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H ambone was playing with a little bell, batting it between her fluffy, gray paws before chasing it under the sofa. She didn’t reemerge, but Ollie could still hear the tinkling of the little bell.

He couldn’t believe they’d crossed paths with the Signature Swindler.

The man was an absolute menace. But there were a few things Ollie still couldn’t quite figure out.

Had the note the cad sent been meant for Ollie, or Evelyn?

Because when they’d first crossed paths with him, he’d stared at Ollie as if Evelyn hadn’t been there.

It’d been quite uncomfortable in the moment.

But it made the most sense to have been for Evelyn, as she could give him access to the museum, had she still carried her key.

But how had he known she worked there? How had he known she was even staying with Ollie?

The Signature Swindler had been breaking into places for years.

Why trick Evelyn into helping him gain access, when he could do it on his own without anyone seeing him?

Because as far as Ollie knew, he and Evelyn were the first people to actually see the Signature Swindler in the midst of his theft.

It didn’t make any sense.

There was also something deeply unsettling about the Signature Swindler. Maybe it was because they could only see his eyes. Everything else of his face, including his nose and mouth, had been covered by the strange mask.

Ollie shuddered.

After the unfortunate meeting with the Signature Swindler, and realizing the painting had been stolen, Ollie and Evelyn had been quiet the entire walk back to the house, concentrating on staying in the shadows of night.

They’d had to go unnoticed for Evelyn’s sake, lest someone snag her for the reward.

It had gotten close at one point, when a large group of people had unexpectedly come out of a fancy restaurant right as they’d been walking by.

Evelyn had gasped, apparently recognizing them, and bolted down a dark alley without warning.

Ollie had had to run after her but, for what felt like an eternity, couldn’t find her.

When he had caught up with her two blocks away, on a crowded street, at that, he’d grabbed her hand without thinking so they wouldn’t get separated again.

Instead of apologizing for running off and giving him a fright, she’d jerked her hand out of his.

Hard. Ollie had immediately realized his error, felt immensely guilty, then he had apologized.

But he couldn’t stop thinking about it, either.

He tried telling himself he knew she disliked being touched, so it wasn’t personal, but he couldn’t help but take it that way.

Did Evelyn really dislike touch that much, or was it worse because it was him?

Ollie had enough brains to see the stark difference between the two of them, and he knew firsthand people were the product of their upbringings.

Despite who his grandparents were, Ollie had remained some lad from the Whitechapel slums. He would never be as polished as other nobs, never have all those manners and rules nailed down.

He’d learned how to talk in Whitechapel and would never have the right accent.

Nor would he ever be as educated, despite his grandparents’ desperate attempt.

Ollie might have appeared polished, might have dressed well, might have had a nice home, might have a title in the family. But the second he opened his mouth, people knew what he really was. Just some street rat.

Evelyn probably thought that as well.

Really, he shouldn’t have cared what Evelyn thought of him, and he couldn’t figure out why he cared in the first place. That was, aside from the fact that she was a friend and he did care about what his friends thought of him. Right?

Actually, he wasn’t sure that was true. To some degree it was maybe, but he really cared a lot about what Evelyn thought about him.

But as he tried to think too hard about why he cared what she thought, his head started to hurt.

Dantes was the one who cared what people thought, not Ollie. Ollie was the one who told Dantes not to give a fig what a bunch of idiots thought.

No, he didn’t care at all what his friends thought about him.

He was the one, after all, who’d invited his friends from Oxford to visit The Harp & Thistle when it had originally opened years ago.

He was the entire reason their pub attracted both the lower class and the upper class.

If he cared what his friends thought of him, he wouldn’t have told them he had decided to join his working-class brothers in the family pub. Much less invite them.

Yet here he was, caring that Evelyn Sparrow might be repulsed by him and his working-class roots.

Back to being irritated, and now with a headache, Ollie stood up from the sofa and began pacing. He was alone in the parlor for the moment and had to shake off these negative thoughts before Evelyn came in.

Moments ago, they had returned from the museum and Evelyn had gone looking for Mrs. Chapman to return the hat she had borrowed, leaving Ollie alone with his idiotic brain.

