A Good Debutante's Guide to Ruin_The Debutante Files

The blasted dowry. She wished Dec had never seen fit to announce that to the world.

“He’ll never give the dowry to you,” she argued. “This will all be for nothing.”

“Oh, he will. He’d never let you suffer side by side with us in penury. Nor would he wish you shamed before the world.” Her mother looked her up and down. “He cares too much for you. And he’s too honorable.”

The truth of her mother’s words sank like rocks into the pit of her stomach. Melisande was right. She tried to convince herself that even if she was forced into marriage with Horley, it would mean nothing to Dec. He’d still want her. If Horley forced her into consummating the marriage, Dec would come to her the moment he was able. He would rescue her. She told herself that.

Except she wasn’t so convinced.

Would he want a bride who was broken? Broken in the way her mother had broken him? Could things ever be right between them?

She made a bolt for it then, only to have Horley grab her around the waist. She screeched, legs kicking, arms beating at him—anywhere she could reach.

She could hear her mother reprimanding her to behave herself over her own cries. As though she were the disobedient child.

“Peter, remove your cravat! Silence her with it. We don’t need to concern the servants.”

Horley yanked off his cravat and stuffed it into her mouth. Then her mother was there, too, Melisande’s fingers working deftly at the back of her head, tying the cravat in an unyielding knot. “Come now, Rosalie! None of us are happy about this, but it’s just the way it has to be.”

Horley managed to pin her arms at her sides, grunting in her ear.

Panting, she glared up at his flushed face, at the smug smile. And she was quite certain that her mother might be unhappy with the situation, but he was not.

Aurelia met Dec at the door when he returned home that afternoon. Will and Max accompanied him. He had invited them home with him following a match at the club. In the back of his mind he suspected he wanted their company to keep him distracted from his encounter with Rosalie.

Somehow, absurdly, he now realized he had thought she would never have to know. That he could keep that bit of sordid history from her.

Will frowned at his sister as she stood in the foyer wringing her hands, her brown eyes deep with worry. “Aurelia, what’s amiss?”

“I have not seen Rosalie in hours. We took breakfast together, and then her mother paid her a visit and she went out. But that was hours ago. Do you know where she could be, Dec?”

He processed her words, a sick feeling starting in his gut.

At his mulling silence, she cast a quick glance at her brother and Max. Shaking her head as if their presence didn’t matter to her, she looked back at him and added, “We were supposed to go shopping this afternoon—Declan, where are you going?”

He was out the door, moving swiftly down the steps.

“Declan!” she called, her footsteps rushing after him.

He had a fairly good idea where Rosalie had gone. His stomach knotted to think of her back with her mother, in the same house, even for a moment, where she had felt compelled to barricade herself in her bedchamber every night.

Bloody hell.

He shouldn’t have let her walk out. He had seen the knowledge of what transpired between him and her mother in her eyes . . . it was more than he could abide. He had not realized how much her good opinion mattered to him until then. The chance that she would somehow look at him differently, that things between them would not be the same again, was something he couldn’t face, and so he’d let her walk away.

And now his cowardice had put her at risk. She was his to protect, and he had failed her. He should have made her stay. He should have told her what she needed to hear. He should have shown her that the past didn’t matter anymore. Especially now. Now that he had her. Now that they had each other.

“Declan.” Aurelia grabbed his sleeve and clung. “Where are you going?”

“To her mother’s.”

Aurelia frowned. “Why would she wish to go back there?”

“We’ll take my carriage,” Will announced, motioning to Dec’s doorman to bring his carriage back around.

“We?” Will arched an eyebrow.

Aurelia nodded. “I’m going, too.”

“Why are you going?” Max demanded.

Aurelia propped one hand on her hip. “She’s my friend. Why are you going? Wait . . . what are you even doing here? Why are you always here?”

He jerked his head in Dec’s direction. “He’s my friend.”

“This is a family matter,” Aurelia informed him, lifting her chin, “and contrary to how much you’re always lurking around, you are not family, Lord Camden.”

“Small blessings,” he muttered. “Not to have a brat sister—”

“Can you two sheath your claws for once?” Will snapped.

Dec shook his head. He didn’t have time for their bickering. He spotted the carriage clattering his way and started moving toward it with long strides. Then he saw a heavyset woman in livery turning down the drive, puffing for breath.

She held up her arm, waving at him. “Are you the Duke of Banbury?”

He met her halfway, nodding. “Yes.”

She stopped, pressing a hand to the generous swell of her stomach as if suffering a stitch. “They took ’er, Your Grace.”

“Her? You mean Rosalie? Who took her? They who?” he demanded, even though he already knew. With a sinking sensation in his gut, he knew. He just didn’t know why. Revenge? Were they that stupid? He’d hunt them to the farthest corner of the earth. If they hurt even a hair on her head, there was nowhere he wouldn’t find them.

The woman nodded. “I was in the kitchen, but I came out when I heard the commotion. They shoved her out the door into the carriage. I tried to help, but they had Tom, the footman, and he’s the size of a mountain—”

He shook his head. “I understand. Of course. Do you have any clue where they were taking her?”

She swiped several graying hairs back from her sweating cheeks. “I heard Lord Horley tell the driver they were heading to Scotland.”

“Scotland?”

“Aye, Your Grace. He means to marry her.”

“What?” He blinked.

“Lord Horley means to marry Miss Rosalie.”

Aurelia gasped beside him.

He froze. Everything in him turning cold. “He can’t.” He could think no other words.

He can’t. He can’t.

Rosalie was his. He couldn’t lose her.

He vaulted inside the waiting carriage, hardly even aware of Will and Max hopping inside with him or Will forbidding his sister from joining them. His only thought was catching up to Rosalie. His hands opened and closed at his sides on the seat.

“Dec? Are you all right?”

He looked up and met his cousin’s stare. “I have to get her back, Will.” He had to. Somehow, in only a short time, she had come to be everything to him and he couldn’t imagine a life without her.





Chapter 24


Stop looking out the window. There’s nowhere to go. Peter or the servants will overtake you if you try to run.”

Rosalie let the curtain fall back into place on the window. Horley had left them in the carriage and gone to speak to the innkeeper—no doubt weaving some fanciful tale about her. How else would he explain when she opened her mouth to shout for help?

As though her mother could read her mind, Melisande said, “Now don’t go doing anything foolish. Peter is letting them know that you’re sick. Mad. And not to listen to a word you say.”