“Mr. Kavanagh!” Petrocelli said cheerfully. “It’s been a while, hasn’t it?”
You had to give it to Petrocelli. He’d never indicated that he knew anything about Ross’s disgrace, even though it had been in all the papers. “Two dogs, Luigi. Easy on the sauerkraut.”
“You bet.” The man began slathering two buns with mustard, ketchup and sauerkraut. Toby stood on his toes and watched, politely restrained, but clearly ravenous. He thanked the vendor very graciously, glanced at Ross for permission, then bit into his hot dog with every indication of pure bliss, just like any redblooded American boy.
“Relative of yours?” Petrocelli asked. “There’s something familiar about him.”
The vendor’s casual words hit Ross like a line drive. He grabbed Toby and pulled him away before he was tempted to make up some pathetic story about a long-lost nephew.
At least the long-lost part is accurate.
Oblivious to Ross’s turmoil, Toby drifted along the sidewalk, hot dog in hand, turning in slow circles as he took in the towering buildings on every side. Ross plucked him from the edge of the kerb when he would have walked right into the street.
“Listen, kid,” he said, planting Toby in front of him. “This is New York. Haven’t you ever been in a big city before?”
Toby gazed at him with the slightly blank expression of a rube just off the train from Podunk. “Grandfather, Mother and I went to London once, when I was very small. I don’t really remember.”
Ross was momentarily distracted by thoughts of Gillian and grimly forced his attention back to the matter at hand. “London ain’t New York,” he said. “You can get yourself hurt a hundred different ways here if you’re not careful.”
“Oh! You don’t have to worry. I can take care of myself.”
Ross tried to imagine what it must have been like for a little boy to cross the ocean alone and make his way from the docks to Midtown without adult assistance. The kid had guts, no doubt of that. “Do you have any money?” he asked.
Toby plunged his hand into his trousers and removed a wad of badly crinkled bills. “I have pound notes and a few American dollars,” he said. “Do you need them, Father?”
Damn. “You hold on to them for now.” He frowned at Toby’s gray tweed suit with its perfectly cut jacket and short trousers, now disheveled and stained. “That the only outfit you’ve got?”
“Oh, no. I have another suit in my bag. I’m sorry I didn’t have time to change.”
His expression was suddenly anxious, as if he expected Ross to blame him for the state of his clothes. Ross reached out and put his hand on the boy’s shoulder.
“Listen,” he said. “I’m down to my last clean shirt myself. Guys in my line of work—” my former line of work “—don’t always have time to look pretty.”
Toby relaxed for about ten seconds before his facile mind latched on to a new subject. “Have you arrested lots of criminals, Father?”
Ross wondered why he was so bent on making the kid think well of him. “I’ve taken a few bad guys off the streets in my day.”
“Capital!” Toby’s eyes swept the streets as if he expected a mobster to appear right in front of them. “Do you think we’ll meet any bootleggers?” he asked eagerly.
“We aren’t going to see any bootleggers, mobsters or criminals of any kind.”
Toby’s face fell. “You said New York was dangerous.”
“It’s not like there’s a gunfight every few minutes. You just have to be careful.” He resisted the urge to take out his handkerchief and wipe a bit of mustard from Toby’s upper lip. “You wouldn’t have made it this far if you weren’t pretty good at that.”
Another lightning-quick change of mood and Toby was grinning again. “Will you show me all around New York? Will we see the Woolworth Building and Coney Island?”
Ross cleared his throat. He still wasn’t prepared to lie to the kid, but he didn’t have to tell the whole truth, either. “I’ll see what I can do,” he said. “You need a wash-up, first. And a nap.”
“Oh, I don’t take naps anymore.”
“You will today.”
Toby groaned. “You sound just like Mother.”
Ross grabbed Toby’s hand and flagged down a taxi. “How is she?” he asked.
The question was out before he could stop it. Don’t kid yourself. You’d have asked it sooner or later.
“Oh, she’s all right.”
Ross said nothing until a cab pulled up, and he and Toby were in the backseat. “Does she live alone?” he asked. “I mean…” Idiot. He shut up before he dug the hole any deeper.
But Toby was too bright to have missed his intent. “I haven’t got another father,” he said. “I always knew my real father wasn’t dead.”
“Mr. Delvaux…”
“Mother never talked about him. I’m not even sure he’s real.”
“You mean your mother wasn’t really married?”
Now you’ve done it, he thought. But Toby didn’t seem to be offended.
“I don’t know,” the boy said. “Some of the pages in her diary were missing, but there was enough in it to help me find you.”
Gillian had kept a diary. About him. And she’d somehow known that he’d gone into the force when he returned to America. He hadn’t even thought about it himself until he was standing on the East River docks, trying to think of the best way to forget Gillian Maitland.
Why hadn’t she forgotten him?
“Didn’t you think how upset your mother would be when you ran away?” he asked, resolutely focusing on the present.
Toby hunched his shoulders. “She has enough things to worry about.”
Ross swallowed the questions that immediately popped into his head. “Your mother has done a lot more than just worry.”
A speculative look came into Toby’s hazel eyes. “How do you know that, Father?”
“She sent someone to look for you. A man called Ethan Warbrick.”
“Uncle Ethan?” Toby’s forehead creased with concern. “Don’t tell him I’m here.” He tugged at Ross’s sleeve. “Please, Father.”
“Don’t you like him?”
“He’s all right, but…” He lowered his voice. “I think he wants to marry my mother.”
“War—Uncle Ethan isn’t a werewolf, is he?”
Toby looked up at him curiously. “No,” he said. “Did you think he was?”
“He knows all about werewolves.”
“Mother and Uncle Ethan were secret friends when they were children.”
“Does she want to marry Uncle Ethan?” he asked, cursing himself for his weakness.
“I don’t know,” Toby said slowly, as if he’d given the matter some thought. “You wouldn’t let him, would you?”
Ross didn’t get a chance to come up with an answer, because the cab had arrived at his building and someone was standing by the door. Someone Ross recognized the moment she turned her head and looked straight into his eyes.