Page 30 of A Mother for the Blind Duke’s Orphans

“Your Grace, may I⁠—”

Hector turned his head toward the Duke and Duchess of Pridewell, who approached with their son, and he ignored Lord Bendon. The man stuttered, then said nothing further.

There were men who mistook access for authority, and Lord Bendon was one of them. Hector had no use for these kinds of men who treated their families terribly while praising those in power.

“Poppy,” the Duchess of Pridewell’s voice carried an intimacy that softened the formal address she might otherwise have used.

There was another embrace, harder this time, gathering Her Grace in not as a bride being admired but as a woman being sent onward. The duchess bent to embrace the child as well.

“Goodbye, Thomas,” she whispered.

Hector watched the pale line of her back curve as she straightened.

“If you ever need anything,” the Duke of Pridewell started. “Your sister and I⁠—”

“I can assure you that she will lack nothing.” Hector cut him off.

The Duke of Pridewell nodded with understanding in his direction. Her hand lifted once toward her face; Hector did not know whether it was to adjust a veil, brush away moisture, or conceal what she would rather not display.

He stepped closer to her as they reached the carriage.

“Your Grace,” the footman said from near the carriage door.

Hector did not look toward him as he set the cane aside. “I have her.”

The possessive words emerged before he considered them. He felt Her Grace’s attention shift toward him at once, though she said nothing. He offered his hand, and for a moment she did not take it. Then her gloved fingers came down into his palm. The contact was slight and proper. Nothing in it should have reached beneath his skin, yet it did.

“I got you,” he said confidently.

He closed his hand around hers with measured care and ignored the tightening in his gut as she shuddered. It passed through her quickly. But he felt it.

He angled his head toward her.

“Are you cold, duchess?”

“No, Your Grace, but thank you for your concern…” She spoke too quickly and smiled nervously at him, but Hector did not return her smile. He was too busy studying her in her ivory dress and wondering why he felt a sudden rush of heat flow through his body.

“It is my duty to be concerned for you,” he eventually said, quite coldly.

She did not answer at once. A moment passed between them as he held her soft, warm hand. For a moment, a flash of color emerged from her eyes, but it disappeared just as quickly as it appeared. Hector guided her toward the carriage step. He knew the height of the step by memory and motion. He placed his free hand where it needed to be and lifted her fingers a fraction, giving her some balance. She gathered her skirts, and he saw the pale movement of fabric. She was careful as she raised a fair foot and stepped inside. Halfway into the carriage, she turned her head back toward him.

“Thank you,” she spoke softly but sincerely.

Hector knew that her gratitude was for something else entirely.

Their nearness was sudden, and the closeness of her lips altered everything. At this distance, her face was still not clear, but it was no longer an arrangement of pale shadow and color. He saw the darker shapes where her eyes rested beneath their lashes, and he saw their attention fixed on him.

She took a sharp breath, and where her face had been pale, a shadow of a blush moved across it like a cloud.

“You are blushing,” he pointed out.

Her hand froze in his. “You cannot possibly know that.”

She remained poised on the step, half in the world she was leaving and half inside the carriage that would carry her away with him. Her fingers were still in his, but neither of them had released the other.

Hector allowed the silence to lengthen by a breath.

“I know enough.”