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If anyone could escape from this scenario with her head held high, it was she.

Arabella was three feet from the door when it opened. The duchess was on the other side of it. "There you are, child. Come in. We were just speaking of you."

That was not exactly reassuring, but Arabella lifted her chin and strode into the room.

Lord Alderton rose when she entered. "Lady Arabella."

"Lord Alderton." Her voice sounded stiffer than she'd intended. But that was better than being emotional. She'd exhibited far too much emotion in front of this man already.

Today she would be on her best behavior.

The duchess had taken her chair. There was already a tea tray on the small table and Arabella sat down in the chair across from the duchess with her composure firmly in place and her hands folded in her lap.

She lifted her chin, ready with a little smile or a polite murmur for whatever was to come.

The duchess studied her for a moment with a small private amusement that suggested she was not entirely fooled. "My dear child, I shall come straight to the point. I imagine you are not particularly eager to share your private affairs with two relative strangers. I shall therefore begin with what I already know, and you may correct me as we go."

Arabella did not react.

"You are being blackmailed," the duchess said.

It was not a question. There was no preamble, no curl of inquiry. The duchess had said the word as a statement.

Arabella stared at her in surprise.

She could not quite manage a no. She also could not manage a yes.

Without meaning to, she glanced at Lord Alderton.

His hands were curled into fists on his thighs, but he had not moved.

She looked back at the duchess. Composure. She must keep her composure.

But then the duchess kept talking. "I do not know what this person has on you, my dear. Nor do I know how long it has been going on. I do know that you have been in a very unfortunate position for some time, and that this person has not been brought to any kind of account."

The duchess leaned forward to pour a cup of tea as if she had no idea her words were upending Arabella's entire world.

"To that end," the duchess continued amiably, "I would like to help you."

The silence after the sentence had a thickness to it.

Arabella's training rose dutifully to meet the moment. She knew exactly what to say. Your Grace is too kind. You have misread the situation entirely. I assure you I am perfectly well. The marks are nothing. I knocked my throat on the corner of a cabinet. I shall be returning to Marchmont House this afternoon.

Arabella had been delivering performances of this ilk for years. She could do it in her sleep.

She opened her mouth. But then she made the mistake of looking at Lord Alderton again.

His eyes were on her, dark and warm and…worried. There was so much concern there, it caught her off guard. And the composure she had so carefully pulled together this morning⁠—

It gave way all at once.

One moment she was upright in the chair, and the next her hands were over her face and her shoulders were shaking and she was making a sound she had not made in front of another person since she was a small child.

It was not a pretty sound. And this was decidedly not delicate weeping. It was the sort of crying that came on unexpectedly and, apparently, could not be stopped.

Arabella was horrified by it. But she couldn't stop the sobs that wracked her frame or the sounds that came out of her as she gasped for breath.

She felt the cushion beside her shift and then Lord Alderton's arm come around her shoulders and tug her close.