Staggering slightly as she lowered the child’s chunky body to firm land, Harriet suffered a brief glimpse of what it must be like to love and care for a precious, fragile life. It was difficult enough tending to a wounded pet. She didn’t think she could tolerate seeing a child hurt.

Really, she had nothing to worry about. She need only meet Lucas, let him see how utterly unsuitable she was, and go about her merry way. Her father and the tenants and the animals needed her. She had a very full life without an annoying man providing obstacles, objecting to everything she did or wanted. It was not as if she needed a man for anything. And she already had one yelling impossible orders all day long. She certainly didn’t require another. Taking a deep breath to settle her racing pulse, she swung Verity’s hand and was smiling when she entered the study where the men waited. Her confidence faltered a little at sight of the tall, immaculately dressed gentleman nearly filling the furniture-stuffed room.

Lucas Sumner had grown from lanky lad to a huge, square-shouldered man with shadowed eyes that had seen too much suffering. Harriet’s soft heart nearly plummeted to her toes. She could ignore laughing, handsome men. She could not ignore wounded ones.

“Thank you for rescuing my obstreperous daughter, Miss Briggs. I must take her home, where she belongs.”

A small hand clenched Harriet’s. The child very properly did not argue, but Harriet knew how it felt to be invisible. She tickled Verity’s palm while nodding pretend agreement. She would give Major Sumner one more chance at a little empathy.

“I have promised Verity tea and biscuits,” she said in her politest hostess tones. “Perhaps we could retire to the parlour and have a bite before you must leave?”

“No, she’s not capable of sitting still,” he responded dismissively. “I would not ruin your rugs with spilled tea and crumbs. It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance again, Miss Briggs. Perhaps another time?”

Ah well, such a pity that he was a blind fool like all the others, but then, attractive men often thought they owned the world. And society allowed them to continue thinking that.

Harriet supposed it was naughty of her, but she would like Verity to recognize that she was not lacking in any way. She was simply being a child, and her father was simply being … well, a stiff-necked man.

At her father’s curt dismissal, Verity tugged her hand free and fled the room. Major Sumner uttered an impolite word and stalked after her.

Harriet blocked his path. Giving the Major a warning look, she called after the fleeing child, “If Invisible Girl will wait outside the front door, I will follow shortly. I do not break promises!”

The front door slammed. She hoped Verity was bright enough to listen. And be curious.

“I promised Verity tea and biscuits. Now I shall have to walk with her and explain they’ll have to wait for another day or she will think I’ve lied to her.” Harriet pasted a sweet smile over her irritation.

The glowering gentleman appeared prepared to bodily remove her from his path, and her smile grew more challenging.

Three

Lucas did not know what to make of the annoying Miss Briggs. She walked alongside him without a coat to cover her thin lawn blouse. Even her dishevelled lace jabot did not conceal her plump bosom. Her riding skirts and boots allowed her to take long strides that matched his, proving she was not so demure as her pursed lips and silence would lead him to believe.

She had a veritable cloud of frizzy mouse brown curls that she had made no attempt to tame or cover. She had not really grown out of her gangliness either. Her limbs were long and ungraceful, but her waist was small, and she curved in womanly places as she had not as a fifteen-year-old. He supposed, in an evening gown, she would reveal far more than this unconventional costume did. He could not quite put a reason to his shock … or attraction. She was as undisciplined a hoyden as Verity and not at all the polite sort of female he’d envisioned.

Perhaps he should have visited a dolly-mop or two in London before returning to the village if his idea of luscious womanhood was this defiant filly.

As they strode along the village lane, Verity scampered behind the stone fences and hedgerows, just out of sight, but following closely, as she must have earlier when she’d trailed him here. His daughter was far too clever and bold for her own good.

The silence grew awkward. Lucas sought for some means of breaking it, but he did not have much experience in conversing with unattached females. He had rather hoped for a businesslike transaction. Courting was another matter entirely — provided he wanted to court a woman who defied him before they even exchanged greetings.

“Do you prefer rural society to London?” he asked, wincing at his stilted tone.

“I believe I prefer animal society,” she responded without inflection.

