She lowers her hand. Her voice is quiet when she speaks. Too quiet.
“I’m going home to Paradise Falls.”
Everything in me rebels.
“No.”
Her chin lifts.
There she is.
My Sophie.
Hurt. Proud. Bleeding, but not bowing.
“You just postponed our wedding because I kept something from you. I’m not staying here tonight like a punished child while every brother in your club listens for whether I cry.”
“That ain’t what this is.”
“No? Then what is it?”
“It ain’t safe.”
She laughs once. “Now you sound like every man I have ever had to fight.”
“That ain’t fair.”
“No.” Her eyes shine again. “It isn’t. Neither is postponing a wedding in front of ghosts my father may have helped make, but here we are.”
I step toward her. “Sophie.”
She steps back.
The space hurts worse than I expect.
“I need to go home,” she says. “I need to think. I need to look at what I found without trying to guess what your face will do when I tell you. And I need to ask my father some questions before someone else bleeds for answers.”
“You’re not going alone.”
Her jaw tightens. “Don’t do that.”
“I am still me.”
“And I am still me.”
We stare at each other across wedding ribbons and cornbread crumbs, both too stubborn, both too hurt, both right enough to be dangerous.
Finally, I say, “I’ll send men.”
“I know.”
“I’ll send Derby.”
“No.” Her voice is immediate. “Derby stays with Amelia and August.”
That lands.
Even now.