Once Upon a Duke: 12 Dukes of Christmas, #1

Chapter 1

24 December

London, England

Benjamin Ward, the fifth Duke of Silkridge, reached for another bottle of champagne. The guests who filled his home with amusement and laughter weren’t the patronesses of Almack’s or his peers in the House of Lords. These friends were like him: rudderless in the worst time of the year to be alone.

Christmastide.

Not that this was a Christmas house party. Benjamin did not celebrate Christmas or Yule or Twelfth Night or anything else that reminded him of—

Champagne! he called out, just before the pop filled the air. A trickle of fizzy foam bubbled out over the edge of the bottle.

A dozen crystal glasses swung his way at once. He grinned at his first-cousins—and heirs presumptive—Nicholas and Christopher, as he refilled their glasses.

You’d make a splendid footman, Nicholas said with a straight face. If you tire of the ‘duke’ thing.

Alas, Christopher interjected. "Silkridge will never tire of the ‘duke’ thing. When he is not in the House of Lords, he’s discussing politics in gentlemen’s clubs. When he is not discussing politics in gentlemen’s clubs, he’s off in coffee houses interviewing the people about politics. When he is not in coffee houses—"

—he’s rebuffing the subtle machinations of matchmaking mamas everywhere, Nicholas finished.

They’re not subtle, Benjamin said with a grimace. When you’re duke, you’ll discover what it’s like.

I already know what it’s like. Nicholas groaned in commiseration. Although he possessed no title, he was London’s most celebrated rake. Doe-eyed debutantes swooned in his wake everywhere he went.

Christopher pressed a hand to his cravat. "You poor lads. How deeply you must suffer, to be so handsome and so powerful that hopeful young ladies pile up about you like snowdrifts. You may think you’ll never marry, but one day—"

Music filled the parlor, drowning out whatever romantic curse Christopher had hoped to inflict upon them.

Nicholas pointed to his ear in an exaggerated What? I can’t hear you! gesture, and swung the closest woman before the orchestra to dance. Christopher rolled his eyes in good-natured frustration, and followed suit.

The series of musicians Benjamin had hired to entertain the party over the next several days had, like the rest of the guests, nowhere else to be. The pianist was new to town, the violinist between plays, the flautist a young hopeful dreaming of one day performing at Vauxhall.

If they were a motley crew, well, so were Benjamin’s friends. He and his cousins were the last of their family. The widow in Nicholas’s arms had no one at all. Everyone present would have finished out the year all alone, had it not been for the Unyuletide celebration. For twelve days, they’d have each other. No one need fear so much as a whisper of Christmases best forgotten.

As always, the unwelcome reminder of everything he’d put behind him brought to mind a shimmer of the one bright spot in all that darkness. Warm brown eyes, soft pink lips, clever wit… Noelle Pratchett had imprinted on his soul. Benjamin sighed. Despite endless champagne and a house full of music and people, the empty ache inside his chest only grew wider.

He flagged down a passing footman. John, has the Gazette arrived?

No need to specify which. Benjamin had been trying to remove his name from the Cressmouth Gazette’s subscriber list from the day he’d unexpectedly received its first issue. No matter how many stern letters his man of business sent on Benjamin’s behalf, the relentless four-page publication arrived on Benjamin’s doorstep every three months without fail.

Until this winter.

Not yet, Your Grace, the footman answered. Perhaps they’ve finally removed your name from the list.

Pity. Benjamin had been looking forward to throwing it in the fire.

Well, after he’d scoured it for mention of Noelle. But there never was.

I am glad, he informed the footman.

And he should have been. He did not require the unsolicited delivery of a tiny local journal to know what the latest news would be. Cressmouth was colloquially known as Christmas. A pristine speck of a village high atop a lonesome mountain in the northernmost corner of England, punctuated by a folly of a castle amid an endless sea of evergreens.

The gazette’s winter edition always said the same things. Although it was always Christmas in Cressmouth, the village additionally hosted a special Yuletide festival every year from the sixth of December to the fifth of January. All were welcome.

Many did. Visitors flocked to the idyllic site from far and wide. The predictable influx of coin supplemented the villagers’ income for the rest of the year, until it was time to begin their excessively prolonged Christmastide celebrations all over again.

Benjamin could not think of a worse hell than eternal Christmas. He certainly had no wish to read about it. Unsubscribing from quarterly updates about the cheerful village’s Yuletide exploits was a dream come true. He had assumed the feat would fill him with elation, but instead all he felt was… a hole. Yet more yawning emptiness, right there in his chest.

He threw himself into the forced gaiety of his party. What he needed was more music, more champagne, more distractions from old memories that wouldn’t stay locked away.

His butler approached with a silver tray and a grave expression. A message, Your Grace.

At this hour? Benjamin lifted the neatly folded parchment with trepidation.

It was too small to be the Cressmouth Gazette, and yet a prickling of the skin warned him that big problems might be tucked inside all the same.

He was right.

Three short lines from Castle Marlowe’s resident solicitor: Benjamin’s estranged grandfather was dead. Bequests would be read in five days. The will and testament required Benjamin’s immediate presence.

He tucked the missive into his waistcoat pocket with a calm he did not feel. Prepare my coach, please.

As you please.

Benjamin’s cousin Christopher approached the moment the butler left. Is something amiss?

Nothing’s amiss, Benjamin lied. He’d never expected to see his maternal grandfather again, so his death did not change their relationship. Rather, the missive gave him hope. Perhaps his grandfather had repented. Perhaps being named in the bequest meant the old man was finally returning the heirloom he’d stolen from his grandchild. The one link Benjamin had cherished above all others. I have to go.

Where?

Cressmouth.

Christopher frowned. I thought…

So did I, Benjamin said flatly. He’d thought a lot of things that had turned out not to be true.

