Rafe stood. “All right, Charlie. Tell your friends this was very nice, but…Mrs. Dazzling and I are not getting married. Nor are we kissing.”
Exhaling loudly, Charlie started to turn toward the stairs. “They won’t like it when I tell them.”
Rafe went to the boy and touched his shoulder. “I appreciate your efforts very much. Please thank them for me, will you?”
“I will. Annie’s still going to be disappointed.” As he climbed back up the stairs, Rafe’s throat tightened.
“That was very sweet,” Anne said softly from just to his left.
He hadn’t realized she’d gotten up from the table. “Yes.”
“You have quite an extended family.”
Rafe blinked in surprise. He’d never thought of them like that. He helped children when he could. Some went on to find their way, and a few, like Daniel, even kept in touch. Others accepted his support for a time, then disappeared. Thankfully, there were fewer of those.
“Selina and I were alone. The man who cared for us, who claimed to be our uncle, wasn’t particularly kind.” Rafe would have given anything for an adult to take a genuine interest in him, beyond what use he could provide. There’d been one woman—a friend’s mother—but she’d struggled at the time, drinking too much gin and with too many children of her own. Still, she’d looked after him and Selina as much as she could. He’d kept in contact with her even after she’d stopped drinking and gotten married, and Selina had rekindled their relationship when she’d returned to London a few months prior.
Anne touched his sleeve, her fingers curling around his arm just below his elbow. “You don’t say much about your childhood. I know your sister went to school. Did you?”
“No. I was privately tutored.” The lie fell from his tongue, but he supposed it was perversely true. He just hadn’t been tutored in the same things he would have been as the son of an earl.
“How did that man come to care for you? What happened to him?”
Rafe brushed his hand through his hair, effectively dislodging her grasp. “I don’t like to discuss it. I don’t like questions.”
“I know. But I can’t seem to stop myself asking them.”
Rafe went back to his chair, turning his back to her. “He was responsible for our kidnapping. He brought us to London from Stonehaven. He died a long time ago.”
“Why would he take you away?” The anguish in her question was answered by the anger trapped inside him.
“I can’t ask him, can I?” Nor did he need to. Edgar had taken two children whom he could use to fatten his own pockets through swindling and thievery.
He exhaled and took a sip of his weak, lukewarm tea, not because he wanted it but because it was something to do. “This was very nice,” he whispered, looking at the table and moved by the children’s thoughtfulness. “We should at least finish one cup of tea and our biscuits.”
“Yes, we should.” Anne joined him at the table, and they both sat.
He took a large bite of the biscuit and choked it down with a swig of tea. Anne did something similar, though she took a smaller taste. She also winced slightly as she swallowed.
“What’s your favorite kind of biscuit?” he asked.
“I don’t think I have one.” She tipped her head to the side. “I do love almond.”
“I like that too. I’m afraid I’m a glutton for marzipan.”
Her eyes glowed with amusement. “Oh yes, I can eat an entire tray at Yuletide.”
“I think I’m more partial to cakes than biscuits.” He crammed the last of the biscuit into his mouth and swallowed it down with the rest of his tea. “Especially after today.” He laughed, and she joined him.
He held out his hand. “Give me your biscuit. I’ll finish it.”
She hesitated, but only briefly, before depositing the half-eaten biscuit into his palm. “You are a gentleman, regardless of what you say.”
Perhaps he was. At least with her. She seemed to bring out the very best in him. This moment, this ordinary situation, had been mostly absent from his life. And wasn’t this what he wanted? Christ, he’d become far too maudlin since learning who he really was.
He ate the rest of Anne’s biscuit in two bites, then stood and offered her his hand. “Come, I want to take you somewhere.”
She put her hand in his and rose. “Shouldn’t we thank the children?”
“They’re probably listening.” He turned his head toward the stairs. “Thank you, Daniel, Bart, Charlie, and Annie.”
Anne giggled, her eyes lighting. He grabbed her bonnet and gloves from a small table against the wall, then led her to the back door and outside to a narrow alley that ran between the buildings.
Clutching her hand tightly, he guided her through the alley to where it met Warwick Lane. He located the cabriolet and helped her inside as the tiger held the horse. She set her bonnet on her head and brought down the veil as he settled in next to her.
He drove them out to Paternoster Row, but instead of turning west, he went east toward Cheapside.
“You’re not taking me for caviar, are you?”
He laughed. “No. We’re not even stopping along Cheapside.”
“That’s a shame. I thoroughly enjoyed our afternoon here.” Her head moved from side to side as they entered the thoroughfare, and though he couldn’t see her face, he knew she was delighted.
“This is perhaps my favorite part of London.” He hadn’t told her that when they’d come before. He’d always kept his guard up, but suddenly, perhaps because of what the children had tried to do, he just didn’t want to make the effort.
“Even more that Paternoster Row?”
He chuckled. “It’s close. Cheapside wins slightly, only because of its greater size. I imagine how it might have been hundreds of years ago when the streets earned their names—Ironmonger Lane, Bread Street, Milk Street. I wonder what those people who lived here would say if they could see it now.”
“They would be amazed. At all of London.”
Just before they reached Poultry Street, he steered them to the right onto Bucklersbury Lane. Partway down, he pulled the cabriolet to the side and came to a stop.
“You can see Mansion House quite well from here,” she said, gesturing to the end of the street in front of them.
“Yes.” Seeing that grand house had been one of the reasons he’d chosen Bucklersbury Lane for his own residence. He looked to the left at the house in front of where they’d stopped. “This is my house.”
She lifted her veil and took in the narrow brick façade. “This is where you lived as a child?”
He shook his head. “This is where I lived the past four years. Would you like to come inside?”
“Very much.”
He helped her from the vehicle and returned the cabriolet to his tiger’s care. Offering her his arm, he guided her up the steps. He inserted a key in the lock, and by the time they walked into the entry hall, Mrs. Watts came hurrying to greet them.
A short, stocky woman, the housekeeper also served as his cook. Her biscuits were never too salty, and she was, in fact, the reason he adored cakes.
“Mr. Bowles,” she said with a smile, her gaze flitting to Anne. “I didn’t expect to see you today.”