She knocked lightly on the library door and heard a muffled “Come” from inside. She eased the door open and entered, her eyes doing an immediate search for him.
He was sitting at his desk holding a quill, but when he saw her, he laid it aside and leaned back in his chair. “Good evening, Jenna.”
She crossed the room and walked around his desk to stand to the side of him. An open ledger sat in front of him next to an inkwell, and it was apparent he’d been working on it before her arrival. “What are you doing?” she asked, her curiosity piqued.
“I am going over my accounts.”
“But surely you have a solicitor for such things.”
He chuckled. “I didn’t get to where I am by trusting others to do things for me.”
She turned and sat down on the desk, sliding back a few inches until her feet dangled over the edge as she had done so often when conversing with her brothers. “So what is it that you do anyway?”
“I am a businessman.”
She snorted. “Aren’t you all? What sort of business do you dabble in?”
He laughed again and rose from his chair. “Spoken like a true aristocrat’s daughter. Come, let’s adjourn by the fire. We’ll talk more there.”
He helped her from the desk and guided her to the rug in front of the stone fireplace. Silk pillows almost as large as Jenna were arranged on the floor, and he settled down onto one of them. He motioned for her to follow suit, and she sank onto one, carefully arranging her skirts around her.
“I don’t dabble in business. I buy them or invest in them, but I take them all very seriously.”
“Were you always so enormously wealthy or did you make your fortune in trade?”
He raised an eyebrow. “Are you so certain I am enormously wealthy?”
“Rumor has it you are as rich as Croesus. You aren’t titled so I assume you weren’t born into wealth.”
He shifted and settled onto his side in front of her, raising up on his elbow to look at her. A glint of amusement sparkled in his eyes. “Not everyone who is born into wealth is titled, Jenna. But no, I was hardly born to it. Quite the opposite actually.”
She leaned forward in interest. “Do go on.”
“I wasn’t a bastard,” he said with a grin. “I am aware of that particular rumor circulating theton. My father was a Scot and my mother was English. I grew up close to the docks and learned early that the only way to assure myself a meal was to work for it.”
“So your parents were poor,” she said softly.
“I don’t think poor accurately describes our living conditions. We lived in squalor and often went days without eating. As soon as I was old enough to work I did, and I’ve not stopped since.”
He glanced down at the floor, his dark hair falling over his forehead. “I used to wonder what would become of me if something happened to my parents. I would have no place to live, nothing to eat...”
“How awful,” she murmured sympathetically.
“I fund an orphanage for that very reason,” he said looking back up at her. “That’s what I was going over when you came in. The ledgers for the children’s home.”
She blinked in surprise, wondering if the depths to this man knew no bounds. He held her gaze as if searching for disdain or scorn in her face. Her cheeks warmed under his scrutiny. She’d only been in an orphanage once in her life, and it hadn’t been one of her favorite experiences.
But imagining him as a small boy, alone on the streets tugged at her heart. How must these other children feel to be in the same position?
“Which orphanage do you fund?” she asked lightly in an attempt to cover her shame.
“The old Newton place on Oxford. Do you know of it?”
She nodded, not about to admit she knew nothing of any orphanage. But she tucked the information away.
“So what did happen to your parents?” she asked diverting the conversation away from the orphanage.
“When I turned fifteen, I signed on with a ship carrying supplies to our troops. I made a good wage and arranged for my parents to return to Scotland to live near my father’s family. I try and visit them as often as I can.”
