“You’re lying.”
“Yes.” Moonlight highlighted the shadows on her wan face, flickering within her desperate eyes. “Yes, I’m lying. If you cared anything about yourself—your children…”
Coldness rushed through him. “How did you know I have children?”
She staggered to the edge of the bridge, peered down at the hazy view of the Thames, but he seized her arm—
A cry broke from her lips. She clamped a hand across her side, sucked air between her teeth. “Don’t touch me,” she gasped.
“You are hurt.”
“Does not matter.”
He turned her body until moonlight shimmered over her dress—the blood on her white hand, soaking across her abdomen, trickling down her dress. “Who did this to you?”
“Leave me alone.”
“Why are you protecting them when—”
“I’m not protecting them!” Groaning, she stumbled to the ledge and cursed. “I’m protecting you. Get out of here while you can. Leave me alone.”
“I will not leave you like this.”
“You’re a fool.”
“Whoever is doing this must be stopped.”
“But it doesn’t work that way.” She glanced back at him with hair whipping across her face. “The good ones get stopped instead. They get locked in wine cellars and thrown out into the streets. They get locked in brothel bedchambers and eat scraps and get stabbed in the stomach for the one thing they…they…” In one frantic movement, she hurled herself over the wet-stoned ledge, her scream deafening.
Simon lunged after her. His stomach dropped, air beat at his face, then cold water smacked his body so hard the breath escaped his lungs.Lord, help me.Black water swirled him deeper. He stroked, pushed himself upward, broke the surface and blinked hard against the water stinging his eyes. “Helen!” He spat out water. “Helen!”
A body rushed past him, carried into the black shadow of the bridge.
With a rush of adrenaline, he dove after her, snatched her foot and dragged her to him. “Hold on to me.” Fingernails clawed at his face, seized his hair and pulled. Water sucked them down. He resurfaced and kicked his way toward the stone pier, but her flailing arms turned limp.She’s dead.
No.
Not that fast.
Please no, God.The prayer raced like madness. He was under again, breathing again, under again, breathing again. Everything hurt. Somewhere in the distance, voices shouted at him. Or was it only the roar of the water?
Rough stone met his fingertips. Spewing fish-tasting water from his mouth, he secured his grip and pressed his back against the pier, where the rushing current could no longer carry them.
Everything blurred. The moonlight flickering on the Thames. The distant lamplights. The small schooners and rowing boats and distant figures watching them from muddy banks. “Someone, help!” The yell was hoarse, but it must have carried, for the figures began scurrying into action. Seconds later, several silhouettes were lunging into a rowboat and paddling toward them.
Simon hoisted Helen higher, her limp head on his shoulder. A faint breath tickled his neck as water splashed around them. “Hold on. Help is coming.”
“I want to die.” Slurred and sickening and almost lifeless. “They hurt me enough. I just want to die.”
“I will find them.”
“No.”
“They must be stopped before more people are injured—”
“Fool.” A string of profanity gagged from her lips. She seized his coat in a death grip. “Leave it alone. Forget everything.”
“Helen—”
