“They are almost perfect,” she said. “I think by the end of the year, we should have them where we want them.”
He wasn’t sure if she was joking, because the month was only May. One could never really tell with Mavis.
“Do not sell him any. I want them all, as I have a wife who is expecting and needs the nourishment!”
Behind him, Ramsey Hellion had exploded through the door yelling these words, looking harried, which the man had rarely looked in the short time they’d been acquainted.
“Surely you can spare me one, Ram?”
“Flora is craving apricotines,” the man explained.
Ambrose looked at the cabinets full of food, then back at Ram, raising a brow.
“I was sent for apricotines, and rather tersely, I might add.”
Tall, dark, and some would say handsome, Ramsey Hellion was married to a cousin of the Nightingales and an integral cog in the workings of the family.
They were a large, boisterous lot who had once been thrown out of society due to their father’s perfidious behavior. Now they were back, but on their terms, and from what Ambrose could gather, didn’t give a fig about what anyone thought of them.
Then there was the small matter of them being clairvoyants that had taken Ambrose a while to come to grips with.
“You’re back, Mr. Hellion.” An elderly lady, whom he knew was Mrs. Greedy, staggered in from the rear, carrying a tray of what looked to be pies. She bent to place them in the cabinet, and her knees creaked.
“I didn’t know you baked pies here too,” Ambrose said, sniffing the air like a hound.
“It’s a new addition,” Ram said, also sniffing loudly. “Sweet, savory, and delicious. Cambridge Sinclair is a constant visitor and says they are some of the best in London.”
“Perhaps you should take a room here, seeing as you’ve clearly nowhere else to be, Hellion.”
A large Scotsman by the name of Mungo delivered these deep words. He stood in the doorway, his shoulders nearly brushing both sides of the frame. He scowled at Ram, his brows drawn in the middle, as they most often were.
“Mungo, my day is now complete,” Ram said, smiling for the first time since he’d walked in.
“You do know Flora sends you out of the house because your cosseting is driving her mad,” Mungo added in his Scottish burr.
“Is he cosseting her?” Ambrose enquired, pondering the cabinets again. Perhaps an apricotine and a pie. He could eat them on the short walk to number 11 Crabbett Close. Orshould he take food to have with tea? Chances were, the household would be full, as it always was.
“Constantly,” Mungo replied.
“I am merely looking after my wife when she needs me most,” Ram protested.
“Does she or does she not send you from the house every day on some small errand?” Mungo asked.
The Scotsman worked in the Nightingale household, but from what Ambrose had heard, he didn’t need to. Much to everyone’s surprise, he’d fallen in love with the governess employed by the family to shave off the rough edges before the young ladies entered society and had married her.
Privately, it gave Ambrose hope. If a man such as this one could find love, there was a chance for the rest of them.
“You’re suffocating her,” Mungo snapped as he moved to stand beside Ambrose.
“Mungo.” He nodded.
“Talbot,” he grunted. “I thought you were attending the meeting at 11 Crabbett Close.”
“Just heading there now but thought to get food first.”
“No need. There is plenty. Bud has been baking.”
“Well then, just something to eat on the journey,” Ambrose said, refusing to be intimidated by this man. People had been trying to do that to him for most of his life, especially in business, and he was more than up to the task of standing up for himself.