Page 116 of The Duke's Sinful Deal
There was no reproach in her voice. No accusation. Only a steady invitation that made it difficult to turn away.
Arabella stopped walking.
For a moment, she said nothing. The street moved around them, the quiet hum of conversation and passing wheels continuing as though nothing had shifted at all.
“I did not wish to add to your concerns,” she said at last.
Eleanor’s hand tightened slightly on her arm. “You never have. Not once.”
“That is not how it felt,” Arabella replied, her voice softer now. “You had your own life, your own concerns. And I…” She hesitated, searching for the right shape of it. “I felt as though my choices were always… evaluated, whether you intended it or not.”
Eleanor’s expression changed at that, something like surprise flickering through it before settling into something more thoughtful.
“I did judge you,” she admitted, after a moment. “More than I should have. I thought it was my duty to guide you, to ensure you did not make mistakes I could prevent.”
Arabella looked at her then. “And did you believe I would?”
“I believed you capable of anything,” Eleanor said, a faint smile touching her lips. “Which, as it turns out, includes decisions I was entirely unprepared for.”
There was a brief pause, the tension easing just slightly.
“I am sorry,” Eleanor continued, her tone more earnest now. “Not for caring, but for the manner in which I expressed it. I see now that it created a distance I did not intend.”
Arabella held her gaze, the sincerity there difficult to dismiss.
“I did not wish to trouble you,” she said again, though more quietly this time. “And when I felt… judged, it seemed easier not to speak at all.”
Eleanor exhaled, the sound soft. “You could never trouble me in the way you imagine.”
Arabella’s brow furrowed slightly. “You say that, but?—”
“I say it because it is true,” Eleanor interrupted gently. “Do you think I would be as I am now if you had not been there? If I had not had you beside me when everything else seemed uncertain?”
Arabella’s breath caught, just slightly.
“You were never a burden,” Eleanor continued. “You were the reason I endured much of what I did. The reason I found my way through it with any measure of happiness at all.”
The words settled into something deeper than reassurance. Something that shifted the ground beneath Arabella’s assumptions in a way she had not quite prepared for.
“I did not know that,” she said.
“I suspect you did not wish to,” Eleanor replied, though without unkindness.
For a moment, neither of them spoke.
Then Arabella stepped forward, closing the small distance that had formed between them, and Eleanor met her without hesitation. The embrace was firm in a way that spoke of familiarity long set aside and now, quietly, reclaimed.
“I am sorry,” Arabella said into her shoulder.
“As am I,” Eleanor returned.
They drew apart slowly, the air between them lighter than it had been before.
It was then, perhaps because the moment had softened something within her, that Arabella spoke again.
“There is something else,” she said.
Eleanor’s attention sharpened at once, though her expression remained open. “Yes?”
