Finding Her Prince. Lilian Darcy

      “What on earth can she be dreaming about that’s making her so happy?”

      “You,” Stephen said. He was standing beside her, and Suzanne felt the warmth of his forearm against her wrist. She noticed the way his smile lit up his whole face. Like baby Alice’s smile. Slowly she was beginning to lose that instinctive mistrust she’d had on first meeting him. Maybe here, at last, was someone else who cared about her orphaned niece.

      “She’s dreaming about your voice,” he continued. “Your fragrance. The songs you sing to her.”

      They were both watching the baby again, intent on every tiny movement in her face.

      “Am I right thinking you would give almost anything to be able to bring her up as your own?” Stephen asked suddenly.

      “Of course I would,” Suzanne answered. “I love her.”

      “Then marry me.”

      Dear Reader,

      What are your New Year’s resolutions? I hope one is to relax and escape life’s everyday stresses with our fantasy-filled books! Each month, Silhouette Romance presents six soul-stirring stories about falling in love. So even if you haven’t gotten around to your other resolutions (hey, spring cleaning is still months away!), curling up with these dreamy stories should be one that’s a pure pleasure to keep.

      Could you imagine seducing the boss? Well, that’s what the heroine of Julianna Morris’s Last Chance for Baby, the fourth in the madly popular miniseries HAVING THE BOSS’S BABY did. And that’s what starts the fun in Susan Meier’s The Boss’s Urgent Proposal—part of our AN OLDER MAN thematic series—when the boss…finally…shows up on his secretary’s doorstep.

      Looking for a modern-day fairy tale? Then you’ll adore Lilian Darcy’s Finding Her Prince, the third in her CINDERELLA CONSPIRACY series about three sisters finding true love by the stroke of midnight! And delight in DeAnna Talcott’s I-need-a-miracle tale, The Nanny & Her Scrooge.

      With over one hundred books in print, Marie Ferrarella is still whipping up fun, steamy romances, this time with three adorable bambinos on board in A Triple Threat to Bachelorhood. Meanwhile, a single mom’s secret baby could lead to Texas-size trouble in Linda Goodnight’s For Her Child…, a fireworks-filled cowboy romance!

      So, a thought just occurred: Is it cheating if one of your New Year’s resolutions is pure fun? Hmm…I don’t think so. So kick back, relax and enjoy. You deserve it!

      Happy reading!

      Mary-Theresa Hussey

      Senior Editor

      Finding Her Prince

      

      Lilian Darcy

      

       www.millsandboon.co.uk

      Books by Lilian Darcy

      Silhouette Romance

      The Baby Bond #1390

      Her Sister’s Child #1449

      Raising Baby Jane #1478

      *Cinderella After Midnight #1542

      *Saving Cinderella #1555

      *Finding Her Prince #1567

      LILIAN DARCY

      has written nearly fifty books for Silhouette Romance and Harlequin Mills & Boon Medical Romance (Prescription Romance). Her first book for Silhouette appeared on the Waldenbooks Series Romance Best-sellers list, and she’s hoping readers go on responding strongly to her work. Happily married, with four active children and a very patient cat, she enjoys keeping busy and could probably fill several more lifetimes with the things she likes to do—including cooking, gardening, quilting, drawing and traveling. She currently lives in Australia but travels to the United States as often as possible to visit family. She loves to hear from fans, who can e-mail her at [email protected].

      Contents

       Chapter One

       Chapter Two

       Chapter Three

       Chapter Four

       Chapter Five

       Chapter Six

       Chapter Seven

       Chapter Eight

       Chapter Nine

       Epilogue

      Chapter One

      “Darn it, Prince Charming was right!” Suzanne Brown muttered.

      She scrunched a small piece of pink, hand-knitted wool in her hand and slashed a line through another of the male names in her appointment diary. This one was Robert. Over the past two days, there had also been Mike, Duane, Les, Colin and Dan. She hadn’t spent long enough with any of them to find out their last names.

      Her stomach ached and knotted with disappointment. The squeak of Robert’s footsteps on the polished vinyl floor faded into the ambient sounds of the busy hospital café, and he left without a backward glance.

      Again!

      It was the tiny pink baby bootie, still scrunched in her hand, that nixed the deal every single time! And every time, it happened in exactly the same way.

      First, Suzanne would rummage in her purse in search of a tissue. Then she would “accidentally” let the bootie fall out of her messy purse onto the coffee shop table. Every time, it looked so cute and fragile, and every time it earned a slightly alarmed stare from the man—Mike, Les, Colin and the others—across the table.

      “Are you a single mom, or something?” a couple of them had said.

      Picking the bootie up—nervous, at this point—Suzanne would use it as a way to explain the situation with baby Alice.

      That her birth mother, Suzanne’s much older half sister, Dr. Jodie Rimsky, had died of a brain aneurysm in the sixth month of her pregnancy. That Alice had been safely delivered, more than three months premature, by emergency Caesarean, thanks only to the quick thinking of Jodie’s medical practice partner, Michael Feldman.

      That Alice was still in hospital and Suzanne was hoping for custody, once the baby was discharged. Alice had been conceived through artificial insemination at a clinic and there was no father to claim her.

      Finally, after ten minutes or so, with the pink bootie still cradled in her palm, Suzanne would sit back and watch another chance at Alice’s happiness dissolve before her