even known a man could be that way. After all, her earliest and almost only memories of her own father all included her being viciously beaten or slapped.
Seeing him kneel down beside this ragged street urchin and speak in hushed tones, her heart remembered all over again why she’d fallen in love with him.
And she hated it.
Because it was easier to resent the man who’d paraded her before his duke and duchess grandparents . . . and his former betrothed . . . than to face the man who was so tender and so perfect with little children.
A man who should have children of his own . . .
Oh, God. It is too much.
The child in her arms squirmed, and she relaxed the unintended tight grip she’d had upon the girl.
“Now, Chance,” Dare was saying. “I take it you have some manner of explanation about the babe?” Ever so gently, he stroked the top of the child’s head.
“It’s a girl,” Lionel piped in.
The sight of him, so tender with the child, ravaged Temperance’s already weak heart.
Clearing his throat, Chance released Gwynn’s hand. “He is the younger brother of Joseph Gurney.”
At last the reason Lionel was so familiar made sense. He’d the look of his older brother, Chance’s best friend from the Rookeries. The pair had hero-worshipped Dare, looking to him to teach them how to thieve.
“And . . . was he caught stealing?” Dare asked.
“No,” Chance said instantly. “Joseph followed the honorable path, like myself.” Color filled the young man’s cheeks. “No offense, sir,” he said gruffly.
“None taken.”
He’d never been the manner of man to be offended . . . or possessed of an ego. “Gurney is a carder at another mill,” Temperance murmured, bringing them back to the matter of Lionel’s brother.
Chance’s mouth flattened. “Joseph’s proprietor is not nearly as kind or generous as Mr. Buxton. Punishing fellow. Cuts wages for imagined offenses, and keeps the differences for himself. He accused Gurney of stealing . . . but he was only keeping what he had coming to him. And now he’s stuck in gaol.”
And yet . . .
Quizzically, Dare looked to the little girl. “And the babe?”
“She’s moi brother’s babe,” Lionel interjected. “But Joseph’s been put in Newgate, and it doesn’t look loike he’s returnin’, and my da didn’t . . . doesn’t want ’er,” Lionel said with a matter-of-factness that made Temperance’s chest ache for altogether different reasons.
Wasn’t that the way of the Rookeries, though? Daughters were of little value until they were of an age where they could be whored to the depraved . . . or somehow found other skills to justify their existence, as Temperance had with her sewing.
The boy shrugged. “She’s just a girl,” he added, as if it’d not been perfectly clear as to why the child had been rejected.
“And no less special for it,” Dare reminded the boy.
Temperance’s eyes filled, and the pair conversing blurred. Dare would have never been one to reject a child because of their gender. Caring for strangers as he did, he would have only passionately loved whatever child had been his.
But then hadn’t he shown her that same kindness and regard when she’d been just a girl? When she and all her suffering and the abuse she’d endured at Abaddon Swift’s hand had gone ignored or been unseen by the other boys and men in the Rookeries?
“That’s why I sent him looking for you,” Chance said quietly. “Mr. Buxton has been traveling, and there’s been more work for me to see to because of it. As such, I couldn’t get away from my work to speak to you myself . . . before now.”
And in that desire to look after others, her brother proved so very much like the man he’d looked up to as a father, the one who’d been around since Chance had been the smallest child and had been raised like he were a babe of his own. Her heart hurt for the bond that had been lost . . . between Dare and Chance.
Between her and Dare. If she were being honest with herself, she mourned that loss, too.
She always would.
Dare looked briefly over to the child on Temperance’s lap with a tenderness that continued to wreak havoc on Temperance’s heart. “What is her name?”
“Rose,” Lionel answered. “’er name is Rose.”
“Rose,” Temperance murmured to herself, and the little girl briefly quieted in her arms. With her bright-red cheeks and the mop of auburn curls on her head, it was a perfect name for