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Everything.

He’d a few giant cracks and a thousand tiny fissures to cross. And, he suspected, the only way to reach her was not to charge ahead, but to go back to the very beginning.

After a moment’s hesitation, he peeled away the under glove he never removed in company.

He gazed down at the ugly scars. His by-rote bodily functions suspended. He forced himself to swallow.

“A long time ago, you asked me what happened to my hand.”

She inhaled sharply, and then she stopped breathing. In halting, fitful bursts of movement, she lowered her arm.

“Ask me”—his smarting eyes briefly interrupted him—“again.”

If he’d guessed correctly, she would soon be the mother of his child, but he saw in her face the wan little girl who had bravely tried to heal his hurt.

Now, he must heal hers.

And next—he heard his mother’s voice—may I present Miss Lenora Wainwright?

“Miss Lenora Wainwright,” he acknowledged.

He tucked his hand, his uninjured hand, behind his back, held out his crooked pinky and bowed. From that position, he held her gaze, willing her to remember, to understand.

Mute, she stared at his scars, then she whispered, “Did you hurt your hand?”

“Yes.” Again, he forced a swallow. “Come sit. And I’ll tell you how.”

She placed her trembling hand in his, and he drew her to the mattress. Together, they sat down.

Her small hand placed inordinate pressure on his first three fingers, but his scars muted feeling in the fourth. He took a deep breath and gathered his thoughts.

“We think of ‘school’ as a place of learning.” Easier to begin in the general. “Brutality touted as toughening up part of a proper education. As if beatings were bracing.”

He squinted out the window and bit his lip. “As if the result of repeated humiliation is strength rather than rage.”

She stilled.

“A schoolmaster once advised me to proudly accept Willard’s beatings. While he wasn’t wrong about learning endurance, he didn’t understand Willard’s depravity.” He raised his brows. “Nor did I believe then or now the other thing he told me—inuring myself to pain, to compassion, to shame would prepare me for my role to dominate and subdue those of the lesser classes.”

“Simon,” she whispered.

“Yes, Simon,” he repeated bitterly. “Simple Simon. Scared Simon. Lily-livered Landon.”

He glanced back. She held his gaze with changeling eyes. No. With dear and loving eyes.

The rancor his tale had roused eased. He resumed the story. “Name calling, fights—neither are unusual, nor would they have caused a significant wound, but Willard was without conscience.” His gaze unfocused. “Others’ pain gave him glee. Willard was so cruel that Neville, who was no stranger to ribbing the younger boys, decided to teach Willard’s favorite targets to fight back.”

She wet her lips.

“Lenora,” he spoke urgently, and, he hoped, persuasively. “Neville will be a good husband to Millie. Yesterday, we three arranged her marriage settlements. Together.” She had to understand how unusual that was. “Even I could hardly believe how drastically things have changed between them. They’re growing close, I swear.”

Her eyes moved between his, as if she were searching his gaze for truth.

“I would never have forced Millie, or any of you, to wed.” Although, in Lenora’s case, he wished he could.

She nodded slowly. “I believe you.”

That much gave him peace.