My Abusive Uncle Tried To Strike Me For Ruining His Plans — Until The Feared Duke Stepped In
Part 1
The wool chafed my collarbone.
It was a permanent reminder of my invisibility.
I was the shadow in my uncle Dan’s ballroom.
He forced me to wear funeral black for a brother I barely knew.
I was ordered to sit, nod, and vanish.
Then, the heavy oak doors splintered open.
The monster of the northern campaigns walked in.
Craig, the feared Duke of War, looked like a man who had just crawled out of a trench.
His dark coat was impeccably tailored, but his shoulders were too broad for polite society.
He dragged his left leg slightly.
It was a stiffness that spoke of shattered bone knitting back together poorly.
Everyone in the room stared.
Mothers clutched their debutante daughters.
Uncle Dan scrambled forward, bowing so deeply he nearly toppled over.
Craig barely looked at him.
He handed his heavy, rain-spotted cloak to a terrified footman.
His face was tanned and weathered like old saddle leather.
A thick white scar cut straight through his left eyebrow.
It gave him an expression of perpetual, dangerous skepticism.
He hated this room.
He hated these people, and this noise, just as much as I did.
The crowd parted for him instantly.
They wanted his title, but they were terrified of his physical presence.
Moving with a heavy, predatory momentum, the duke bypassed the tables of iced champagne.
My cousin Megan pushed herself forward in her pink silk dress, only to be completely ignored.
His deliberate path cut straight toward the edges of the room, heading directly for the shadows.
The glittering crowd no longer held his attention.
Instead, his piercing gaze locked onto the empty, velvet-cushioned chair sitting exactly two feet to my left.
I didn’t lower my eyes.
I breathed shallowly against the whalebone of my corset.
My hands stayed folded in my lap.
I watched the most feared man in England march directly toward my sanctuary.
Craig stopped.
The sheer mass of him blocked out the glaring light of the chandeliers.
I was cast in a sudden, cool shadow.
Up close, he smelled of rain-soaked wool and harsh lye soap.
He collapsed into the chair beside me.
The delicate wooden frame let out a terrifying creak under his weight.
He stretched his stiff left leg out in front of him.
He rested his elbows on his knees.
A hundred pairs of eyes were now fixed on my corner.
I could practically hear my uncle Dan’s blood pressure rising from across the room.
Craig turned his head.
His pale gray eyes locked onto mine.
He didn’t blink.
The silence between us stretched, thick and suffocating.
My fingernails dug into the palms of my hands.
He finally broke the silence.
“Who died?”
I blinked at the bluntness.
“My brother.”
“Five years ago.”
His brow furrowed further.
“You wear black for five years?”
“I wear black because it is required of me,” I answered.
“It is a highly effective method of ensuring I remain a piece of furniture.”
Before he could reply, my uncle Dan appeared.
He dragged a beaming, desperately blushing Megan by the elbow.
He puffed out a sycophantic greeting, ignoring me completely.
Craig didn’t stand up.
The insult was glaring and deliberate.
He stared at Dan, then at Megan.
His expression turned to stone.
“I do not dance,” Craig stated flatly.
Dan paled, stammering apologies.
Suddenly, Craig stood up.
He turned his back on them entirely.
He looked down at me.
“Stand up.”
“We are dancing.”
My heart slammed against my ribs.
I looked at his outstretched hand.
If I took that hand, the quiet, miserable life I had built would detonate.
I placed my bare hand into his.
His grip was startlingly firm, calloused, and hot.
He pulled me to my feet and marched me toward the center of the ballroom floor.
The musicians fumbled their instruments in pure terror.
A waltz began, erratic and trembling.
Craig clamped his right hand onto my waist.
The sheer weight of his grip pressed the rigid whalebone stays of my corset painfully into my skin.
We stumbled through the first turn.
He pulled me with a jerky, lopsided momentum.
Every time he pivoted on his left leg, a sharp tremor ran through his arm.
He was in agonizing pain.
Sweat beaded at his temples.
“You are making a spectacle of me,” I whispered.
“My uncle will lock me in the attic for a month for this.”
Craig looked down at me.
“You are the only safe thing in this room.”
“You have no value to them.”
The room was spinning.
He stumbled slightly, his bad leg giving way for a fraction of a second.
I didn’t think.
I shifted my weight.
I leaned into his solid frame.
I anchored my hand more firmly onto his shoulder to absorb his sudden instability.
For a single, fleeting second, the violent tug-of-war between us ceased.
Craig looked at me, his pale gray eyes wide with unguarded surprise.
He felt the sudden deliberate support I offered.
His breathing was ragged.
“Your leg is failing,” I whispered.
“It holds,” he rasped defensively.
“Stop dancing before you collapse,” I told him.
He let out a harsh, scraping noise.
He was laughing.
The music ground to a halt.
Craig stopped moving.
He kept me anchored against him for three long heartbeats.
Then, he released me.
He gave me a short nod, turned on his heel, and limped straight out of the ballroom.
I was left standing entirely alone.
Before the heavy oak doors had even clicked shut, my uncle Dan’s hand clamped violently around my upper arm.
He dragged me into a small, dimly lit antechamber.
He shoved me hard.
My hip hit the sharp edge of a mahogany side table.
A jolt of pain radiated down my leg.
Dan was vibrating, pacing the small room like a rabid dog.
He raised his hand.
I flinched, bracing for the crack of his palm against my cheek.
The blow never landed.
The heavy antechamber door exploded inward.
The brass handle smashed violently against the plaster wall.
Craig filled the doorway.
His face was a mask of absolute, terrifying violence.
The temperature in the small room plummeted.
“If you touch her,” he whispered, his voice cutting through the silence, “I will snap your wrist, pull the bone through the skin, and beat you to death with it.”
