Page 144 of A Duchess for his Family

“I’m all right,” she whispered.

He stared at her. Water ran from her hair over the blanket. Her lips were almost colorless, and she was trembling so violently he could feel it through his coat.

“You are not all right.”

“I am.”

“You were beneath the water.”

“Only for a moment.”

Only.

Benedict began walking.

“Benedict.”

He did not answer. The carriage stood nearby, but Rivermere was visible beyond the trees, its lamps glowing in the darkness. He could walk faster than the carriage could be turned around on the narrow track. So he walked.

Sophia shifted in his arms. “You cannot carry me all the way.”

He kept moving.

“Benedict.”

Her head rested against his shoulder. He could feel her breath near his throat. Each breath became something he counted without meaning to.

One.

Two.

Three.

Alive.

“I truly am all right.”

His jaw tightened. He did not trust himself to answer. Because if he spoke, he might say something he could never take back. He might tell her what it had done to him when she vanished. He might tell her that for one terrible second he had understood exactly what a world without Sophia would feel like. And he had discovered that every defense he had built against such pain was useless.

He thought distance would protect him. But distance had not protected him when she disappeared beneath that water. Rules had not protected him. The arrangement had not protected him. Nothing had.

He loved her. The knowledge was there now, terrible and complete.

Sophia shivered. Benedict pulled the blanket tighter around her.

“I’m sorry,” she murmured.

He looked down sharply. “For what?”

“For frightening you.”

His steps faltered, then he continued.

“You need not apologize.”

Her eyes opened slightly wider.

“You went into that water after Marjorie.”