“That is all.”
He frowned at his wife. “There is not a lot to be done. You need only survey the damage and figure out the next steps.”
“Well, why don’t you do it while you are here if that is it?”
Her familiar argumentative nature came back, but it felt different. It didn’t sound like she was arguing to antagonize him. There was something else.
“You only have to take a look?” he asked. “Am I missing something? You don’t want to complete a task that shall take you less than a minute now that you are here?”
Georgina held herself as tense as if a ghostly apparition had laid its hands on her. Her eyes darted around, taking everything in.
“Well, why don’tyoudo it if it’ll only take you a minute? I don’t tell you how to do your job, do I? I would appreciate it if you would not tell me how to do mine. I never asked you to come out here. I was doing perfectly fine on my own, if you must know.”
Lysander had no intention of arguing with her when bigger problems were lurking somewhere nearby. “I know you were doing fine. I overheard you talking with Mrs. Kettleworth, and you have implemented some clever solutions to our problems, and I have no doubt you’ll solve this current problem, too.”
“Is that what you do with your time?” Georgina asked. “You lurk around corners listening to what I have to say to the staff? Are you hoping to hear my deepest, darkest secrets?”
From the moment Georgina opened her mouth, Lysander regretted attempting humor.
“You don’t need to try to fix me,” she snapped, her words sharp enough to cut.
But beneath her defiance, he heard something else—something raw, almost brittle. A small fracture in her carefully composed countenance. He wasn’t sure why, but that note in her voice struck him more deeply than it should have.
“I have no wish to fix you, Duchess,” he said, his tone low and steady. “I only wish to understand—and perhaps help you find a solution.”
Her hands twisted together restlessly as she stood at the tree line, her gaze flicking between him and the lake beyond. There was a rigidity to her posture, the kind bred not merely from discomfort but from something deeper. Something closer to fear.
Then it clicked.
“You’re afraid of the water, aren’t you?”
She scoffed at once, but the sound rang hollow. “Well, that’s ridiculous.”
“Is it because of Hyde Park?” he pressed, keeping his voice calm and non-threatening.
Georgina’s lips pressed together. Her teeth caught her lower lip for the briefest moment. Then—barely perceptible—a nod.
Lysander’s chest tightened. He wasn’t entirely sure why he felt the sudden flicker of protectiveness. He certainly hadn’t invited it. Still, he approached the topic carefully, uncertain how to navigate something so fragile.
“That was… a difficult experience,” he acknowledged, watching her closely. “But you know these grounds now. You aren’t going to fall in.”
“It’s not….” She broke off, her words tangling as she looked away, visibly frustrated with herself. “It’s not that simple.”
He studied her face for a long moment. The tightly drawn brows. The fine tremor in her jaw. Suddenly, it wasn’t difficult to see what she wouldn’t say aloud.
“You don’t know how to swim,” he said quietly.
Her head whipped toward him, eyes wide, horrified. “You don’t need to say it so loudly,” she muttered, looking around as though the trees themselves might start gossiping.
His mouth tugged slightly, despite himself. “I see. So, this is why you’ve avoided the lake entirely since you arrived. It now makes complete sense.”
“No, you don’t understand,” she bit out, crossing her arms defensively.
He could have pressed further, but something in her face—some flicker of humiliation—gave him pause. He understood all too well what it was to keep certain fears hidden, buried beneath the armor one wore every day. There were things from the war he never spoke of. Things that still woke him at night, drenched in sweat, his heart pounding like he’d run ten miles uphill.
Perhaps her fears deserve the same degree of respect.
“I’ll tell you what,” he said instead, with a touch of dryness. “You stay here, and I’ll check the gazebo. No sense in both of us wading through uneven ground.”
