Page 84 of The Duke's Only Desire

Chapter Twenty-Five

Sophie bit herlip as she looked from the note in her gloved hand to the plain door on Ironmonger Lane, marked only with a hand-scrawled number 5 in black paint. The number was undoubtedly a mocking nod to the aristocratic townhouses circling grand squares to the west, where people needed to distinguish one identical house from another so they would know which one was home to which peer and his family.

Here, though, there were no grand houses, and most people who lived in the area didn’t want to be found.

“This is it.” She rested her hand on Shay’s arm to stop him as he walked beside her. She nodded toward the door and the boarding house beyond, located above a ground floor pawn shop. “Cora White’s last known location.”

“Hopefully, she’s still in residence,” Shay mumbled and stepped up to the door to give it a sharp knock.

Sophie held her breath, waiting.

The door rattled open with a grating creak, and a gray-haired matron in a brown worsted wool dress and stained apron stared out at them. “What do you want?” She swept a glance over both Sophie and Shay and muttered, “Your sort don’t belong here.”

“My sort doesn’t belong anywhere,” Shay countered, catching the woman by surprise. “We’re looking for Mrs. Cora Cole. We were told she’d taken a bed here.”

When the matron stiffened, Sophie knew, in preparation to tell them to bugger off and leave her boarders alone, she dangled the only bait she knew the woman would care about—“We have some funds for her. She’s owed five pounds by us, and we want to pay our debts so she can pay off hers.”

The woman’s eyes flared at that bit of juicy information. After all, if Cora White was living as most single women in London were, then she was surviving hand to mouth, never knowing if she would have enough money to pay rent for the week. Five pounds was a fortune for someone in her situation and could keep her in a place like this for over a year, with food in her belly, a roof over her head…and a landlady who was happily paid on time.

“Wait here,” the woman ordered. “I’ll fetch her.”

Sophie took a step forward and placed her hand beseechingly on the woman’s arm, afraid Cora wouldn’t come. “Tell her it regards Ruby.”

“Rubies,” the woman repeated with a nod, misunderstanding, and most likely thinking the promised money was in jewels.

Sophie didn’t correct her. What mattered was that Cora would understand the message.

Then the woman stepped inside and closed the door.

“That was smart of you,” Shay murmured as he came up behind her on the narrow footpath.

“Every mother cares more about her child than she ever would a fortune in funds.” Then she corrected, thinking of her own estranged mother and Shay’s, “Everygoodmother.”

He squeezed her elbow and released her arm to step back, his boot splashing into a brown puddle of filth whose contents let loose a foul odor, just like the other puddles scattered along the road and patches of trash thrown into doorways and recesses.But Shay said nothing, barely noticing. Sophie was certain he’d seen much worse during the wars.

She gazed up at the building’s facade. The old pawn shop had been abandoned and, judging from the layer of dust and cobwebs clinging to its windows, it had been for quite some time, but its three-ball sign still dangled over the door. Most likely, the rooms for let overhead had once been storage rooms for its goods…or used for other nefarious means.

“Cora White must have some kind of steady employment,” Shay mused, “to afford any kind of roof over her head, even if she’s most likely sharing a bed with another boarder or two.”

Sophie nodded, hoping that work wasn’t prostitution. Too many women were forced into doing exactly that when they couldn’t find enough pennies to buy bread or shelter. Jobs for women were scarce at best, and even those women who were gainfully employed had no choice but to sell their bodies occasionally when money ran short at the end of the month. With no respectable opportunity to earn a living and no family or husband to turn to, they had no other choice. None of the MPs or lords in Parliament seemed to care, at least not enough to change the poor laws to truly help those in need. They simply blamed the poor themselves by labeling them as lazy or criminal.

But knowing Cora White had steady employment didn’t lessen the guilt Sophie knew Shay felt at his part in ruining her life. Although, if they were both being honest with themselves, Cora would have been ruined that night, fire or no. At being told she was carrying his child, John would have done nothing but laugh in her face.

“How is it possible,” Sophie wondered in a soft whisper, half to Shay and half to herself, as she took his hand, “that your parents raised two men who were so completely different in character?”

He squeezed her fingers. “Sheer luck.”

That was the god’s truth.

The door opened, and a young woman with dark brown hair and a slender build who couldn’t have been any older than Sophie stared out at them. Her eyes blinked with confusion as they swept over Sophie, only to widen when she saw Shay.

Sophie knew her gasp of surprise wasn’t because of his scars. It was from recognition, followed by a swift paling and a hard swallow.

“You…” the woman whispered hoarsely, her eyes glued to Shay.

He doffed his hat politely. “Mrs. Cole…or should I say Miss White?”

Her hand tightened on the door handle so hard her fingertips turned white. “What do you want? Mrs. Jones said someone was here about Ruby, but you’re not from the hospital.”