Page 1 of How to Capture a Duke

Chapter One

May 1829

Kent, England

Lady Olivia Swift escaped down the gravel path toward the stables. She glanced back at the magnificent country home where currently a dozen guests were enjoying the Duke of Keswick’s hospitality at his house party.

She didn’t have much time before her mother and the duke’s grandmother would notice her absence.

The tittering young ladies in attendance would be preparing for daily afternoon tea on the terrace where they hoped the duke would make his first appearance.

Wishful thinking on their parts.

The duke so far hadn’t shown his noble face for ten days out of the fourteen-day house party. The debutantes and their mothers had all been disappointed.

Olivia had been secretly thrilled.

She made it to the stable doors. Inside, the warmth enveloped her, and the distinctive smell of leather, horse, and clean hay heightened her senses and quickened her pulse.

Heaven.

The duke’s stables were indeed stunning. Row after row of stalls housed beautiful horses—mares, stallions, and geldings. Each served a different purpose, whether it be for racing, hunting, or pulling the duke’s crested carriages, curricle, or high-perched phaeton. The value of the horseflesh would turn the dealers at Tattersall’s green with envy.

Olivia stepped up to the stall of a brown mare to stroke her velvet-soft muzzle. “Hello, pretty. Would you like a treat?” She held out one of the apples she’d pilfered from the kitchens that morning, and the mare’s big brown eyes blinked once as if to say, “Thank you,” then she ate the fruit from her hand.

The duke’s estate was over twenty thousand acres. The manor home looked like a small castle with its white carved stonework, elegant pillars, and window frames highlighted with gold leaf that caught the setting sun. Dozens of gardeners maintained the sculpted gardens, boxwood hedges, and flowering shrubs, which bloomed in every color and perfumed the air. Numerous ponds, fountains, and classical sculptures decorated the lovely gardens.

Olivia longed to ride through the vast lands and gallop across the fields. She’d sit astride the animal, not on a side saddle, release the pins from her hair, and let the wind cool her heated cheeks, just as she’d done years ago at her own family’s country estate.

Her eldest brother Matthew would have adored this stable, would have understood her need to escape the house and the lords and ladies within, to escape the pressure of her mother’s efforts to find her a suitable husband—hopefully the duke.

But Matthew was dead. He had been thrown while racing his own curricle. A pang of familiar sadness pierced her chest, and she stepped back from the brown mare.

That’s when she saw him.

A massive stallion in the last stall, hidden from sight. Over seventeen hands tall, he had a sleek, black coat that gleamed beneath a ray of afternoon sunlight shining through the open stable doors. He took away her breath.

She approached. The big beast watched her with intelligent black eyes, his nostrils slightly flaring, his head tossing once when she came close.

“My God. You are superb.”

What would it feel like to ride him? To feel the exhilarating rhythmic power of those muscles beneath her? She nearly swooned at the thought.

Pulling the remaining apple from her pocket, she held it out to him. “May I touch you?” She tentatively stretched out her hand, careful not to move too swiftly and startle the animal.

“S…s-top!”

Olivia jumped back. The guttural masculine command was harsh and, Heaven help her, menacing.

She whirled to find a tall man storming toward her, his face a mask of annoyance. His chiseled features—strong jaw, hawkish nose, and dark eyes—spoke of strength and confidence. His dark hair, slightly longer than fashion dictated, brushed his collar. Their gazes clashed, and her gut tightened.

“What are you doing here?” he demanded.

He had to be the head groom. He spoke with such command. He must know she was a lady from the manor, a guest at Rosehill. Her muslin walking dress and silk slippers bespoke her station as well as if a majordomo had announced her at a ball.

“I wanted to see the horses,” she said, hoping her voice sounded steady beneath his hard stare.

He stalked closer with a predatory confidence that heightened her unease. “You should be back at the house.”