Page 1 of Stolen By the Duke of Ice
Chapter One
“Where can he be? I am so unforgivably late as it is!”
Lady Dahlia Hill, daughter of the Marquess of Bolton, sat inside her family’s carriage. With the window opened, she leaned as far out as she could, craning her neck to better see. The closed door and the darkness of the windows of the shop in front of the carriage frustrated her. She wrung her hands.
“Beggin’ your pardon, M’Lady, but are you sure Mr. Thomas is coming?” Benson, the Hill Family’s long-time coachman, asked as he looked at Dahlia from atop the coachman’s box.
“Yes, Benson,” she sighed. “His letter is very clear. I am to meet him tonight in front of his printing press at half past eight.” She pulled out the letter and read the details again just to be sure. “He has never been this late before. Half an hour has gone by already!”
“Perhaps I should drive M’Lady to Her Grace’s dinner party now?” Benson suggested. “Perhaps Mr. Thomas was detained and cannot come,” Benson added meekly.
She breathed in, attempting to calm her frayed nerves.
“We must wait for Mr. Thomas, Benson. I must hand over this manuscript tonight. It is most imperative.” She patted the latest of her seven completed novels,The Duke and the Mysterious Debutante.
“But Her Grace will?—”
“Celine is always irritated lately,” she said distractedly, eyes fixed on the street.Her Gracewas her very close friend, Celine. Happily married, she and Rhys Harken, Duke of Wylds, were expecting their first child, which, Dahlia thought with equal parts amusement and exasperation, had made her rather short with everyone. “Worry not, Benson, I shall tell her that it is my new coiffure that caused our tardiness. That will pacify her. But we must not leave without my business being conducted tonight.”
“Ah… about that, M’Lady…” Benson cleared his throat. “Would you not consider a more private circulation of your novels as Biddy, John, and I have asked you before? Like those secret libraries that thetonseem to be fond of. Surely Penelope Lovelace is an authoress that has a place in these circles.”
“It is as if you do not know me, Benson. I do not have the extensive social graces needed for such intimate gatherings. Andbesides, if I bring a manuscript instead of a published book, it will be very apparent that IamPenelope Lovelace! Considering the content and characters in my stories, that will surely create a scandal of astronomical proportions! How can I, a Marquess’ spinster daughter, survive such a scandal?”
“M’Lady—”
“Why, imagine how my chances of findingthe onewill be completely obliterated if I am found to be responsible for the Lovelace novels! As it is, it’s already hard enough to findhim!” She flung out one arm in a dramatic gesture. “One whiff of Penelope Lovelace’s true identity, and the Duke of Ice will have my skin! Afterall, I have not really gone out of my way to conceal the fact that the ‘Duke of Snowdon’ is based on him. So no, secret libraries are completely out of the question, thank you.”
Benson turned from his seat and leaned towards her. The light from a nearby lamp post illuminated his suddenly serious face. From her position by the carriage window, they were but two feet apart. His expression alerted Dahlia.
“M’Lady, Biddy, John, and I, well, we-we’ve been talking, and well, after that near mishap the other night…”
“Benson, that was definitely a most unfortunate circumstance, but it was entirely my own fault; you were not to blame at all,” she reassured the coachman.
“But I should not have let you convince me to let you go inside that pub by yourself at all!”
For a moment, it seemed to Dahlia that he saw her as a daughter and not the daughter of his master; her voice softened with affection for the faithful servant.
“Oh, Benson, you dear old friend, I wasn’t in that much of a danger. Truly, I got out the moment the first face was struck.”
Benson winced. “’Tis dangerous, thisresearchas you call it. But ’tis not just that. You skulking about in the middle of the night, meeting with men of unknown—waiting for them beside dark streets no less!” he said, gesturing around them for emphasis.
“Benson! Mr. Thomas is a highly respectable man in the printing trade; you know that.”
“But the vagrant who followed you was not!”
“You were there to stop him, were you not? And John as well. He most definitely gave that vagrant a scare!”
“Aye, M’Lady, but John narrowly missed a knife wound for it. A footman cannot do his duties if he is leaking blood from his side. Forgive me, M’Lady, I am being brash, but if something were to happen to you…” Benson shook his head and paused. “I’m sorry, but we’ve, all of us, agreed that your… your work puts you in too much danger. It would be very remiss of us—us, whose duty it is to care for your welfare—to let you go about this business.”
Dahlia inhaled sharply, a feeling of trepidation crept in her veins.
“But you know I cannot possibly do this without you!” She moved forward in her seat to better see Benson’s face. “Benson, my writing is important to me; it is the only thing that I see myself doing in my life. The only thing that brings me purpose and happiness. I thought you and the others knew that!”
“Aye, we do, M’Lady! And we helped you in all the ways we can these past three years. Even at the risk of being discovered by the master and mistress, we have still helped you.” Benson looked miserable. “But Mistress has been very suspicious as of late. She took Biddy aside and warned her. That’s three times she was nearly caught doing your bidding for your work. The mistress thinks that she is sneaking about to meet a beau. Your maid did not tell you this, but I am afraid another incident will cost Biddy her position.”
Dahlia could only look at Benson. Shame and guilt, reflected in her green eyes, were new feelings to her. She felt her face flush, her cheeks turning as red as her hair. For the first time in her five-and-twenty years of existence, she was at a loss for words. She, who had words aplenty for all manner of situations, knew not how to respond to Benson’s words.
A long, regretful sigh came out of the servant’s lips.
