Curves for the Rival Duke

Chapter 1

By Eliana Piers

It was supposed to be simple. Not easy. But simple. It was a three-step plan. What could be more straightforward? Show up. Buy the land. Save her family. Thus proving to her dying father that they would not perish. The rest of the family, that is. She bit back her tears.

Really, she exhaled loudly to her and her horse, nothing could be more necessary and more basic.

But the stakes couldn’t be higher. If she wasn’t able to secure this adjacent piece of land, her only other option was to marry into a fortune.

That option would have produced a sarcastic laugh if it weren’t for the hot tears on its heels.

Only a decade of marketability had failed her.

Felicia pulled at her waistcoat, tugging it down over the pillow underneath.

The blasted thing was causing her a more severe headache than the corset her lady’s maid had laced her into for her debut in naive hopes of securing a husband.

She snorted. No corset could be tied tight enough to nab her a husband in a market of men shopping for thinly sliced collops over a nice, juicy, round beefsteak.

Personally, she preferred the beefsteak. And didn’t men, too?

Bah. It was a terrible analogy. She blamed the wig and its itchy hairs falling into her eyes for her inability to think straight.

But if ever there were a day, a definitive hour, in fact, in which she needed to think straight, this was it.

She needed to think clearly and channel Charles.

Shudder. Despite him being the last man on earth her family would have her venerate for any reason, he was the most familiar (besides her father who was far too old to consider).

Charles.

Push the hatred aside. Push the twenty-odd years of family feuding aside and be a man of the peerage. A very important man. A well-respected man—to everyone but the Montclairs. A man who others would listen to should he snap his fingers at them.

Simply put, everything she was not.

The weight of her thoughts would have drowned her except that a man was quickly heading toward her, giving her no more time to prepare.

There wasn’t enough time in the world to prepare for what she was about to do though.

She was desperate for this property that lay adjacent to both her father’s land and the duke’s.

She shuddered again at his name for too many reasons to unpack in the moment.

Shuffling papers and checking his pocketwatch at the same time negated the man’s attempt at efficiency by spilling papers all over the ground.

He grunted as he bent over, picked them up, and stuffed them back under his arm.

His eyes darted around, looking for something, but not really seeming to take in anything.

Even when they landed on her, they hardly registered any emotion. This was to Felicia’s great advantage.

Finally, he spoke with the backdrop of a bankrupt estate taunting her. “Mr. Loxley, I presume?” he asked at last. “Land Steward to the Earl of Oakbridge?”

She cleared her throat at the address and, with the deepest—and most discreet—inhale of her life, lowered her voice and offered up a swift prayer before responding. “Yes, Mr. Fernbottom.” Land steward. Daughter. The difference was negligible. “A pleasure to meet you.”

Then she waited.

Waited for his laughter at her disguise.

Waited for recognition to dawn.

Waited for something. Preferably good, though her curled toes and nails digging into her palms predicted much less than that. Complete and utter ruination, to be precise.

When she chanced a look at Mr. Fernbottom, she caught an unexpected posture, for he, too, was waiting. Odd, that.

“Ahh… there he is now.”

He? He, who? Before turning to follow his gaze, she did her best to school her features. Remain neutral. Albeit from a distance, she had observed Charles often enough to memorize some of his stoicism. Some of his domineering manner.

“Now see here—” she started in her best attempt at dominating the conversation.

Ignoring her completely, he spoke, “Your Grace.” Mr. Fernbottom acknowledged the new arrival with a bow.

Her stomach mimicked the bow, only it didn’t return to its original position. It stayed helplessly around the vicinity of her feet. Perhaps under them. Because she knew… She just knew.

There was only one possible option to make this the uneasiest, unsimplest plan she had ever braved to undertake.

The very man she loved to hate and, quite frankly, had loved to love. The same man she was channeling despite her inner misgivings toward him. The man her family loathed beyond recognition. The only man who could quite possibly make her life a living purgatory had arrived.

The Duke of Kenbrooks. Charles.

It would be both heaven and hell to lay eyes on him. For this, she needed to steel her spine. Her whole body, for that matter, since it usually turned to pudding in his presence.

She turned on bated breath.

And the sight that greeted her told her she was in far too deep.

His muscular, god-like leg swung over the horse’s back, and he dropped to the ground in a cloud of magic.

Dust. That was dust. She shook her head, nearly losing her wig.

Strong feline paws—hands—that she had (countless nights) imagined all over her, patted down his horse in praise while she clenched her trouser-clad legs together.

His wavy dark locks whispered to her fingers, calling them out to play.

Which was patently ridiculous. For she had only ever snuck away with his eight sisters Honoria, Celeste, Georgiana, and usually Rosamund.

Sometimes Eugenia and Imogen had joined the group, and on the rare occasion, she had played with the two youngest, Josephine and Penelope.

But Charles? Never. But oh, what would Honoria think of her now?

Honoria, the ray of sunshine that she was, would probably laugh in delight and then fix her cravat.

Possibly join her in disguise. Though her giggling would give them away.

Forbidden play with the Harrington sisters had always been amusing. But interacting with Charles?

No. His company had been saved for her dreams.

This may well have been a dream for all that her mind was actually present for what Mr. Fernbottom was explaining to Charles.

“...Mr. Loxley, representing the Earl of Oakbridge, also here to submit an offer on the land.”

Before Charles could respond, Felicia braced herself. Surely he would recognize her. Surely, he would see her ample bosom and the curve of her hips for what they were. That being a woman’s figure. Surely he would admonish her and send her home, laughing at her the entire way.

At the very least, there would be fiery ire in his eyes, as there always was. Animosity that only a generation of hatred could engender.

But instead, she saw bewilderment, quickly chased by the twins of unrest and turmoil. Which made little to no sense and was in stark contrast to the absolutely terrifying pyrotechnics going off in her stomach.

This was going to be anything but simple.