully, his other children stepped out from behind the shelves. “This is Louisa, my eldest, who is twelve, and there’s Thomas, who is seven.” Mitch looked around. “Where is Isabella?”
The children all looked at each other like they’d assumed the other had been in charge of the child.
“I’m sorry,” he told Polly. “Would you excuse me for a moment?”
She smiled at him. “Let me help. How old of a child am I looking for?”
“Right.” Mitch tried to smile back, but he found he lacked the energy. “Isabella is three, and she has dark curls and is wearing a...”
He looked at the other children. He’d gone out early this morning, before any of them were up. “What is she wearing?”
“A pink dress,” Louisa volunteered.
Everyone stood there, staring at him. “Well, let’s find her!”
Suddenly, there was a flurry of activity in the store as everyone went off in search of Isabella. Mitch paused at the counter for a moment.
“It’s all right,” Polly said kindly, her hand resting on his arm. “I’m sure we’ll find her.”
Mitch nodded. Like all of the other difficult emotions he had to suppress in life, this one should be no different. After all, Isabella disappeared all the time. She liked to hide in small spaces, where she’d curl up and take a nap. The rational part of his brain told him that Isabella was most likely somewhere doing just that. But the ache in his heart...the one that had already borne too much for any man to bear...
“Thank you,” he said simply. Then he turned to look for his daughter.
* * *
Mitch Taylor was not a cold man, Polly had decided upon meeting him. The simple way he spoke, seemingly unattached, gave an air of coldness that would have driven most people off. But there’d been a catch in his voice whenever he spoke of his children that gave him away. He might want people to think him detached, but Polly could tell by the love in his eyes that he cared deeply for his children.
She paused at a pile of blankets tossed casually on the floor. Mrs. Taylor would never tolerate such disarray in the store. Though she only spoke to the other woman briefly on her visits, Polly knew the pride Mrs. Taylor took in keeping everything in order.
Polly knelt down and moved the blankets. She spied a mass of curly black hair.
She gently touched the child. “Isabella?”
The little girl sighed and pulled the blankets back closer to her.
“I’ve found her!” Polly stood and waved Mitch over.
The relief spreading across the man’s face reaffirmed her belief that there was more to Mitch than he let on. He ran to them and immediately scooped up the little girl into his arms.
“Isabella!” He cradled her against him. Then she lifted her head, yawned and looked around.
Which is when Polly noticed that Isabella was completely unlike any of Mitch’s other children in appearance. Her mass of curls was much darker than the straight brown hair of her other four siblings. But it was the deep rich brown of Isabella’s skin that struck her the most. Especially as it contrasted with Mitch’s fair skin, blond hair and blue eyes.
Her friend Emma Jane had adopted a child, and Polly had always admired her for the ferocity with which she and her husband, Jasper, loved little Moses. But to see this strange man, who wore such a veneer of ice, loving a child so clearly not his own, it made Polly’s heart tumble in a funny manner she hadn’t expected.
“Yes, she’s mine,” Mitch said curtly, still cradling the little girl as he moved past her.
“Of course she is,” Polly said, knowing how Emma Jane and Jasper often had to correct others who made unkind remarks about Moses not being theirs. “I can see you love her very much.”
Mitch relaxed slightly, then peered down at his daughter. “You gave us quite a scare, Isabella. You mustn’t hide like that.”
“I was sweepy,” the little girl mumbled, then rested her head back on her father’s shoulder.
“Mrs. Abernathy’s lessons were too long today,” the eldest girl, Louisa, said as she joined them. “She wasn’t paying the slightest attention to Isabella and was more worried about Clara’s spelling. Rory told her that Clara cheated on her lessons, so Mrs. Abernathy rapped her knuckles. If I hadn’t been forced to work on penmanship, I might have been able to look after Isabella myself.”
Louisa gave him a haughty glare. “I’m twelve years old. I don’t see why I need lessons anymore. I can watch the younger children, and then you won’t need to hire any more dreadful nannies like Mrs. Abernathy. I’m practically a grown woman. I can do it.”
Polly fought the urge to laugh. At twelve, she’d thought herself quite the grown woman. And, in truth, she’d taken on much of those responsibilities. Her mother had been busy taking in the washing from other miners and their families, her father had been busy working in the mines. That is, when her father hadn’t been too drunk to work. It had fallen on Polly’s shoulders to keep an eye on both her younger siblings and any of the other young children in the various mining camps they’d bounced between.
But it was not a life she’d wish on any twelve-year-old child. If a girl had a choice, anything was better than the drudgery of running a household that wasn’t hers to run.
“We won’t be having this argument again,” Mitch said, shifting Isabella in his arms. “You need an education so you can have a good life for yourself.”
“I do have a good life,” Louisa declared hotly, “at least when I don’t have a horrible nanny forcing me to do useless things.”
“Your education is not useless.” Mitch’s voice held the same calmness she’d observed when she first met him. “You have no idea the doors it will open up for you.”
Louisa looked like she was going to speak, but then closed her mouth as she nodded grudgingly. Her expression was anything but accepting, but at least she appeared to be listening to her father.
Polly would have given anything to have her only responsibility be her lessons at that age. Instead, she changed diaper after diaper, wishing things could be different. It was only the Lassiters’ influence that had allowed her to have an education in the first place.
Pastor Lassiter, or Uncle Frank, as he’d lately insisted he be called by the MacDonald family, and his late wife, Catherine, had come to the mining camps as part of their ministry to spread the gospel to the miners. But more than that, they’d helped Polly’s family better their circumstances, and Polly had been able to take lessons with their daughter, Annabelle.
