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      About the Author

      ANNE HERRIES, winner of the Romantic Novelists’ Association ROMANCE PRIZE 2004, lives in Cambridgeshire. She is fond of watching wildlife and spoils the birds and squirrels that are frequent visitors to her garden. Anne loves to write about the beauty of nature and sometimes puts a little into her books, although they are mostly about love and romance. She writes for her own enjoyment and to give pleasure to her readers.

       Previous novels by the same author:

      MARRYING CAPTAIN JACK

      THE UNKNOWN HEIR

      THE HOMELESS HEIRESS

      THE RAKE’S REBELLIOUS LADY

A COUNTRY MISS IN HANOVER SQUARE* AN INNOCENT DEBUTANTE IN HANOVER SQUARE* THE MISTRESS OF HANOVER SQUARE* FORBIDDEN LADY~ THE LORD’S FORCED BRIDE~ THE PIRATE’S WILLING CAPTIVE~ HER DARK AND DANGEROUS LORD~

* A Season in Town trilogy ~ The Melford Dynasty

       and in the Regency series The Steepwood Scandal:

      LORD RAVENSDEN’S MARRIAGE

      COUNTERFEIT EARL

       and in The Hellfire Mysteries:

      AN IMPROPER COMPANION

      A WEALTHY WIDOW

      A WORTHY GENTLEMAN

      Dear Reader,

      This year I’ve had the pleasure of writing a Christmas story for you. I very much enjoyed doing this and hope you will enjoy the story of Selina and her sisters, who have been forced to leave their home because of the inheritance laws that existed at the period. Selina has a secret memory she keeps enshrined in her heart; the memory of a dashing young captain who kissed her and then went off to war. When the new earl comes to claim his estate, where Selina has become a temporary tenant, she and he are in for a shock.

      Will the Captain Moorcroft of her dreams and the new earl prove to be the same man—or will she discover that her idol was but a dream? Christmas is the time when wishes ought to come true, so perhaps Selina’s dream will be granted.

      Happy Christmas to all my readers and thank you for continuing to buy my books. I hope you have as much fun with this one as I did writing it.

       Anne Herries

      PROLOGUE

       Summer 1810, Bath

      SELINA Searles, aged sixteen, innocent and on the verge of womanhood, looked around the crowded Assembly Rooms and felt a tingle of excitement. She was a pretty girl, full of life, happy and thrilled to be at her first ball. Her mama had told her that she was too young to be brought out in London society until the following year. However, since they were in Bath, because dear Mama had been laid low with a chill and Selina had volunteered to care for her, she was being allowed a special treat.

      ‘I shall expect you to behave properly, dearest,’ her mama had told her. ‘This is your first dance, and you must remember the rules of polite society. If a gentleman asks you to dance, you may do so, but before you waltz I must approve your choice. On no account are you to flirt, nor will you leave the ballroom in the company of a gentleman, and you must never, never allow a man to kiss you unless you have accepted a proposal of marriage. You will do no such thing, for you are too young and it is unlikely to happen, but remember the rules, my love, and you will not go far wrong.’

      ‘Yes, Mama,’ Selina had said and smiled. ‘You’ve told me all this before, and I should not dream of disobeying you.’

      Her feet tapping to the music, Selina waited patiently to be asked to dance. She was an exceptionally lovely girl, some might say beautiful, with melting brown eyes and dark hair that curled about her face before being swept up into ringlets that fell on one shoulder, but it was her vivacity, her joy in life that shone out of her, lighting up the room. A girl like that could not go unnoticed for long, and indeed it was not much more than five minutes before she was asked to dance by a gentleman who presented himself as Lord March.

      He was a very correct gentleman and held her at precisely the right distance, so that when he asked for a second dance, which was a waltz, her mama immediately granted her permission. Selina hardly had time to catch her breath at the end of the dance before she was besieged with gentlemen asking for dances and every space on her card was filled. Her mama looked on indulgently, as if she had expected this to happen, nodding her permission each time Selina looked at her. Every waltz had been taken, and Selina was soon lost in the excitement and delight of being a raging success.

      It was not until about halfway through the evening that she noticed a gentleman dressed in a magnificent scarlet-and-black uniform. Suddenly it was as if a hundred candles had been lit, for his presence seemed to light up the room. Selina noticed that he was immediately the centre of a large group of young men and women, and she could hear their laughter from across the room. The newcomer was the most handsome man in the room—and popular, for it seemed everyone wanted to be near him. After a moment he seemed to become aware of her interest, and their eyes met briefly. She felt a tingle of excitement run through her and could not turn her eyes away, though she knew she ought.

      It

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