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Probability: 100%.

Regina’s remarks about Bea’s body were like robins in spring: ubiquitous, flashy, and wholly impossible to ignore.

Lady Alcon thrust Bea in front of Regina’s brother with an introduction that sounded like an apology. Bea took a quick glance at His Grace’s eyes—they were the same color as Regina’s—and barely managed to turn her shudder into a curtsy that suggested respect.

“Your Grace,” she said, staring directly at the floor.

He briskly kissed her hand, bowed, and expressed something or other.

Lady Alcon had drawn Martha and the twins into a conversation, but Regina had attached herself to her brother’s arm and was amusing herself by looking down her nose at Bea. It wasn’t hard because Bea was, as her father used to put it, as small and round as an acorn.

The Season was only five weeks old, but she already knew what that smile on Regina’s lips foretold. No need for a query; certainties weren’t worth calculating odds.

“Goodness me,” Regina said, her lips curling sweetly. “I do believe that you’ve been on a reducing diet since I saw you last, Beatrice. Don’t you agree with me, Duke?”

Her brother, Bea saw with a fleeting glance, was glancing over the ballroom with the air of a man incapable of polite conversation.

Regina elbowed him, and Bea, watching the way the narrow point dug into the gentleman’s side, was rather surprised when he looked down at his sister without indignation and said something in a deep voice that might have been, “Whoa.”

In other words, the command one gave a horse when driving a buggy.

Regina’s jaw firmed, but then she laughed. “You’re such a charmer, Lennox.”

“No evidence of that,” her brother stated, obviously not giving a damn.

“Well,” Bea said brightly, thinking that perhaps she could escape in the midst of a sibling squabble, “If you’ll excuse me, I’ll—”

Regina’s hand whipped out, and she caught Bea’s arm. “Oh, no! I insist that you allow my brother to share in your triumph, Beatrice.”

Bea froze. What on earth was she talking about?

Regina turned to her brother. “Miss Valentine has put in so much effort to trim down all that flesh she carries around with her. You can see that she battles a morbid propensity to fatten, the poor girl.”

A sickening heat swept up from Bea’s chest into her face. “I don’t battle,” she croaked, which made absolutely no sense.

“It is so, so humiliating,” Regina cooed, “but you are among friends here, Beatrice. My brother is always kind to those who can’t help themselves. He’s quite a saint, in fact. Just this afternoon he chided me for refusing a beggar.” Her voice sharpened on the last word.

“It was less for refusing the boy than for kicking him,” the duke said flatly.

Regina shivered in a dramatic fashion. “The rat dared to touch me, though he was dressed in the most revolting rags. I am certain that he was infested with all different sorts of bugs.”

Query: What is the probability that a young beggar might transfer a flea?

Probability: Very low. Perhaps 5%?

One could always hope.

“You called me unkind, Lennox, but Beatrice can tell you that I have done my very best to help her from the moment she arrived in London.”

“Help” was one way of putting it, if making Bea’s life hell counted.

“I’m glad to hear it,” Regina’s brother replied.

Bea risked a look at the man. He was scanning the ballroom again, looking for a friend. Perhaps his mistress.

Having seen his expression, Bea predicted that even if Prudence curtsied so low that she plopped down to the floor on her bottom, this man had no interest in marriage or marriageable girls. The contours of his jaw were what one could expect from the aristocracy, but his eyes weren’t. They were remote, chilly, and completely detached.

“Since I saw you three days ago, Beatrice, I trust that you have eaten nothing but potatoes and soda water, as I advised?” Regina demanded.