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Sara watched from the alley as Evie left with her father, wondering if James Kinney had put a stop to his daughter’s torment. Something about the angry set of his shoulders told her he had.

She might never see Evie again. Or her father. A hot rush of longing swept through her, and she allowed herself a moment to imagine walking at their side. Leaving the humiliation of Cooper’s Inn with a little girl’s trusting hand clasped in hers and a pair of broad shoulders she could lean on.

Stifling the sharp ache, she comforted herself with the reminder that she’d helped this motherless little girl. Evie had a father who cared about more than society’s dictates. What happened to Sara would never happen to her.

Sara squared her shoulders. She’d throw herself into her work and let her heart go back to its dormant state. In a few months she’d have enough money to move Granny to new lodgings. She darted around to the mews, and made her way to the courtyard, hoping her absence hadn’t been missed.

“Sara.” Henry’s whisper hissed out from the stable door as she passed. “Cooper’s looking for you. Don’t look happy.” His thin face was pinched with worry.

Before Sara could thank him, the innkeeper’s voice boomed across the courtyard. “Just where have you been, O’Connor?”

Sara’s heart dropped. Mrs. Cooper came out of the laundry shed, hands on hips. “I just stepped out for a moment, ma’am.”

“What for? A man? Should’ve known you were loose, coming with no references and all.”

Sara forced her eyes down. “I did nothing improper, I assure you.”

Mrs. Cooper took a step closer, her eyes narrowing. “It’s too late for putting on airs. I warned you, O’Connor, that your next false step would be your last. Jennie saw you filling Mr. Kinney’s ears with lies.”

“It’s not lies,” Sara said, forgetting caution, forgetting everything that kept her safe. “Miss Giblin is too harsh with Evie. She’ll kill the girl’s spirit.”

“Spirit? What use has a lady for spirit? James Kinney ought to be thanking us for taking that odd thing in hand.”

“Evie ain’t odd.” Henry darted to Sara’s side, hands on hips. “She’s smarter than all of you lot put together.”

Mrs. Cooper cut off Henry’s words with a cuff to the side of the head. “Get back to the stable.” Henry’s dirty hands fisted at his side and his eyes narrowed to slits.

Sara put a restraining arm around his shoulders. “It’s all right, Henry. Run along, before you get into more trouble.” He hesitated, his wiry frame pulsing with tension. She leaned to whisper in his ear. “She could send you back to the workhouse.”

At her words, the fight drained out of him. His shoulders sagged and he took one step back, then another.

Mrs. Cooper ignored him, reaching to grab Sara’s arm with a painful twist. The woman stood a few inches taller and many pounds heavier than Sara. “Get out.” She released Sara with a shove.

Sara stumbled. Why couldn’t she have held her tongue? She clenched her hands, clammy with panic. “Please let me stay. You can dock my pay.”

The older woman’s lip curled. “If you imagine I’d keep a lying, sneaking servant in my employ, you’re not as clever as you think you are.”

Dread filled her in a cold wave. What would she and Granny do without this job? “A reference.” Her voice came out like a croak, and she cleared her throat and started again. “I need a reference, Mrs. Cooper. Surely you can’t fault the work I did.”

Mrs. Cooper stepped forward, her narrow gaze boring into Sara. “If you’re not off this property in ten minutes, I’ll call the magistrate.”

Sara stemmed the rush of tears. No new lodgings for Granny, no restorative broth or warm fire in winter. Granny had given her a home and the love of a family, and she’d repaid her with failure.

“I’ll collect my things.”

“No need. The maid fetched them.” With a snap of Mrs. Cooper’s fingers, Jennie hurried out of the kitchen and shoved a sack into Sara’s hands with a triumphant smirk. “Now get out.”

The fog in her mind cleared. “But my wages... I’m owed this month still.”

“Says who? I’d like to see you prove it.”

Except for Henry and Evie, she’d avoided others in her month at the inn, but the isolation she’d sought in the laundry had come at a price. Not likely any of the staff here would risk their positions to defend her. But how could she go back to Granny with nothing?

“I—I’ll go to the magistrate.” Sara swallowed her panic and forced confidence into her voice.

