Welcome back for Sunday Snippet and the 5th snippet from No Duke of Mine! The final novel in the Scandalous Brides series released last week, and I’m thrilled by how much the story was loved. Algernon could be my favorite duke (if I were allowed to play favorites) and also the loudest. He’s been invading my daydreams for quite some time, and I miss him dreadfully already.

But his future is set now, and it’s probably time to move on to my next hero. It’s so hard to let go…

He and his aunt were not close. She criticized him and how he ran the estate constantly since her return. However, he was not her enemy, and Algernon debated how to reassure her of that. ���What can I do?���

���Do what I want.���

���I cannot, but perhaps I could simplify matters upon my return.��� He paused. ���I will be making a call to the Archbishop of Canterbury to obtain a special license to marry Lady Kent while I am in London. Perhaps I could secure a second for you.���

Her eyes widened. ���Yes, that is what I want most of all.���

He nodded. ���Consider it done, Aunt.���

She let out a shuddering breath and smiled hesitantly. ���Safe journey, boy, and a fast return.���

He bowed and swept from her presence, bemused that he was about to play matchmaker again when he returned to Ravenswood. A marriage to a butler for a noble-born lady was bound to make waves in society and in the family. But if he approved, others would not be difficult.

Surely, having two very old people marry respectably was better than sneaking around after dark to see each other and risking broken bones.

He found everyone waiting at the front door still, even his butler. He gave the older man additional instructions. ���Keep a close eye on my aunt.���

���Yes, of course,��� Seymour promised.

���Make sure she doesn���t become too tired with the children sitting on her knee,��� he warned. ���Shoo them away and lock the door.���

���There is no stopping her when it comes to the young ones,��� Seymour told him.

���Find a way to keep her happy until I come back,��� he insisted.

Algernon nodded to everyone else, took one last glance around him, and sighed heavily. There was nothing left to keep him from his duty now. No reason to delay in the hope of a last-minute rescue from marriage. All his instructions had been delivered and would be executed in his absence.

Algernon climbed into his carriage, resigned to leave at last.

You can catch up with all the previous��snippets for this story and do come back for more of No Duke of Mine when it continues next Sunday.

Week 1, Week 2, Week 3, Week 4

Scandalous Brides, Book 5

Algernon Sweet, Duke of Ravenswood, has a plan. Travel to London. Propose to the rich titled widow who can solve all his financial woes. Easy. Or it would be if he weren���t trapped at a country inn by rising floodwaters where he encounters a childhood friend who once read poetry to his dog and questioned him about everything under the sun. Margaret Black turned grown-up is a distraction, even more a bluestocking, and inconveniently attractive, too. When it becomes clear she needs help to reach her father, he offers a seat in his carriage���purely out of politeness, of course. And not at all because she makes him laugh like no woman ever has.

Maggie Black has never quite belonged���not in drawing rooms, not in London, and certainly not stranded at an inn with a duke. Trading stories about their very different lives and discussing books over bad stew and too much brandy late at night isn���t a good idea for a spinster traveling without a chaperone. But it���s hard to resist a man who���s both familiar and frustratingly handsome���especially when he hangs on her every word as if she were the only woman in the world. Somewhere between road delays, accidental confessions, and a scandalously intimate stop in a bookshop, Maggie finds herself falling for the one man who absolutely cannot be hers. Because dukes don���t marry poor bluestockings with a passion for books and a tendency to argue. Do they?

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