A few days later, I'd made a decision. I found Sam in the drawing room, taking inventory of the remaining bolts of silk. He made some mention about how we would need to order more soon enough while I reached for one of beautiful crimson damask.

"I'm taking this one," I told him. "I'll pay for it, don't worry."

Sam only nodded, asking no further questions as he returned to tallying his numbers and I headed for the door, taking my hat and topcoat from Bonnie on the way.

Despite having already decided upon my course of action, I argued with myself internally the whole way there. It was highly likely I would just receive another door slammed in my face or a polite but firm farewell before I even got to speak but I had to try. I wasn't even sure why. Just that I knew it was the right thing to do.

Nathaniel Harrison's home was only a block over from his office. A townhouse on the corner overlooking the park. It had been renovated in a way that screamed new money or new wife or both. Pink lilies bloomed in the box at every window, neatly trimmed bushes lined the walk to the door where a fresh coat of paint and a perfectly polished pane of glass awaited visitors. Now, that was me. I reached out and knocked firmly on the wood, waiting.

I expected a servant but the woman I'd come to see herself appeared at the door a moment later. Elena Langley, or I suppose it was Elena Harrison now, opened the door, alone as I had expected since her husband was at work. The moment she saw me, her smile faded to a frown and she moved to close the door in my face. Having expected the maneuver, I slammed the bolt of silk between the door and the wood so that it could not be closed.

"I bring gifts," I told her, peering over the bolt of silk and giving a pointed glance toward it. She looked from me to the fabric and back again, her brow furrowing in confusion.

"Why?" she asked simply. A fair question.

"I want to talk."

"Why?"

"Your friend didn't send me to rot in prison with the rest of my family. Doesn't that count for something? Doesn't that earn me at least the right to be heard before you slam the door in my face?"

She hesitated, crossing her arms and glaring at me. I wondered if she was thinking about that night in a dark alley, the one in which my father's thugs held her captive. When they'd threatened her. When she had run away when Charlotte stabbed the one holding her only to find that they'd slashed her open after the fact. I took a deep breath. If that was what she was thinking, I couldn't blame her for not letting me in. But then she surprised me. She took a step to the side and let the door fall open. I lowered the bolt of silk and gave her an appreciative nod as I stepped inside her home.

I'd been right about the renovations. Elena Harrison was in the thick of it. New carpet was being laid, new wallpaper applied, even the furniture was being reupholstered and the way she was eying the fabric in my arms now made me think she might already have a use for it in mind.

"Alright," she said a moment later, turning away from me with a sigh as she kept her arms crossed and her gaze pointed into a glare. "I let you in. Say what you have to say and go."

I set the bolt of silk down and turned to face her.

"It's about Anne," I said.

She froze, stunned. Her eyes widened in shock, even her arms fell to her sides.

"Anne," she repeated. "What about her?"

"Elizabeth and Felicity told me what they did to her."

Her lips parted in shock and then she turned away, shaking her head with a scoff.

"They admitted it," she said, incredulous. "After all this time, they finally admitted it. You didn't torture it out of them, did you?"

"Unfortunately, no."

It was brief. So brief that I would have missed it if I had blinked. But the corners of her lips turned up into a delicate smirk for only a moment before she remembered it was me she was talking to and it fell away again, turning back to that same suspicious examination.

"Why do you want to know about her?" she asked then, watching me closely.

"Let's just say I have an appreciation for how she felt," I answered. "Ruined reputation and all."

She hesitated, gaze narrowing again. But then she told me. The whole story from start to finish. I'd already heard most of it from Elizabeth and Felicity but Elena seemed to need to tell me for her own sake. So I let her. When she was finished, I asked the question I had come here to ask.

"Where is she now?"

"In a convent in South France," she answered, gaze narrowing in suspicion once again. "Why?"

"I'm trying so hard to fix my own reputation. Might as well try to fix hers as well," I said and she blinked at me in surprise. "Do you happen to know the name of the convent?"

She gaped at me.

"You can't win her back, Camden," she said after a moment, her voice softer, more gentler than I had ever heard it. I grit my teeth against the pity but did not respond. "You know that, don't you?"

"The name, Elena," I growled and then fought to keep my temper in check.

"The Abbey of Fontenay," she answered.

"Thank you."

With that, I turned on my heel and headed for the door again. She remained behind, watching after me as I went. It was only when I had reached the door to her home that she called out to me.

"What is it that you intend to do?" she called. "Camden–"

But I was already leaving, shutting the door behind me and striding out onto the street beyond. I had other errands to attend to this morning and, as important as it had been to allow Elena to speak about her friend's past so that I might gather all the detail I would possibly need, I was running behind schedule. For that reason, I called my carriage to take me to the next location and stepped out onto another busy street right across from a butcher shop with a painted red door and a glossy new sign. It didn't appear as though Charlotte's family was struggling despite their butcher having a shattered arm.

