“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 up next month. She’d made fast friends with him as she peppered him with questions about his celebrity passengers and near misses when it came to women almost giving birth on the back seat. Her sunny nature didn’t appear to have been put on for my benefit. Or if it had, it was extended to the cabbie as well. She seemed genuinely happy. All. The. Time.
At least she hadn’t broken out into song.
We stepped out of the cab onto the street, and I lifted Bethany onto my shoulders like we normally did. This time of year, the crowds wouldn’t be too bad, but I wasn’t taking any chances. Bethany was safe and also had the best view.
“Could there be anything more iconically British then going to see the changing of the guard in a black cab?” Autumn asked, her wide smile lighting up a very dull April morning.
“Bears!” Bethany said, pointing toward the palace.
“Let’s go,” I replied. “We need to get a good spot.” There were just a few people here right now but within ten minutes, thousands would appear from nowhere like ants on ice cream.
I felt the vibration of my phone in my pocket before I heard it and my gut swirled like week-old gravy. I knew it would be Mike. I wanted to dump him as a client but with the economy in the ditch, he was the only person making sure I wasn’t pushed out of the firm. I pulled the phone from my pocket, holding both of Bethany’s legs with one hand. Even with my daughter’s splayed hands across my forehead and one eye, I could make out that it was indeed Mike.
“Work?” Autumn asked.
“Yeah,” I said. “I have one particularly demanding client. Doesn’t have kids so doesn’t get wanting to be away from the office.”
“But, man, it’s the weekend.”
“Says the woman who’s hanging out with her boss and her charge.”
She laughed. “I suppose. But this is fun.” She clapped her mitten-covered hands together and turned to Bethany. “I can see the bear soldiers!”
If she was having fun, she’d stay for her full term. Bethany seemed to like Autumn, and other than her love of musicals, she wasn’t a terrible lodger. I was barely at home anyway and when I was, I spent most of the time in my workshop. For me, our arrangement was a perfect fit.
We got to the palace gates and huddled into one of the remaining slots in front of the tall black railings surrounding the palace.
“Honestly, I’ve been waiting to see this since I was nine years old,” Autumn said.
“The changing of the guard?”
“Yes. And London. And the world,” she said, tilting her head back as far as she could, as if she was trying to make out Jupiter.
“You’ve always wanted to travel?” I asked.
“Always. And when Hollie got to come to Europe first, I knew I wouldn’t be far behind. I can’t wait to see the Colosseum. The Eiffel Tower. I want to go and watch the . . .” She made pincer movements with her fingers. “You know, in Seville.”
“Flamenco?” I suggested.
“Gah,” she replied, closing her eyes and inhaling as if she was breathing in a bouquet of summer flowers. “I can’t wait. I thought I’d have to wait for paid vacation but turns out not having my job start until next September means I can spend the whole of August travelling. Things have turned out for the best.”