Elise flinched, not because of shame—she had nothing to be ashamed of—but because the words struck at the precise place her mind could not afford to examine.
“Enough.” Mr. Leigh growled.
Holt lunged again, desperate now, and one of the other men—tall, composed, with an air of authority—stepped forward to intercept him. Another, broader than the rest, seized Holt’s arm as if it were a twig.
Holt fought like a cornered animal nonetheless. He twisted, he spat, he tried to break away toward the water.
Elise saw his hand dart toward his coat pocket. The ledger, her mind screamed. If he threw it into the sea?—
“No!” she cried, and did not recognize the rawness of her own voice.
Mr. Leigh reacted instantly, as if her fear had become his command. He grabbed Holt’s forearm, wrenching it away from the pocket, and for a moment Holt’s eyes met Elise’s with hateful triumph.
“You will never read it,” Holt hissed.
“I do not need to read it,” Mr. Leigh said, and his voice was the most dangerous thing Elise had ever heard—so quiet, so absolute, it was keener than the rasp of steel.
The broader man slammed Holt back against the boat-house wall. Another man—elegant and quick—reached into Holt’s pocket with brisk efficiency and withdrew a leather-wrapped packet.
“The ledger,” he said, almost conversationally, as if announcing the discovery of a misplaced glove.
Holt roared, thrashing his arms and body in a frenzy. “Thieves!”
The commanding man—Elise saw now that he was the leader, the centre the others moved around—stepped forward and delivered a single controlled blow that made Holt sag.
Holt did not collapse entirely for rage kept him upright, but his fight drained into helpless fury. They bound him swiftly. They contained him, as one contains a fire before it leaps.
Elise stood shaking, her arm aching. Her breathing was harsh and too fast. The sea’s wind cut across her face, cold and sharp, and she realized only then that she had tears in her eyes—not grief, not even fear, but shock: the body’s protest at having been too close to life’s ending.
Mr. Leigh turned to her at once. “Elise,” he said, his voice softer now, as if he had stepped back into humanity.
She stared at him, seeing not only the man who had blocked Holt’s hands, but the man Holt had named: one brother trying to right another’s wrongs.
She could not fit it into her mind, not now; not with Holt snarling nearby and strange men holding her husband’s past in their hands.
Mr. Leigh’s gaze searched her face. “Are you hurt?”
Elise swallowed. “No.” It was the truth in body, if not in spirit.
He reached out, hesitated and then placed his hand lightly at her elbow, steadying her as if she might fall. The contact was brief and controlled, yet Elise felt it like a brand: warmth through wool, a quiet claim of presence. She breathed in, and his scent—cold air, damp wool, something clean beneath it—made her suddenly aware of how alone she had been before he came. And that awareness frightened her almost as much as Holt had.
Bound and furious, Holt lifted his head. His gaze fixed on Mr. Leigh with loathing and a kind of malicious amusement. “You think this is over, do you?” he sneered. “This does not end here.”
Mr. Leigh’s expression did not change, but Elise saw something in his eyes. Pain, perhaps—or anger, held in a vice.
The men began to move Holt away, toward the lane, toward whatever justice awaited beyond Plymouth’s grey shore.
The commanding man stepped toward Elise. “Mrs. Larkin,” he said, his voice calm, “you were very brave.”
Elise blinked, trying to gather her composure as if it were a dropped shawl. “Who are you?”
“A friend,” he replied, and it was the sort of answer that carried layers Elise knew she would not be permitted to peel back.
She looked to Mr. Leigh, helplessly, because if she was to trust anyone in that moment, it would be the man who had kept Holt’s hands from her.
Mr. Leigh met her gaze, and in his eyes was something—not evasion, but reassurance.
“We have it,” he said quietly.