Perhaps he should have listened to Lorena. Miss Briggs was not a comfortable companion, at the very least. Just a little annoyed that she ignored him to keep her eye on Verity, he released some of his frustration.

“Pets cannot talk back?” he suggested with a hint of sarcasm.

She shot him a sideways glance but whether of surprise, appreciation or distaste, he could not discern.

“Animals do talk back, if only one listens. Rather like children, actually.” Her small boots kicked up dust on the rutted dirt lane.

“Children aren’t supposed to talk back. They are too young to offer intelligent observation and must be educated.”

She made a rude noise that startled him. He was very much out of touch if ladies these days made uncouth sounds instead of pouting prettily.

“I have not been back in the country long,” he admitted cautiously. “Perhaps I am missing the nuances of your reply.”

She bestowed a laughing look on him. “What would you think if your batman snorted at your priggish assertion?”

He’d definitely been around men too long. Her laughter stirred his interest more than a little, despite her insult. “I would think he needed his pay docked,” he responded tartly. “Would you take that attitude from a kitchen wench?”

“I would if she was speaking about something of which she knew more than I did,” she said.

There was the spirited girl he remembered, although he’d rather forgotten that she had a tart tongue to match her intelligence. But she was wrong if she thought a child ought to be allowed to talk disrespectfully to her elders.

“Invisible Girl shouldn’t climb trees,” Harriet abruptly called as Verity headed for a low-hanging apple branch. “Trees make her visible.”

Verity darted back into the cover of the hedge.

Now he was more than intrigued. “Invisible Girl?” he enquired.

She shrugged. “Women and children are expected to be invisible. That works for some of us. Not all.”

“Expecting Verity to behave is not asking her to be invisible. There is a reason discipline and authority are required,” he objected. “If my men didn’t follow my command, they could put themselves or others in harm’s way.”

“Provided your command was correct,” she argued. “You do not allow for independent thinking.”

“Not while I’m the one responsible for what happens! That’s the entire point of being in charge — to know what is best for those relying on my expertise and knowledge. Verity cannot simply run unchecked about town, not acknowledging anyone’s authority but her own.”

“She is a child! She cannot be expected to respect the authority of someone she barely knows. And who barely knows her! Have you even tried to understand your daughter, Major Sumner?”

“I shouldn’t have to understand her, Miss Briggs,” he declared. “She should simply obey the adults in her life until she’s reached an age of reason.”

Miss Briggs gave him a look of incredulity, emitted another rude snort, and climbed the turnstile to join Verity in the field. Together, they ran laughing in the direction of the village.

Lucas didn’t think his suit was going very well. Perhaps he should consider plump, henpecked Mary after all. He marched down the lane, realizing this was the first time he’d seen Verity laugh since he’d returned home. He tugged uncomfortably at his neckcloth.

Striding down the lane after Sunday dinner, Harriet knew she’d behaved badly earlier in the week. And she’d done so deliberately, rejecting Major Sumner before he could reject her. She’d seen the disapproval in his eyes, let it raise her temper and then she’d goaded him into behaving like a military high stickler. Which he was, or at least, he had been. That did not mean he was a bad man, just one accustomed to certain behaviour.

The kind of behaviour a child could not follow. Nor Harriet, for all that mattered, but that did not mean Major Sumner was wrong. It just meant that he and his daughter would have a very hard time of it, if someone did not intervene.

She was probably not the right person to do so, but who else would? The other unattached ladies in town simply whispered to each other behind their hands, wearing their best bonnets in hopes that Major Sumner would notice them. As if he was likely to notice a bonnet full of roses and birds! They’d do better to wear stiff military caps to make him feel more at home.

Mary had taken him a basket of muffins. Jane had taken him a pie. The child and Major Sumner would not go hungry, at least. But Verity would be ignored and feel even more like an Invisible Girl.

Verity was the only reason Harriet was marching down the lane this fine April Sunday afternoon, carrying a basket containing an adorable black-and-white kitten that would create havoc in Major Sumner’s orderly household. Perhaps he needed to be reminded — as the other ladies would not — that he was not the only person in his home.