Page 515 of From Rakes to Riches

There.Rake had located the loose thread of Gem’s story—but how to gain purchase and fully unravel it?

“And your mam was cook for this lord?”

Gem nodded.

“Other family?”

Another nod.

“Brother? Sister?”

“Brother.”

“Your last name is Cassidy. Irish?”

An uneasy nod, as the lad stared at his boots, which had surely tracked muck through the house.

“And an education?” asked Rake, taking another tack. “You received one at the lord’s estate?”

The lad’s gaze startled up, golden eyebrows crinkling together.At last.“Whyever would my education be of importance to you?”

A few facts struck Rake at once.Ithad made its reappearance—Gem’s correct grammar. His manner of stringing words together in a way that stable lads generally didn’t.

Further, the lad wasn’t mumbling or muttering or grunting or grumbling. He was speaking in a clear voice—his true voice.

A voice Rake had heard hinted at, but not fully expressed.

Rake’s brow furrowed.

That voice… It sounded like it belonged to a?—

Rake noticed it.

The bead of sweat.

Before—beforethis conversation…beforethe voice—it would’ve gone unnoticed.

After all, the air was warm and sticky with humidity that slicked the gray marble floor and wall tiles. A bit of perspiration was only natural in the atmosphere of a bathing room. In fact, he was perspiring himself.

In fact, the lad’s gaze appeared to be following one such bead of sweat down the center of his chest at this very moment, even as Rake tracked Gem’s bead of sweat trickling down his smooth cheek…over his pert chin…down the elegant, ivory column of his neck…to dip into the delicate indent at the base of his throat in a glistening, little pool…

Sometimes with a person, we only see what we expect to see, and not what’s really there.

And Rake saw…

Heknew.

He’d been seeing Gem all wrong.

As a lad.

But the person standing before him wasn’t a lad at all…

But a lass.

The realization felt…confusing. And…

Right.

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