An Inconvenient Anthology

Lord Rothbury Makes A Promise

Lord Benedict William Montgomery was forced to abandon his work when the door to his study banged open without so much as a by your leave. He was prepared to put on the strict father act and deliver a lecture about knocking when he was confronted by his biggest weakness.

His youngest stood at the door, her hair arranged into plaits that had become unruly at some point, her coffee-brown eyes pooling with tears. Ben's resolve crumbled in a second.

"Seph, sweetheart?" He rushed to her. "What is the matter?"

"S-Selene and Charlie won't p-play tea party with me!" She wailed and threw herself into his arms sobbing as if she'd been grievously wronged. "Selene s-said that tea party is for babies a-and Charlie says he doesn't want to play girl games."

"Oh, no, poor sweetheart," He lifted her into his arms and kissed her hair. He felt for her, she was younger than Selene by six years and Charlie by three years. Selene, on the very cusp of adolescence, was desperate to prove that she was no longer a child. Charlie, at almost ten, was beginning to realize that perhaps not all boys allowed their sisters to dress them up with bows and pins in their hair. He was very desperate to prove his masculinity, asking his grandmother for a set of toy knights as a gift instead of his typical fare of storybooks. "Why don't you play with Nanny and Miss Dolly?"

"It's Nanny's day off and I don't like Miss Dolly anymore. Charlie broke her arm because he wanted to play war games and he didn't have enough knights. Now she is ugly."

Ben's eyebrow arched in ducal disapproval, why they'd only bought Miss Dolly last week! And Charlie had a whole set of toy knights and horses gifted to him by his grandmother at the same time! He opened his mouth to offer a lecture on responsibility but was once again defeated by the sight of a tear sliding down her chubby little cheek.

He was hopeless.

"We'll buy a new doll," Ben found himself promising, and that finally elicited a smile from his youngest.

"This is why you're my best friend, Papa," she planted a kiss smack onto the bridge of his nose, a gesture her mother frequently did for him but with a touch more gentility. Oh God. How was a man to resist such unfettered adorableness?

With a rueful smile, Ben considered whether he would have ever even conceived the thought that either of his parents could be his friends and the answer was a resounding no. Would he have ever heard these precious words if his wife hadn't shown him that there was much love that he could give and receive? Likely he would have been the same frigid sort of parent that his own were

"You'll come play with me, won't you, Papa?"

Ben winced. He really had to read his steward's accounts and review his accounts. He had to respond to several important missives, he had to review the motion he intended to present in parliament the following week, and he had to settle his wife's shopping bills.

"Poppet...."He began hesitantly. And then Persephone employed the most lethal weapon in her arsenal; the wobbling lip.

"But...but I thought you were my best friend," she whispered with heartbreak. "You go riding with Selene. And fishing with Charlie. But you don't want to spend time with me. Are you not my friend, then, Papa? D-do you love Selene and Charlie more than you love me?"

Ah, but the little creature was a master at manipulating her papa. If Minerva was here, she would have firmly told Seph about how busy Ben was and that if she wished to play with him she must wait for the evening when he would be done with all his work. She would have pointed out that Ben had on numerous occasions offered to take Persephone riding, it was her own dislike of horses that had her refusing every time.