That he would now have to spend the first few of the twelve days of Christmas traveling to the godforsaken mountaintop where Christmas never ended was the cream on the crumpet.

Stay here, he told his cousin. After all, Jacob Marlowe wasn’t their relative. Nicholas and Christopher were the sons of the previous duke’s sister. They needn’t be burdened with this quest. Just because Benjamin was suddenly forced to face his past in the back of beyond did not mean he needed to spoil the party for anyone else. Let everyone know they needn’t return to their empty homes on my account. The musicians and caterers have already been contracted, and my staff is more than competent. Everyone is welcome to stay. I’ll be back as soon as I can.

With luck, he would arrive mere moments before the bequests were made and leave immediately after. Gone just over a sennight. He could do this.

He’d survived worse.

And yet, as the air grew colder and the countryside bleaker and the passing days grew from two to three to four, Benjamin began to fear that being trapped inside the four walls of his coach for one more hour would drive him mad before he even arrived.

Winter enveloped the frost-tipped forest in its deathly grip as the lone black carriage made its determined way up the side of the frozen mountain.

Benjamin glowered at the sleet obstructing the view from the window. Instead of being ensconced in the dry warmth of his town house in London, he was almost four hundred miles north, heading ever closer to the one place he had vowed never to return.

Cressmouth, England.

The nearer his coach drew to the tiny village nestled on the mountain, the worse the weather became. The cold breeze had turned into a punishing wind, and the endless gray skies above had begun to clot with heavy clouds.

Already, blobs too icy to be rain and too wet to be snow spit down upon him.

Bad weather was a good sign. It meant he was getting closer to his goal. Closer to the end. The sooner he fetched the heirloom that had been stolen from him, the sooner he could return to London. Back to where he belonged.

Benjamin clenched his jaw and tore his gaze from the countryside. He hated to leave his home. This was the first time he’d been called away in years. The first time he’d allowed a deviation from his rigid timetable.

Whether Parliament was in session or not, there was too much work to be done back home. Benjamin was personally responsible for half a dozen committees shaping the country’s future. He had no time for distracting quests.

But here he was.

His horses clomped past a large, festive sign held sturdy in the frozen ground by thick wooden posts. Despite the darkening sky and the falling sleet, its boldly lettered words were still legible.

Welcome to Christmas!

"It’s Cressmouth, not Christmas," he muttered beneath his breath.

But it was no use. The quaint northern village was even worse than he remembered. Brightly colored cottages dotted amongst the white of the snow and the frosted tips of a thousand evergreens.

Everywhere he looked there were sparkling candelabra in windowpanes, curling smoke rising merrily from red brick chimneys, children in colorful woolen mittens pelting each other with soft balls of snow.

Humbug, he muttered. He would not take part.

But it was too late. The Silkridge ducal crest gracing the sides of his stately coach had caught the attention of those he passed. Children smiled. Ladies waved.

Ho, there, called out a ruddy-cheeked gentleman shoveling snow from his walk. Happy Christmas!

No such thing, Benjamin muttered to his valet.

Didn’t you see the sign? Doyle answered with a grin. ’Tis eternally a happy Christmas here.

Humbug, Benjamin repeated, and motioned the driver onward.

He’d never understood the attraction of living out in Nowhereland. Although the area did grow warmer in the summer months, the inhabitants lived as though there were twelve months of Christmas, rather than twelve days. The only explanation for such fervor was a sad and desperate attempt to try to create some sort of advantage to living in the coldest corner of all of England.

Benjamin glared at the snow-dusted pines dipping and curving down the mountain. Cressmouth was in the middle of nowhere. The closest town was Cornhill-on-Tweed. Any further north, and this village would be in Scotland.

A bright red ball sailed from between a pair of cottages and out into the street.

The horses reared in alarm. The driver struggled to keep control of the reins.

From the corner of Benjamin’s eye, he caught a flash of movement. A lad scarcely six years of age intended to dart out before the horses in order to retrieve his ball.

"Stay," Benjamin barked, not to his horses and driver, but to the child at the edge of the street.

He leapt from the coach and hurled the ball far over the child’s head so that he would be forced to run away from the lane to fetch it.

So kind of you, called a woman from an open doorway. You saved Nigel’s life.

Benjamin might not love the festive season, but he liked children. They did not deserve ill fates. He gave a stiff nod to the woman and jumped back into the carriage.

His shoulders tightened. He was tired of the cold, tired of traveling, tired of waiting this long to regain something he had lost.

Not Christmas. He had given that up on purpose. Benjamin was after something far more precious. In the long ride up, he’d convinced himself that a wrong was about to be put right.

At tomorrow morning’s reading of the will, his mother’s locket would return where it belonged. To Benjamin’s hands. He and the last trace of his mother would be reunited at last.

The dizzying white castle seemed to mock him from the peak of the mountain. That had been his estranged grandfather’s home. The same grandfather responsible for reviving what had once been a ghostly settlement into a vibrant Christmas village.

A madman. There was no other explanation.

Benjamin directed his driver toward the winding path up to the castle’s imposing portcullis. They would sleep here tonight. There were no other inns. Besides, this had once been Benjamin’s winter home.

It was past time to take his birthright back. Not the castle—he wasn’t after the old man’s riches. He was here for his mother’s locket. The one meant for him. The one bearing a miniature family portrait inside, painted mere weeks after Benjamin was born.

It was the only portrait he shared with his mother. His throat tightened. She had died shortly after his birth. That had been Benjamin’s first Christmastide. That time of the year had not improved since.

After all these years, it finally seemed possible to retrieve the stolen necklace. Benjamin had begged for its safe return a thousand times. But his grandfather was as immovable as his castle.

The old man always said he’d give the golden locket back to Benjamin over his dead body,