His words had her wrapping her arms around his neck and clutching him tight as if seeking his warmth. Seeking his protection. She’d never reached for him like this before. It unsettled and humbled him at the same time.
“I-I, h-how are you here?”
“Sssh, we will talk soon. For now, we need to get off this boat and to get you warm.”
She was like a block of ice. Her teeth chattered, and her entire body shook. She was slight in his arms. Always had been. Willowy and small. She wasn’t like others in his family with their big personalities. But she was one of the happiest, most optimistic people he’d ever encountered. It had often terrified him that she walked about London with that attitude, which could easily see her taken advantage of.
She was like a chick leaving the nest for the first time every damn day she left
her brother’s town house.
“W-w-w—”
“Samantha, shut up.”
Her teeth snapped together, and he guessed the only reason she was not taking him to task for his words was because she could not form any. Warwick did not want to think about how she would have gotten off this boat if he had not arrived. Looking over his shoulder, he saw Archie was on his heels, his arms full of Penny, the maid.
Warwick was good-natured for the most part and treated people as he wished them to treat him, but fear had him cleaving a path through the bodies with ruthless determination. He wanted her off this vessel and safe. Yes, other passengers were in the same situation as Samantha and her maid, but he didn’t care. He cared abouther.
Making his way back to the gangway, Warwick followed the other passengers down.
“Move!”
“St-stop, yelling.”
Her ice-cold nose was pressed into his neck, and her arms clung to him.
“I’ll yell if I bloody want to,” he muttered. Fear turned Warwick mean, it always had. He hated when those he cared for were vulnerable or in pain. Hated if they were scared or hurting. He would move an entire city brick by brick if he could alleviate their suffering.
When finally they reached the bottom, he kept walking until he saw Bids, his family’s driver. Now a great deal older than when Warwick first met him, he was still sharp eyed and wiry and used when they needed another set of hands and eyes. Entrusted and almost part of the family, he watched over them and always had, sometimes a little too zealously.
“Oh, dear!” He was standing on his perch, watching them walk toward him. “Is Lady Samantha all right, sir?”
“No. We need to get her to somewhere warm, Bids. A tavern or anything that looks clean and dry.”
“At once, sir.” Bids sat as Archie hurried up behind Warwick, carrying Penny.
“Her maid is also hurt,” Warwick added.
“The luggage, sir?”
He’d forgotten about that.
“Where is your luggage, Samantha?”
“N-near us.”
Which Warwick took to mean, close to where he’d found them. Looking around him he saw three boys. He waved them closer.
“How many pieces?” he whispered in Samantha’s ear.
“Th-three.”
“Do they have James’s crest on them?”
She nodded. “P-Penny’s is with them.”
He gave the boys instruction and money and told them more would be forthcoming if they collected the luggage with the Duke of Raven’s crest on it. After explaining what that looked like, he and Archie climbed inside the carriage with their burdens. The door was shut hard enough that it rocked on its springs.
