Page 82 of The Duke's Only Desire

Chapter Twenty-Four

“Good evening, Mr.and Mrs. Alton,” Michael Connor, the former runner turned private investigator said as he sat behind his desk in his little office located just off Bow Street. “The hour’s late. Shall we strike right to the matter, then?”

Shay saw Sophie tense as she sat in her chair beside him, her face pale. He reached to cover her hand with his as it rested on the chair arm and gave it a reassuring squeeze, but the little gesture did little to put her at ease. He didn’t blame her. This evening meeting certainly must be frazzling her nerves.

All those precautions they’d taken—of him pretending to ride north and then arriving in London under a false name, of Chase escorting her to the George Inn—they’d set her on edge. Movements like those weren’t a part of her world, even if they’d become engrained in his. But they couldn’t be helped. He’d received reports from Lucien Grenier, Duke of Crewe, that Malcolm had arrived in London shortly after Sophie, most likely having followed her to make certain his spies’ reports were accurate, that she truly had put an end to their marriage.

His fingers laced protectively through hers. That nonsense would end soon, he’d make certain of it. This meeting with Connor was simply the start.

Connor perched a pair of spectacles on his nose and thumbed through a short stack of papers. With hair graying at his templesand unkempt clothes that hadn’t had the attention of a valet, the effect made him look more like an unassuming country solicitor than one of the best runners in Bow Street history. And one of its deadliest. Michael Connor was not to be messed with. Which was precisely why Shay had hired him.

“I believe I’ve found the little girl you’re looking for,” the investigator mumbled, preoccupied with sorting his papers.

Sophie’s fingers tightened against Shay’s. “Are you certain?”

He lifted his gaze from the desk to give her a patronizing look. “Be assured, ma’am, that I amverygood at what I do.”

Instead of that curt reply angering Sophie, Shay felt her exhale a long breath of relief.Good.They had to trust Connor. He was the only one who could find Cora White and her child with the scant information Shay had been able to provide. The man could be the rudest bastard to ever walk London’s streets for all Shay cared, as long as he could help them.

“Three years ago, a baby girl was given to the Foundling Hospital.” Connor turned his attention back to the short stack of papers. “The mother insisted the girl’s name not be changed. The mother had named her Ruby, you see, and she was afraid the nurses at the hospital would change it to something more Christian.”

Shay’s heart skipped, but he kept his face carefully stoic, both for Connor and Sophie. He didn’t want the investigator to learn how important the girl truly was to them, and he didn’t want to give Sophie false hope. For all they knew, the baby had died, as most of the children admitted to the hospital did, or the mother had completely abandoned her child, given a false name and address, and vanished. Finding the child without the mother would do them no good.

“Most mothers leave little trinkets with their babies to identify them later, should they become able to reclaim them…love knots, pieces of fabric, handmade rattles, and whatnot. Thehospital has tried to put a stop to the custom, yet it persists.” The investigator’s voice was completely callous and unsentimental, as if he couldn’t care less about a mother’s agony at having to relinquish her baby. But then, after all Connor had seen in his long career, he must have had to harden himself against emotions, just as soldiers did. “This one left a cravat pin with initials engraved into it—D and J.”

Shay felt Sophie catch her breath. JD…John Douglass.That baby girl was the one they were looking for.

“Is the child alive?” Shay asked.

“For the moment.” Connor busied himself with searching through his papers. “Her mother’s name was registered as Cora, the same Christian name you gave me.” He found the page he sought, turned it around, and slid it across the desk toward Shay and Sophie. Then he sat back in his chair. “But the surname wasn’t White. It was Cole.”

Shay had expected a false name. In order to surrender a child to the Foundling Hospital, a mother had to have fallen into financial desperation through no fault of her own and not through any immoral circumstance such as getting with child out of wedlock. All unwed mothers were turned away, so were women who had abandoned their husbands. God only knew what happened to those women and children, how long they suffered on the streets before perishing to starvation or the elements. Or were murdered.

Cora White undoubtedly told them the baby’s father had died, if not from some terrible accident during his work—always believable, given how many men were killed each year on the docks or in the warehouses—then from fever or infection. She could have claimed her husband died in the wars, too, given how few widows had actually been paid their husband’s death benefits. Those who did receive them soon learned the amount wasn’t enough for one person to live on, let alone to raisea family. There would have been more than enough former soldiers in London who had fallen on hard times for her to find one and bribe him into testifying that the man knew her dead husband. With death so prevalent in London, the hospital administrators would never have questioned her story.

“Her residence.” Connor tapped his finger on the sheet of paper. “A boarding house in Cheapside.”

Like the father and her witness, most likely also a fake. “If the baby was given up three years ago,” Shay drawled, “she’s certainly moved on since then.” If she had ever lived there at all.

“This one is current. She updates her information with the hospital, which means she labors under the false hope that someday she’ll be able to reclaim the child.”

“She labors under love, you mean,” Sophie corrected softly. “What mother wouldn’t want to be reunited with her child?”

The investigator leveled a hard look on Sophie. “Many.”

A faint tremble raced through Sophie, but she said nothing in return to that, although Shay suspected she wanted to reach across the desk and slap the man. Hard.

“But you might just be right about this one, Mrs. Alton,” the investigator conceded with a nod at the sheet listing all the information he’d been able to gather about Cora Cole. “This one hasn’t completely abandoned her child. According to my contacts within the hospital, she regularly brings small gifts for the girl and the wet nurse who cares for her, most likely to bribe the woman into taking better care of her daughter. Clothing, shoes, and small toys for the child…food, candles, and such for the nurse.”

“So she’s in direct contact with the child?” Shay asked, already contemplating the best way to convince the woman to testify on their behalf.

“She hasn’t seen the girl since she gave her up three years ago. She delivers the objects to the hospital, and they send themon. The hospital forbids interaction. I’m certain you understand their reasons.”

Very much.The hospital couldn’t allow a mother to interfere in the lives of the wet nurses and the other children they might also be caring for, or give unscrupulous mothers the opportunity to extort the nurses. Or worse—to give unscrupulous nurses the opportunity to exploit the mothers.

“All Mrs. Cole knows,” the investigator continued, not trying to hide a knowing sneer at the use of her false name, “is that her baby has been sent to a wet nurse to be cared for. When the child is old enough, she’ll be brought back to the hospital and raised there until she is either old enough to be placed into a position of some kind or until her mother finds the means to reclaim her. As I’m certain you’re aware, most children are never reclaimed by their mothers and are placed into work. That is, if they’ve managed to live that long. Most die before they’re two. Those who survive beyond two die by the time they’re seven, and any who survive beyond that are lucky to see twelve and an apprenticeship. It’s a harsh reality, yet it’s the truth.”

“Which is why we need to find Ruby and her mother,” Sophie interjected, releasing Shay’s hand and shifting forward to the edge of her seat. “Before something terrible happens to them.”