Page 1 of Stolen By the Cruel Duke
Chapter One
“We’re ruined! We’re all ruined!”
Miss Iris Crampton looked up to see her sister, Rosalie, staring at the newspaper she was reading, a look of shock, horror, and confusion on her face.
“Rose?” she asked cautiously, her finger hovering over the daisies she was stitching into a pillowcase. “Is everything all right?”
While the youngest Crampton daughter was prone to dramatics, Iris couldn’t help but feel a twinge of unease at her sister’s calamitous announcement.
Rosalie turned her large green eyes—so much like Iris’s, so much like their mother’s—to her sister and opened her mouth, but no words came out. This was also unlike her. At seventeen, Rosalie Crampton always had something to say.
From across the drawing room, their middle sister, Violet, looked up from her book. “Are you reading the gossip sheets again, Rose? You really ought not to believe a word they say. Life for young ladies is not nearly as exciting as they make it out to be.”
Rosalie found her voice. “But—this one is about Iris!”
A stunned silence greeted this pronouncement.
Iris’s stomach turned over, and heat rushed to her cheeks and neck. “W-why would they write about me?” she stammered. “I’m just a boring spinster.”
Violet, however, had closed her book. She stood up and crossed to Rosalie, snatching the paper from her hands. Her eyes widened as she began to read, and then she clapped a hand over her mouth.
“It can’t be,” she whispered through her fingers.
“The gossip sheets wouldn’t lie about something this ruinous,” Rosalie said at once. She turned to look at Iris, who felt as if she’d been punched in the stomach.
“Now you’re both scaring me,” Iris said. Standing, she held out her hand, which had begun to shake. “Give me the paper.”
Violet hesitated for a moment, and Iris gave her her most formidable look. Iris was the eldest, after all, and now that theirmother was gone, it was her responsibility to look out for her sisters and mitigate any harm that might come to the family. Whatever the paper said, it was better she met it head-on.
Violet handed her the paper, and Iris smoothed it out to read it.
She wasn’t sure what she had been expecting. The headline, however, was far worse than anything she could have imagined.
Spirited Spinster Miss I. C. sneaks away from the ball for rendezvous with Dangerous DukeE.
Iris began to read, her heart in her throat.
Scandal ensued by the cover of night last Saturday at the Holloway Ball, when the eldest daughter of a divisive viscount was seen embracing the most dangerous Duke in the realm. Miss I. C. was the only young lady to faint at the ball, leading some to speculate whether this fit was, in fact, genuine or a ruse designed to allow her to meet in secret with her paramour. After ‘swooning,’ Miss I. C. was seen leaving the ball unchaperoned and making her way to the rose garden. There, she was joined by her tall, blue-eyed Duke, in what this writer can only describe as a licentious tryst unfit for the eyes of its delicate readers
The article went on in a similar vein, but Iris had stopped reading.
The most dangerous Duke in the realm. Duke E. Tall, blue-eyed.There could be no doubt who this piece was referring to: the infamous and reclusive Duke of Eavestone.
Iris thought she might cast up her crumpets. Looking up, her eyes met her sister’s.
“Who would write this?” she whispered as she slowly sank back onto the settee. “It’s not true. I swear it isn’t true!”
“We’d understand if it was,” Rosalie began quickly. “Certainly, we wouldn’t approve, but I’ve read romance novels, so I understand the temptation to?—”
“Itisn’t true,” Iris repeated, her anger flaring. “I mean… Yes, I did feel faint at the ball. It was warm and crowded, and I swooned from overexertion. So, I stepped outside onto the terrace for some air, but I was accompanied by… by…”
In truth, Iris couldn’t remember who had been out on the terrace with her. Some matron or another. She hadn’t been paying attention, as she’d been still woozy from her fainting spell. Now she wished she could remember so that she could beg them to verify her innocence.
“Of course, we know it isn’t true,” Violet interjected quickly, shooting Rosalie a scathing look. She sat down on the settee next to Iris and put her arm around her. “We’ll find a way to prove it. I promise.”
But her reassurance did little to comfort Iris. “My reputation will be ruined…” she whispered. “I’ll be shunned from Society. And you two will be wrapped up in the scandal, tainted by association.”
The irony of it all was not lost on her. After all these years as the perfect, proper young lady, she would not be the reason for her sisters’ ruination. It was unthinkable. She rarely danced at balls, never flirted with gentlemen, and had never even had a serious suitor. At twenty-three, she was firmly on the shelf, happy to be the spinster who guided her sisters through the various pitfalls of London Society.
