The Inconvenient Duchess

best friends as girls and both as sweet and beautiful as one could hope. When I was fourteen, my father died. He left sufficient funds to see me through school, and provide a modest Season when I came of age, and left my guardianship to an aged aunt who knew little of what happened while I was away.’
    Her mouth twisted in a bitter line. ‘There was a trustee there who took, shall we say, a personal interest in my case. He took every opportunity to remind me that my funds were limited, and my position at the school in jeopardy. Finally, he persuaded me to meet him one night in an office. To go over the details of my father’s will. How was I to know what he intended? I was only a girl.’ There was anguish in her voice and Marcus felt the man next to him tighten protectively.
    ‘I returned to my room afterward crying and shaking and your mother helped me clean away the blood and swore she would tell no one what had happened. And she kept the secret for me because I begged her to, even though the man continued to use me on and off for the rest of the term. I escaped to my aunt’s home after that, and saw nothing of your mother until the year we had our Season.
    ‘She was a great beauty, as was I.’ Cecily smiled as she remembered. ‘I’d put the difficulties at school far behind me and hoped to make a match with an understanding manwho would not question the lack of blood on the sheet. I had several fine prospects, including my dear Anthony, and…’ she looked appraisingly at Marcus ‘…your own father. Many of the same men who hovered about your mother, in fact. We had been friends at school, but we were rivals now. When it looked like your father might be ready to offer for me, when it looked like she might lose, your mother let my secret slip out, and then spread it enthusiastically about the ton . Suddenly I was not a poor, abused girl, but a young seductress. And the offers I received?’ She laughed. ‘Well, they were not offers of marriage. Eventually, I accepted one. And when he tired of me, I found another. And that is when I was known as “Lady Cecily”. And why I responded as I did when you came to the door. Anthony was the last of the men that kept me, and I loved him from the time before my fall from honour. When he became too poor to keep me?’ She shrugged. ‘I kept him. And he ran through all I had saved before I could persuade him to take his daughter, abandon his honour and run.’
    ‘And you sought to ruin me, as my mother ruined you?’
    ‘No, your Grace. I swear we meant you no harm. I only sought to find the best possible home for Miranda. And I do you no disservice in sending you a wife. She is not so great as the ladies you might choose, but she has had no opportunity to be a lady since she was ten, and no mother to guide her. Had the past been different, she would be every bit as fine as the woman you would select for yourself.’
    The words were distant in his ears, drowned out by the memories in his head.
    ‘The poor girl…’
    ‘Your family honour…’
    ‘Look at her and think of what will happen to her if you beg off now…’
    ‘The child needs a name…’
    ‘Your Grace?’ Cecily Dawson was looking at him in puzzlement and he snapped back to the present.
    ‘I beg your pardon, madam. Pray continue.’
    ‘We never meant to trap you into a marriage with Miranda. It was our hope, rather naïve perhaps, but our hope all the same, that if she could only meet a few gentlemen of her own class, she might by her modesty and good sense attract the attention of one of them. I thought, if your mother was unable to persuade one of her sons to take a wife, we might, by continued threat, convince her to take the girl as a ward and introduce her to other gentlemen in the area. At the very least, a position as companion to your mother…’
    ‘Delivering the girl into the hands of your enemies?’ He quirked a brow and smiled ironically back to them.
    Sir Anthony responded, ‘At this point, it was the frying pan or the fire for her. I apologise for my candour, your Grace. Your mother may have had a tongue like a viper, but words are not capable of hurting my daughter. Her acceptance of my daughter was an admission of guilt and fear of exposure.’
    ‘But my mother is dead,’ Marcus said silkily. ‘And I am under no such compulsion.’
    The looks on the faces of the other two went from resolve to alarm.
    ‘I beg pardon for what I have said. I’m sorry for your loss,