Nina Beaumont - Surrender The Heart

Cover Page

Excerpt Her beauty was delicate, but there was nothing fragile about it. And she was not as cool and serene as she pretended to be, he decided. Her eyes, dark and restless, gave her away. There was passion beneath the cool exterior. And he wanted to be the one to discover it. It occurred to him that it had been a long time since he had wanted anything quite so badly. “Bon soir.” Insolently he reached for her hand instead of waiting for her to offer it. “So you did remember that you’d promised me the first waltz.” “I did not promise, Monsieur Blanchard. You demanded.” “So?” A wealth of insinuation swung with that single word. “And you always give in to demands?” His tawny eyebrows curved upward wickedly. “I shall have to remember that.” “On the contrary.” Temper darkened her eyes. “I do not deal well with demands at all…!”

Dear Reader Dear Reader In Nina Beaumont’s new historical, Surrender the Heart, a brash American and an independent Frenchwoman make a dangerous bargain. He will court her to keep away unwanted suitors, and she, in return, will allow him the chance to seduce her. But the two are unprepared for the passionate love that develops between them in this sizzling story set in nineteenth-century Paris. In Bogus Bride, by Australian author Emily French, a spirited young woman must convince her new husband that although he had intended to marry her sister, she is his true soul mate. And in Knights Divided by Suzanne Barclay, a medieval tale from one of our most popular authors, a young woman finds herself embroiled in a maelstrom of passion and deceit when she kidnaps the rogue whom she believes murdered her sister. And in our final selection for the month, Judith Stacy’s heartwarming Western, Outlaw Love, a Federal Marshal on the trail of a gang of female outlaws doesn’t realize that the woman he’s falling in love with is their leader. Whatever your taste in reading, we hope you’ll find a story written just for you between the covers of a Harlequin Historical novel. Keep a lookout for all four titles wherever Harlequin Historicals are sold. Sincerely, Tracy Farrell, Senior Editor Please address questions and book requests to: Harlequin Reader Service U.S.: 3010 Walden Ave., P.O. Box 1325, Buffalo, NY 14269 Canadian: P.O. Box 609, Fort Erie, Ont. L2A 5X3

Title Page Surrender The Heart Nina Beaumont www.millsandboon.co.uk

About The Author NINA BEAUMONT is of Russian parentage and has a family tree that includes the Counts Stroganoff and a Mongolian khan. A real cosmopolitan, she was born in Salzburg and grew up in Massachusetts before moving to Austria, where she lived for twenty-five years. Although she has relocated to the Seattle area, her European ties are still strong, so she plans to stick with the exotic settings she has had the opportunity to get to know firsthand. Books and music are her first loves, but she also enjoys painting watercolors and making pottery.

Dedication To Loma and Ed Hudgens— thank you for making me part of your family. My heartfelt thanks to: my editor, Tracy Farrell, and she and I know why; my writer friends, Sonya Jorgensen, Suzanne Neel and Mike Miller, for their brainstorming help when I was in need.

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Epilogue

Copyright

And she was not as cool and serene as she pretended to be, he decided. Her eyes, dark and restless, gave her away. There was passion beneath the cool exterior. And he wanted to be the one to discover it. It occurred to him that it had been a long time since he had wanted anything quite so badly.

“Bon soir.” Insolently he reached for her hand instead of waiting for her to offer it. “So you did remember that you’d promised me the first waltz.”

“I did not promise, Monsieur Blanchard. You demanded.”

“So?” A wealth of insinuation swung with that single word. “And you always give in to demands?” His tawny eyebrows curved upward wickedly. “I shall have to remember that.”

“On the contrary.” Temper darkened her eyes. “I do not deal well with demands at all…!”

In Nina Beaumont’s new historical, Surrender the Heart, a brash American and an independent Frenchwoman make a dangerous bargain. He will court her to keep away unwanted suitors, and she, in return, will allow him the chance to seduce her. But the two are unprepared for the passionate love that develops between them in this sizzling story set in nineteenth-century Paris.

In Bogus Bride, by Australian author Emily French, a spirited young woman must convince her new husband that although he had intended to marry her sister, she is his true soul mate. And in Knights Divided by Suzanne Barclay, a medieval tale from one of our most popular authors, a young woman finds herself embroiled in a maelstrom of passion and deceit when she kidnaps the rogue whom she believes murdered her sister.

And in our final selection for the month, Judith Stacy’s heartwarming Western, Outlaw Love, a Federal Marshal on the trail of a gang of female outlaws doesn’t realize that the woman he’s falling in love with is their leader.

Whatever your taste in reading, we hope you’ll find a story written just for you between the covers of a Harlequin Historical novel. Keep a lookout for all four titles wherever Harlequin Historicals are sold.

Sincerely,

Tracy Farrell,

Senior Editor

Please address questions and book requests to:

Harlequin Reader Service

U.S.: 3010 Walden Ave., P.O. Box 1325, Buffalo, NY 14269

Canadian: P.O. Box 609, Fort Erie, Ont. L2A 5X3

www.millsandboon.co.uk

is of Russian parentage and has a family tree that includes the Counts Stroganoff and a Mongolian khan. A real cosmopolitan, she was born in Salzburg and grew up in Massachusetts before moving to Austria, where she lived for twenty-five years.

Although she has relocated to the Seattle area, her European ties are still strong, so she plans to stick with the exotic settings she has had the opportunity to get to know firsthand.

Books and music are her first loves, but she also enjoys painting watercolors and making pottery.

To Loma and Ed Hudgens—

thank you for making me part of your family.

My heartfelt thanks to:

my editor, Tracy Farrell, and she and I know why;

my writer friends, Sonya Jorgensen, Suzanne Neel and

Mike Miller, for their brainstorming help

when I was in need.

Paris, October 1855

“Ariane, if you don’t take that bored look off your face, you’re never going to get a husband.”

Ariane de Valmont barely managed to suppress the temptation to roll her eyes in exasperation. Curving her mouth into the semblance of a smile, she shifted so that she faced the stage more fully. Perhaps, she thought, maman would not be able to see the expression on her face quite so precisely from this angle.