“You’re a fool,” he mumbled to himself. “Get a hold of yourself, man!”

Someone cleared their throat from the doorway. Inwardly cursing at himself, Ollie turned to find Evelyn standing in the doorway watching him. “Is everything all right?” she asked, sounding unsure.

Ollie began pacing again. “Everything is just swell.”

“Please, sit down.” Evelyn’s eyes followed him back and forth across the room. “There’s nothing we can do about the painting right now. It’s the middle of the night.”

Ollie paused and turned to face Evelyn. She was trying her best to look relaxed, no doubt in a bid for him to mimic her, but it didn’t work.

His hands flexed closed, open, then closed again.

He needed to redirect his ire away from Evelyn’s dislike of him and onto the Signature Swindler.

“That bloody Irishman!” was all he managed to sputter out before pacing again.

With a sigh, Evelyn began following Ollie in his pacing. Hambone poked her lion-like head out to see what they were doing but quickly lost interest and returned to batting at her bell.

“In the span of two days, I’ve completely destroyed everything people relied on me for and I feel like rubbish for it.

It’s one thing to let Victor down—he’s never happy with me, no matter what I do—but Dantes has been on my side a number of times.

When he finds out what happened to his prized possession, his painting, he is going to despise me for the rest of my life! ”

“He won’t despise you for the rest of your life.”

Ollie glanced at Evelyn. “When the fire took Dantes’s flat, he blamed Victor for losing his possessions and for the fire damage to the paintings. You know what he said to Victor about that?”

Evelyn waited, seemingly unsure.

“He said, ‘I don’t care about my things, but my paintings? I will never forgive you for losing them.’ And he was completely serious.

” Ollie tried to imagine Dantes’s reaction when he learned one of his paintings had been stolen under Ollie’s care.

Ollie envisioned a gargoyle rearing up to its hindlegs with a roar, its eyes glowing red, its teeth sharp and bloodthirsty. Ollie gulped.

“It wasn’t your fault though, Ollie.” Evelyn’s voice pulled him from the vision.

“A thief followed us in after we broke into a museum .” Now Evelyn began pacing while Ollie watched.

As she passed the sofa, a fluffy paw reached out, trying to snag the hem of her skirt. “I could go to prison for that!”

“Pretty sure we both could,” Ollie replied, feeling worse.

“Regardless of what you think, the paintings were under my care.” Evelyn huffed.

She reached the end of the room, turned, and walked back toward him.

“My care, not yours. Please do not put that on yourself.” She stopped moving once she’d passed him but spun around to face him once more.

“If it ever gets out that I practically invited an art thief into the museum, my professional reputation will be completely destroyed! Do you know how hard I worked to gain respect? And that’s assuming they don’t find out about me running from the altar!

” Her face reddened with emotion. “A man with my position starts out with basic respect by others. As time passes and he proves himself, his respect builds. When I began, I was at negative one hundred!” Her finger shot up into the air.

“I have to do twice the work, earn twice the respect, to be considered equal to my male colleagues. All because I’m a woman! ”

Ollie didn’t know much about being a woman, of course, but he could see in Evelyn’s passion and anger that she had genuinely struggled significantly to grow in her career. There was no doubt in his mind she was being truthful and, perhaps, even minimizing it.

“Well, I think you’re….” He faltered, trying to think of the perfect word. What word embodied everything he thought about Evelyn? The glowing respect he had for her brilliant mind, her beauty that became more jaw-dropping to him each day, her determination and wit that he was envious of.

“Smart,” was what he came up with.

Christ, he sounded like an idiot.

“Thank you, Ollie,” Evelyn replied after a moment, her red eyebrows hitched. “I don’t feel very smart right now, though.”

“Nor do I. Not that that’s any different from normal.” Time to move on. “I’ve been wondering. Why did the Signature Swindler send that note? Why not simply break in without our help?”

“I don’t know. I’ve been wondering that, too.” Evelyn sank into a chair and leaned into the arm. She stared off into the fire in thought.

“Do we go to the police?” Ollie asked, referring to the stolen painting.