Page 51 of The Duke and the Darkness

“Good night, Mr. Hunter. Sleep well.”

He glanced at Peyton with concern. Sleep?Impossible.Yet he nodded his gratitude and escorted her across the large front room that served as dining hall, common room, and reception for the children who sought refuge here and toward the wide wooden steps in the center of the building where porters had once stomped up and down to store goods in the old warehouse.

“Mr. Hunter?” Peyton murmured, her voice as soft as shadows around them.

“You’re not the only one with a false identity, Lady Payne.”

“Yes, but you’re a duke. I’m dead to the world.” She paused for a beat before adding in her grief, “And now the world is dead to me.”

“Oh no, it’s not.” But the firmness with which he said that did nothing to lessen her anguish.

Instead of leading her upstairs, he guided her down into the cellar. He unlocked the door barring their way at the bottom of the steps, and she stopped and stared at the room beyond when he pushed open the door.

Her hand dropped away from his arm. “What is this place?”

“It was used to store casks of wine,” he explained as he closed and locked the door behind them. He paused to take a look around what could be seen of the long, narrow cellar in the dim candlelight. It was filled with fighting equipment and a separate living space at the far end where he could collapse from exhaustion after a long night of training or haunting the city streets…or from being haunted. “Now its purpose is the same as the three floors above.”

Her gaze fixed on a dummy target made of burlap sack, sawdust, and reed layers that had seen too many days at the end of his sword. “Which is?”

He acknowledged quietly, “A refuge.”

She arched a disbelieving brow.

He took her arm and led her through the room in the soft light of the candle so she wouldn’t trip over any unseen apparatus in the dark that he had left strewn across the floor after his last visit. “I use this place to hone my fighting edge,” he explained vaguely. And where he could physically take out his frustrations and lingering resentments. Here, he could let loose the pent-up anger that he hid from the rest of the world. Anthony Titus had taught him that.Control.The problem wasn’t when a fighter succumbed to his emotions; that always needed to happen in the end, one way or another. No, the problem was when those emotions couldn’t be controlled until they could be dealt with.

Here, he could control them.

He guided her to a separate room in the rear of the cellar. Although calling the room a bedroom was a stretch, it did hold a small bed…and nothing else except a worn leather reading chair where he usually tossed his clothes and a bedside table that held a bottle of brandy, which he often needed far more than the bed. A rickety old Franklin stove sat in the corner, its pipe sticking up thorough a hole in the foundation and emerging in the sliver of the rear yard tucked behind the building.

“We’ll stay here for the night,” he explained as he closed the door and set the candle on the stove. “You’re safe. No one knows to look for us here.” He added in a mutter as he knelt in front of the stove and began to build a small fire inside its metal belly, “Not even my family.”

“And Mr. Hunter?”

He pushed the candle inside the grate to light the tinder. “He’s a very private patron who owns the building and funds the services it provides.”

“What exactly are those services?”

His lips curled slightly as he concentrated on the fire. She was asking questions, if quietly. That was a good sign. “We takein homeless children who have nowhere else to go for shelter and security. We ask no questions, give them a small meal and a clean bed, and provide a safe place for them to spend the night, with a locked door between them and whoever might want to harm them. From dusk to dawn, we provide a temporary reprieve from the streets.”

When the flame caught, he tossed in a few lumps of coal and stirred them until a small but growing warmth emanated from the stove.

“Sometimes we’re able to find work for the older ones, positions on ships or in households. A few want to go to school. Some come for several nights in a row. Others stay once and never come back.” He rocked back onto his heels and flipped shut the front grill. “Mostly, though, we address the most pressing needs of food and shelter from the weather.”

She nodded toward the training room. “Something tells me Mr. Hunter does far more in this place than just write cheques.”

“As I said, it’s a refuge.” Devlin pushed himself up to his full height. “Sometimes Mr. Hunter finds children on the streets himself and sends them here.”

“And sometimes he goes out looking for children to help, I would wager,” she added quietly, still standing by the door but not yet entering.

“Sometimes,” he admitted, carrying the candle to the bedside table. “Only children on the streets know about this place, and even then, most children who hear about it think it’s a fairytale. They can’t bring themselves to believe that someone might care about what happens to them.”

“And why does Mr. Hunter care?”

If he had to explain that, the night would be very long. Instead, he poured a glass of brandy from the bottle sitting on the table. He took a long, calming swallow, then held it out toward her.

“Until we can learn more about the explosion,” he said, bluntly changing the conversation, “this is the best place for us to hide. I’ve sent word to two friends to ask for their help…Lucien Grenier and Chase Maddox.” Neither man had any idea this place existed. By morning, his two old friends would learn the last of his secrets. “We can trust them with our lives.”

With a silent sigh that drooped her shoulders, she came into the room and took the glass from his hand. She took a long drink, then rested the back of her hand against her lips as the liquor seeped down her slender throat.