Page 1 of This Marquess of Mine

Chapter One

London — June 1821

Lady Olivia Blakely was not, and never would be, one of the great minds of her time. She had, however, learned a thing or two in her twenty years on this earth, and one such lesson was the power in a good accessory.

Knowing precisely the right moment to wield such power was another.

“Thank you for a most enjoyable outing, Your Grace,” she said as the Duke of Paxton escorted her up the sun-lit steps to the front door of her Mayfair townhouse. Her lady’s maid, Nellie, stood on the pavement below, watching the carriages go by while she waited.

“The pleasure was all mine, Lady Olivia,” the young duke replied with a gallant bow of his head. “Will I see you tonight at Lady Tobin’s ball?”

With his thick auburn hair and handsome, friendly face, the Duke of Paxton was precisely the sort of man every young lady hoped to marry. Olivia included.

Donning her most fetching smile, she fanned her gloved fingers across the simple strand of ps resting above the swell of her breasts, gratified when the duke’s dark eyes flared with interest. “I will be there, yes,” she said.

He grinned. “Then you must save me a waltz.”

“Must I?” she teased, arching a playful brow.

“I will be devastated if you do not,” he said, pressing a hand to his heart. “And there is no telling what I might do if you refuse.”

“Oh, dear.” She twisted the pearls around her fingers, battling a smile. “Then I suppose I have no choice but to agree.”

Lifting her free hand to his lips, Paxton brushed a kiss across her knuckles, his admiring gaze never leaving hers. “Thank you, my lady. I will ensure you do not regret it.”

Olivia watched as Paxton bounded down the steps and hopped into his canary yellow phaeton, a satisfied smile turning her lips as he waved farewell and set off down the street in a clatter of wheels and hooves.

Another successful outing, she thought, as she turned to the door. It is only a matter of time now.

She let herself inside, slipping into the cozy entrance hall with Nellie only a few steps behind her.

“Forgive my forwardness, my lady,” the young maid whispered as she shut the door behind her, “but His Lordship seems to grow more and more smitten with you every day. Why, for a moment there, I actually thought he was going to kiss you on the front steps for all and sundry to see.”

The exhilarated gleam in Nellie’s pale green eyes brought a smile to Olivia’s lips. “Good,” she said as she worked at the buttons on her powder blue spencer jacket. “That was precisely what I was hoping he would want to do.”

Nellie giggled as Olivia handed her the spencer before moving on to her bonnet strings, pulling them free with an impatient tug. “Lord above, this bonnet was beginning to make my head ache,” she muttered, lifting the beribboned torture device from her skull. “It is amazing, isn’t it? The things we women will endure to snag a husband?”

Nellie nodded, her brown curls swaying beneath her plain white cap. “Aye, my lady, it is,” she said. “Though I expect it will all be worth it for you, in the end.”

“I certainly hope you’re right, Nellie.” Olivia handed the girl her bonnet and kid gloves before making her way to the drawing room, her heeled slippers clapping on the spotless marble floor.

She’d been after the Duke of Paxton for weeks now, and she was fairly certain she had him in the palm of her hand. Of course, she should already have a wedding band on that hand, and she would have, if only…

Her lips pursed. If only I hadn’t bungled the whole thing last Season.

Paxton had asked for her hand once before but, like a fool, she’d turned him down. A fact his mother seemed unable—or unwilling—to forget. Or forgive. And if there was one person Paxton might hold in higher regard even than Olivia, it was the Duchess of Paxton.

The duke adored his mother, and because he adored her so much, he could not bear to see her unhappy and did everything in his power to please her. If the duchess did not approve of her son’s wish to marry Olivia, it was unlikely to happen. Paxton did not go against his mother’s wishes, which made the duchess the sole obstacle standing between Olivia and a second proposal of marriage.

Try as she might, though—and she had tried—she could not seem to win the woman’s forgiveness.

A frustrated sigh escaped her as she reached the drawing room door. She needed more time.

Time, however, was in short supply. This Season was her last chance to nab the duke. If she could not manage it within the next few months, she would be forced to marry another man.

Someone of her father’s choosing.

Pasting a bright smile to her lips, she shoved all thoughts of her father’s ultimatum to the back of her mind as she walked through the door into the sunny drawing room with its pretty floral furnishings and cheerful, pink-and-white-striped wallpaper.