Mrs. Cooper snorted. “And drag your name through the courts? There wouldn’t be an establishment in Toronto that’d hire you after that.

” Sara shrank back, clutching her sack of belongings to her chest. Not a chance she would risk the notoriety of court, even if she could afford it.

“Go,” Mrs. Cooper said, sensing victory, “before I go to the magistrate and have you arrested for trespassing.”

Sara turned to the mews, her throat aching with suppressed tears. Her feet dragged across the cobblestones, the days of work and worry hitting her in a wave of exhaustion and despair. No money, no work. No future. She’d been here before, but that didn’t mean it hurt any less.

“James Kinney. I’m here to see Mr. Ballantine.”

Ballantine’s butler inclined his head and opened the door, indicating James should precede him into the spacious front hall.

It was a formal home, built along the lines of an English country estate.

The dark walnut wainscoting and heavy side table reminded James of his childhood home.

The same eerie quiet, the same sense of suppressed mourning that his grandparents had maintained after his parents’ early deaths.

“I’ll let Mr. Ballantine know you’re here.” The butler took James’s hat and indicated a straight chair pushed against the wall.

James opted to pace. A summons from Ballantine was rare, and the invitation to meet at his private residence in the middle of the day even rarer.

He didn’t dare refuse, even though he knew it would mean an uncomfortable interview at the very least. Ballantine must have seen Andrew’s fiery open letter in the Correspondent and Advocate .

They wouldn’t be able to hide his involvement with the rebels much longer.

The door to the nearest room stood slightly ajar, permitting James a glimpse into the library.

A wide stone fireplace filled his line of view, topped by a portrait.

A young woman looked down on him, dressed in the high-waisted fashions of twenty years earlier, her blond ringlets falling over her shoulders.

Her eyes were blue and her gaze so direct, it felt as though she were looking at him.

James suppressed a shiver. There was something almost familiar about her, though he knew Ballantine’s wife had died years before.

“James, my boy, good to see you.” Ballantine swept past him, opening wide the door to the library.

He took a seat behind an ornate desk, surrounded by bookshelves. Dark draperies hung from the tall windows behind him, completing the look of an English country squire holding court. He waved to the seat across from him with a careless flick of his hand. “Well? Have you read it?”

James gave a reluctant nod. “The letter was unsigned. We can’t be sure...”

Ballantine snorted. “Got his fingerprints all over it.” He picked up the sheet of newsprint on his desk.

“One need only look at the practices of the Canada Land Company to see this injustice in action,” he quoted, throwing down the paper in disgust. “Every man in the city knows the two of you took on the company. They’ll figure out it’s him.

” He sent James a hard stare. “Or you. He must be stopped.”

“I’ve made inquiries. Andrew’s been out of town.” He winced. He had nothing but excuses for Ballantine. No wonder the man was out of patience with him.

“You must find him. He still won’t answer me.” Ballantine’s stern facade slipped, permitting James a glimpse of the helpless worry underneath the bluster.

Ballantine could be conservative and unbending, yes, but he had Andrew’s interests at heart. “I—I will. I’ll find him.”

Ballantine sat back in the chair with a satisfied smile.

“Good, good. Osgoode offered to go.” James straightened, biting back a protest. “But I thought he’d take it best coming from you,” Ballantine continued.

“You must impress upon him the danger he faces. The governor has no patience for reformers these days.”

James nodded. Ballantine’s fears weren’t overstated.

Just last week, the authorities had arrested a man for publishing what amounted to little more than a mild rebuke of British oversight in the Canadian colonies.

If they discovered the proof that Andrew had written that letter, he’d be behind bars.

“My secretary will be happy to book you passage on the stagecoach.” Ballantine reached for the bell, then paused, his hand hovering over the silver handle. “On second thought, it’s faster to ride. You have a mount, don’t you?”

James nodded, his unease building. “But I can’t—”

Ballantine clapped his hands together in satisfaction. “Excellent. There’s no time to be lost.”

“Sir, I can’t leave right away.” One of Ballantine’s magnificent silver-gray eyebrows rose, making James swallow. “I must make arrangements for Evangeline.”