There was a woman out front. She held an infant in her arms, speaking softly to the child with a smile. Having apparently sensed my gaze, she looked up then and I saw the resemblance. She had the same green eyes as Charlotte. The same full lips, similar facial features, but her hair was a deep auburn and far straighter than Charlotte's ringlet curls. She apparently recognized me as well because she tucked her infant closer to her chest and strode quickly into the shop behind her. I sighed and stepped into the street to cross it. The morning of visiting people in this city who would rather never see my face again was an emotional exhaustion that was beginning to weigh on me. But it had to be done.

Before I could even reach the shop to enter it, however, a man emerged. He had a friendly face but was watching me with suspicion as he stepped outside and shut the door pointedly behind him. It was a warning. He was a pleasant shopkeeper, a butcher with wares to sell, but that was his wife and child that I had spooked and he would give his life to protect them. This meeting would be taking place out on the street. Very well.

"Can I help you, Keene?" he asked.

His tone was one of idle pleasantry, not mockery. If he knew how difficult it would be for me to be addressed by my disgraced family name, if he understood the insult that it was to call me that, he showed no signs of it. Instead, he was just a simple shopkeeper addressing a potential client by their given surname, out of respect, as he would for anyone else.

I just reached into my pocket and pulled out the check, handing it over to him without a word. His brow furrowed as he took it, glancing down at the sum, and inhaling quickly.

"What is this?" he asked.

"Just the beginning of what I owe you for what my family did to you and yours," I told him.

He frowned, looking into the shop beside us where his wife was standing behind the counter, playing peek-a-boo with the child sitting upon it. His gaze softened but his tone remained firm.

"We're doing just fine," he told me, holding the check back out for me to take.

"Please," I said. "It's part of making amends. Part of proving to myself and others that I can do better, that I'm not him."

He looked down at the check again, hesitating, and then slid it into his own pocket. He gave one curt nod and opened the door to his shop to step inside.

Having conducted the business that I came to see through, I turned to make my way across the street.

"You aren't him, Camden," he called out after me when I had made it a few steps farther. I froze, every muscle in my body tensing at the words. But when I turned to face him again, he was gone, disappeared back into his shop, back to his wife and child, back to his life, the one my father had nearly ruined.

It was a punch to the gut that I wasn't expecting. I had anticipated doors slamming in my face, hostile comments about what I had to give not being enough, not ever being enough to make up for what my father had done to them. I had never expected acceptance. I had never foreseen gratitude or even support. But he had given that to me. And Elena had entrusted me with her friend's story, her location, her hope. It lifted my spirits considerably to know that these people did not seem to hate me as much as they should, as much as they had every right to.

So I had one more errand before it all began. One more before I could put my plan in motion. And it, too, would begin with an apology.

I was already speaking the words when Jasper opened the door.

"I know that I cannot apologize enough for my behavior the other night. Nor can I offer any satisfactory explanation or gratitude enough for what you did to get me out of the situation that I had placed myself within. But I apologize, Jasper. Truly and sincerely. I mean it. I'm sorry."

"Enough of that you old sod," Jasper was saying with a grin before I even finished. He reached out and clapped me on the shoulder before pulling me into the house. "Come in, come in."

So I did. And I made polite conversation with him while we waited for his maid to bring us tea. Then, I got to the root of my visit.

"I'm going to France," I told him. He raised a brow as he sipped his tea. "Burgundy, to be specific. I wondered if you might be able to arrange for me to meet your contacts while I'm there, negotiate an arrangement for continuing shipments of silk and perhaps other luxury goods as well. I hear scents are becoming quite popular in Paris, colognes and perfumes and the like. Seems the sort of thing my luxury brand might sell."

"I'm afraid that's not possible," Jasper said, leaning forward to set his teacup down. "My connections are all extremely important and very busy men. And they do not frequent Burgundy."

"I'll take a trip to Paris while I'm there," I replied, waving him off. "Can you make the arrangements or not?"

"Why do you wish to meet them in person? Have I not done a satisfactory job as mediator?"

"Of course you have. But I prefer to know the men I do my business with personally. Besides, I figured they might want to meet the man behind the success of selling their silks so quickly in England."

"Oh, is Sam coming along?"

Jasper grinned like a madman and I couldn't help my snort.

"Why are you really going to France?" Jasper asked a moment later once the joke had passed.

"Don't worry about it," I told him, already standing and donning my hat again as I headed for the door. "Now, I've got a ship to catch. Think it over. Just send me news of business if it comes your way."

"A ship?" Jasper gasped, jumping to his feet as I made my way to the door. "You're going now?"

"No time like the present," I answered with a grin. "Reach out to Sam if you have need of me. He knows where to reach me. I'll see you in a few weeks, Jas."

I left him standing in the center of his foyer, wide eyed with shock, as I stepped out onto the street and stepped into my carriage as it lurched forward, heading for the docks.