Somebody To Love by Kate Rothwell Page A

glimpsed the girl the night he visited Kane’s mansion, and he had the impression of a trembling blancmange. Not a jot of fire in her. “I want to know about her personality.”
    Galvin rolled his eyes again. “Hold yer horses. I’m getting to it.”
    No unctuous underling here, Griffin thought with amusement.
    “She’s polite. Classy, like I said.”
    “You make her sound horrifyingly respectable. Why do you suppose she’s Kane’s mistress?”
    Galvin shrugged. “I dunno. She isn’t like most of the whores. Too innocent like, you know? Kane doesn’t let her around the other girls, but she’s friendly with the cook there. The one that used to work for Miss Timona.”
    Interesting—Araminta had found herself a lost puppy. A weakling who needed rescuing. He almost smiled. No wonder she and his sister got on so well. Ah, and perhaps it explained her mission to find help for a “friend.”
    He pulled a roll of bills from his pocket, peeled off a few and handed them to Galvin. “Good. Stay awake. And remember, don’t let that cook get in trouble. She’s a friend of my sister’s.”
    Galvin leaned forward as he tucked the bills into a back pocket. “That Timona. She makes the oddest friends. A woman who’s just a cook, of all people.”
    Griffin restrained himself from arguing that Araminta, though she could be infuriating, was a great deal more than just a cook.
    “She might also be a source of information.” He tossed the smooth quartz onto the ink blotter, and told Galvin everything she’d told him about the men in the basement.
    Galvin picked up the rock and turned it over in his thick fingers. “Hell. This is Pete’s. One of his lucky rubbing stones.” Galvin gave a low hum. “Hell. I heard Kane say he thought Pushy Pete worked for you.”
    “Ah. That’s interesting.”
    Galvin rolled the stone back onto the desk. “That cook will make a good on-the-spot witness.”
    An unwelcome realization flashed through Griffin. Even more than he wanted to bring down Kane, he wanted to keep Araminta out of danger. “No. Not her. Her usefulness to us is over.”
    He’d spoken with too much heat, and Galvin, who paid close attention to everything, blast the man, sniffed, amused. “Well, well. Is it now?”
    He watched Griffin a moment or two before adding, “I think I’ll put Hobnail onto watching the cook, since he’s at Park Avenue, and I’m on Kane much of the time. That a problem?”
    Griffin shook his head.
    Galvin grunted and leaned back in his armchair. He fingered his mustache and his gray eyes focused on Griffin again. “Funny that a little matter like Kane would grab your attention. Wonder why you suddenly decide to bother with me and so many of my boys? And ask a favor of Inspector Byrnes, no less. Before poor old Pete, who isn’t even one of ours, it wasn’t like Kane was a big threat to anything of any importance. Yup, fellow’s got to wonder what you discovered that night you went gambling at that Park Avenue house of his.”
    “You are presumptuous, Galvin,” Griffin said mildly.
    Galvin winked. “Want I should crawl out of here so Buckler and Hobnail think you’ve beaten me?”
    “If it would amuse you.” He watched his friend amble from the room. It was rather amusing, the foolishness people associated with him. Galvin’s men clearly thought Griffin a bully. And Araminta was not the first to call him a brute.
    Even his own sister had sometimes implied she was disappointed in his nature. Not the first female in his family to dislike his blunt manner.
    A picture of his mother arose, unwelcome, but he didn’t bother to fight the very old memory of her severe face. No point—after all, he saw her every time he looked in the mirror. And truly, he must be grateful for her legacy, for Griffin had little respect for untrammeled passion. Success in any endeavor called for cool minds.
    He pushed away from his desk. He ripped up Galvin’s folded report of facts and figures and dropped