Page 5 of The Duke’s Caught Bride

The cobblestones beneath Alice’s feet seemed to shift. She pressed a palm against her chest, feeling her heart race underneath it. Rachel would not run. Not without reason. Not without telling her.

Unless she had a reason Alice could not begin to imagine.

“You need to send someone to find her,” Alice said, the words tumbling out faster than she could arrange them. “She could have gotten hurt! Perhaps she was on her way to the wedding. Perhaps… If she took⁠—”

“She took nothing,” her father said. “Her wedding dress is still laid out on the bed. Her jewel case is untouched.”

The Duke of Bearmoor had been silent throughout this exchange, a silence that carried its own distinct temperature. Alice could feel it like a change in the air, the quality of stillness that preceded lightning.

“Your daughter,” he said coldly, “has publicly humiliated me. This requires immediate repair.”

“Your Grace, I understand your distress…”

“No.” The single syllable landed with the weight of a closing door. “You do not understand. I will not be made a fool of twice by this family.”

The Duke turned. His gaze, when it settled on Alice, carried an intensity that made the service yard contract around her. She was acutely aware of the travel bag still clutched in her hand, the absurdity of standing in her father’s yard with her escape plotted and ruined in the span of minutes.

“You will be my bride,” he declared.

The world stopped. Not figuratively. Alice felt the actual cessation of sound, of breath, of the ordinary operations of thought.

The Duke of Bearmoor had just proposed marriage to her with all the romantic flourish of a man ordering a cut of meat.

“I…” She cleared her throat. “Your Grace, you cannot possibly…”

“I can,” he said. “And I will. I obtained one special license. I can obtain another. I require a bride. The substitution is… efficient.”

Efficient. The word lodged in Alice’s chest like something cold and hard.

“Lord Peltbury.” The Duke did not look at her father as he spoke. His eyes remained fixed on her, as though she were a document he was reading for inconsistencies. “You will not object. Your family’s standing cannot withstand another scandal today.”

Her father opened his mouth, closed it, opened it again.

The Duke ignored it and continued speaking as though her father were a mere portrait. “Lady Alice will accompany me to Bearmoor House. Today. The wedding will take place within the week.”

“That… that is improper,” Lord Peltbury stammered out, his eyes nearly bulging out of his head.

The Duke gave him a cursory glance. “Lord Peltbury.” His voice was cold. “If you do not mind my directness, I have lost one bride already. I am not willing to lose a second. Lady Alice will accompany me so that I can be certain that this wedding will take place.”

“I will not go.” The words left Alice’s mouth before she could recall them. She heard them with the distant surprise of a woman listening to someone else speak. “Not until we find Rachel. She is my sister. She would not disappear without cause.”

The Duke’s expression did not change, but something shifted behind his eyes—a recalculation, as though she had introduced a variable he had not accounted for.

“Your sister is no longer my concern,” he said. “She made her choice. I am making mine.”

“She is missing.” Alice took a step toward him, her travel bag forgotten at her feet. “A woman does not vanish from her own wedding without reason. Something has happened to her. We must find her.”

“Alice.” Her father’s voice carried a warning she had heard all her life, the tone that preceded reminders of her place, her duty, her unfortunate tendency to speak when silence was preferable. “Mind your tone. His Grace has more pressing concerns than your sister’s whereabouts. And it is my responsibility to find Rachel, not yours.”

“Then find her.” Alice did not turn to look at her father. Her eyes remained on the Duke’s face, on the controlled set of his jaw, the dark intensity of his gaze. “Find my sister. Ensure she is safe. And then… then we may discuss whatever arrangement you believe is necessary.”

The Duke studied her. The silence stretched between them, thin and taut as wire. Alice could hear the distant clatter of the kitchen, the soft whicker of the carriage horses at the front of the house, the sound of her own pulse in her ears.

“You are making demands.” His lips twitched, as though the thought amused him.

“I am stating conditions,” Alice countered. The steadiness in her voice surprised her. “I will accompany you to Bearmoor House. I will wed you. But you need to help my father search for Rachel. She is family. She matters.”

For a long moment, the Duke said nothing. Alice watched his face, the subtle play of calculation behind those dark eyes, the way his jaw worked once, twice.