“You are not going to walk. There is an arrow sticking out of you. I am going to carry you home and possibly everywhere else if that’s what it takes to keep you safe.”
She tugged at the wooden rod.
It didn’t come loose.
Alexander’s stomach roiled.
“Stop that,” he snapped.
“It’s not deep in me,” she said. “At least, not all of the way in. I think part of it is stuck on my petticoats.”
“Don’t touch it. I’ll summon every doctor for miles and they’ll sort out the right thing to do.”
“You know...” Her voice was faint, and her head lolled against his chest. “Maybe I can’t walk.”
“Damn it, Cynthia Louise!” He held her tighter, his throat tight. “Youmuststop acting as though your life doesn’t matter. I have a duty to my title, but you have a duty to the entire world. We would all be much poorer without Miss Cynthia Louise Finch.”
He lifted her up and stumbled down the road toward his cottage with half of the village trailing close behind.
“What about the skis?” she murmured.
“I don’t give a damn about the skis.”
The arrow wobbled with each step, making Alexander’s stomach churn in protest. It was not protruding from her chest, as he’d first feared, but rather from her shoulder.
Blood had seeped through all her layers of clothing to blossom around the arrow like a red rose of death.
“It looks like you’ll miss tea with the duchess,” he informed her.
“Don’t worry,” she mumbled. “Carole will definitely hear this gossip.”
He didn’t doubt that.
People appeared to be pouring from their houses to fall into step around them. Oswald had the door flung wide long before Alexander lurched up the path. His footmen spilled out of the open doorway and dashed up to him with matching expressions of alarm.
They held out their arms. “Can we—”
“No,” Alexander growled, muscling past them.
All of the female guests were packed into the entryway.
His mother stood front and center.
“What is the meaning of this?” demanded the duchess.
“There’s an arrow sticking out of her,” he said icily. “I’m trying to stop that.”
“Where were you?” stammered one of the debutantes.
“Skating down the mountain on skis,” one of the villagers replied helpfully.
The crowd immediately began talking over each other at once to recount the vivid tale of the archery contest, and the dog, and the lady on skis, who bravely rescued the dog, and the duke on skis, who then rescuedher.
“You absented yourself from your own party,” the duchess bit out each syllable, “to play onskiswith... this creature?”
“He saved my life,” Cynthia croaked out. “He’s a hero. He’s still marriageable. Go back to charades.”
The duchess’s voice was glacial. “You’re in hisarms.”