The older man dismissed Evie with a wave of his hand. “She can stay with that Cooper woman for a time, can’t she? Heard she was taking lessons there.”

Warmth crept up James’s cheeks. The man must have eyes everywhere. “Not any longer.”

“Eh?”

“The governess’s methods weren’t to my liking.”

Ballantine snorted. “Nonsense. You coddle that girl.” He shook his head. “Mark my words, no good can come of indulging her.”

James bit his lip. Ballantine hadn’t taken an interest in his personal life in years, and now the man was dispensing child-rearing advice. “I don’t like leaving Evie. Mrs. Hobbes is away at her daughter’s confinement. There’s only the new maid, and she’s not much older than Evie.”

Ballantine reached over and gave James an awkward pat on the shoulder.

“You know what I think? It’s about time you marry again.

” James shook his head, but the man held up his hand and forged ahead.

“No, hear me out. Your loyalty to dear Amelia’s memory does you credit, but a man in your position needs a wife. ”

At the mention of Amelia’s name, a rush of emotion swept through James, equal parts longing and failure. Emotions he couldn’t even understand himself, much less explain to a man like Ballantine. “Sir, I don’t feel—”

“Trust me. That girl of yours needs a mother. And if you’ve any aspirations to advancement, you need a proper hostess at your table.”

If that’s the case, why haven’t you married again? James bit back the impudent question. “I’ve no aptitude for politics.”

Ballantine rose, and James followed suit.

“Aye, so you’ve said. Thought Andrew would make a name for himself, but.

..” The older man moved to the door and motioned for the butler to bring James’s hat.

“Well, I suppose I’ve said too much, but don’t be forgetting what I called you here for.

” He turned and grasped James’s hand. “Don’t fail me, James.

You’ve a good head on your shoulders. You could have some influence, and not only with Andrew. ”

With this parting shot, Ballantine retreated into his library. The butler opened the front door and James found himself outside the mansion, his mind spinning. How can I make a difference, God? I’m no statesman. Yet if he might prevent bloodshed, he had to try.

He mounted, his thoughts spinning back to Osgoode.

Ballantine was ever blind when it came to that man.

Osgoode offering to help? The idea was laughable.

If Andrew had done anything incriminating, Osgoode would be certain to make it known to every Tory in Toronto.

Unless James stopped Andrew before it could get that far.

But he couldn’t imagine leaving Evie even one night, never mind the days required to track Andrew down.

He’d thought, perhaps naively, that Evie would settle back to her old routine, working through her lessons in the mornings, and helping the new maid in the kitchen in the afternoons.

Each night he set out a passage for her to read and a composition to write, but it wasn’t enough.

She was bored and listless, responding to his conversation at supper with monosyllables, though she assured him she learned more from him than she ever had with Miss Giblin.

Was marriage the answer? His fingers tightened on the reins, causing his horse to toss her head in protest. A face flashed through his mind, but it wasn’t Amelia’s round cheeks and dimples.

For a moment, he saw Sara O’Connor, as clearly as if she stood in front of him, her chin tilted at a defiant angle, her eyes clear and knowing.

He shook his head. The least likely candidate for a wife he could imagine.

A wife. A surge of longing gripped him. He remembered laughter and the weight of a hand curled about his arm. The warmth of a woman’s shape lying next to him at night.

On the heels of the longing came darker memories. Tears and accusations and that suffocating sense that he would never get things right.

Marriage he couldn’t do. But peacekeeping? Perhaps.

He turned his mare onto Duke Street. Before he reached the gate, Betsy came running from the front step.

“Oh, Mr. Kinney. Thank God you’re home.”

James jumped down and bolted to where Betsy stood, tears running down her face. “What’s happened?”

“I didn’t mean to, sir. I did exactly as you said, put her to work in the parlor this morning.” She started to wail, lifting her apron up to hide her face.

“Come, now.” He tried to keep his voice calm, though he wanted to take the girl by the shoulders and shake the story out of her. “Where’s Evie?”

“Weren’t no sign of her when I called her for lunch.” She wiped her face and dropped the apron. “She’s gone.”