Snowed in for Christmas: Yuletide Travelers Series, #1

By Isabella Hargreaves

Can a carriage accident and a blizzard create a Christmas miracle?

After the death of his brother, Robert not only becomes Viscount Landers, but also gives up his army career and agrees to marry his brother's beautiful fiancé to ensure the succession. When he's snowed in for Christmas with his shrewish betrothed and her attractive but practical cousin, Eleanor Carlisle, Robert realises he's engaged to the wrong woman.

Eleanor, the impoverished daughter of a disgraced army captain, has loved her cousin's handsome and dashing fiancé from afar, until all three are stranded together.

As the temperature plunges, the heat is on Viscount Landers to untangle the ties of duty and the wishes of the heart.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Isabella Hargreaves
• Release date: Nov 25, 2016
• ISBN: 9780994367167

Isabella Hargreaves

Isabella Hargreaves is an award-winning historical romance author. She writes Romance through the Ages, with a story to tell from the Regency era to Ancient Britain and to 1920s Australia. She loves writing about strong heroines finding the men to match them. She is a winner of the Romance Writers of Australia Romantic Book of the Year 2022 (novella category), the Romance Writers of New Zealand Koru Award 2018 (novella category) and the Romance Writers of Australia 'Little Gems' short story competition 2018, and a finalist in a number of other awards. Isabella lives in Brisbane, Australia, where she works as an historian and is butler to three moggies. When she's not reading and writing, Isabella loves horse-riding and scenic walks. She dreams of an around-the-world trip to indulge these passions. For more information about Isabella Hargreaves' books, and to sign up for email advice about her next release, go to: www.isabellahargreaves.com Follow on: Bookbub: https://www.bookbub.com/profile/isabella-hargreaves Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/7457181.Isabella_Hargreaves Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/IsabellaHargreavesBooks

Book preview

Snowed in for Christmas:

a Regency romance

––––––––

Isabella Hargreaves

Copyright © Isabella Hargreaves 2016

ISBN 978-0-9943671-8-1

Except for use in any review, no part of this book may be used, reproduced, or transmitted in whole or in part, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the author. This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the author’s prior consent. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

This novella is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

No AI Training: Without in any way limiting the author’s exclusive rights under copyright, any use of this publication to train generative artificial intelligence (AI) technologies to generate text is expressly prohibited. The author reserves all rights to license uses of this work for generative AI training and development of machine learning language models.

Find out more about Isabella Hargreaves and her books at www.isabellahargreaves.com

Foreword

With thanks to: Brian Sinclair, Anthea Jones, Claire Austen, and Olivia and Becky at Hot Tree Editing for their invaluable comments on the story.

––––––––

This story is written using US spelling conventions.

Table of Contents

Foreword

Table of Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Epilogue

Preview: Runaway Christmas Bride

Historical Note

Other Publications

About the Author

Chapter One

Christmas Eve, 1813

A flurry of snow whipped across Robert Landers, Viscount Linden’s face. Tidings of comfort and joy, he muttered. The heir to the Marquess of Linville looked up at the looming grey sky and tried to reassure himself that they would reach his family’s country estate before the threatening storm added more snow to that already carpeting the ground.

The heavily laden traveling coach he was shadowing lumbered through the stark white landscape. The coachman plied his long whip above the straining horses to keep them moving on the slippery road.

Inside the coach were Robert’s fiancée, the Honorable Augusta Crawshaw, and her companion and cousin, Miss Eleanor Carlisle. He hoped that they, wrapped in furs with hot bricks at their feet, were still warm. He certainly wasn’t.

This was Augusta’s first visit to his family estate, and his elderly father eagerly awaited their arrival, anxious to meet his future daughter-in-law. The succession plagued him day and night, he had confessed in his last letter to Robert, so this forthcoming marriage was a godsend.

Another wind-driven pelting of snow signaled the start of the storm.

Their journey had been delayed this morning by Augusta’s reluctant start to the day, accompanied by more than one change of outfit. The servants had already been sent ahead with most of the luggage when she’d insisted on one more, so Miss Carlisle had acted as Augusta’s lady’s maid for her last-minute wardrobe change.

Robert, with growing frustration, had watched Miss Carlisle hurry to and from Augusta’s room, unpacking and repacking a portmanteau to assuage his fiancée’s clothing demands.

As a result, the coachman now urged his team along this narrow road, which was quickly disappearing under a shroud of snow. Over the next ten miles to the gates of the estate, the ground grew whiter.

Finally, they entered the estate and followed the long road through woodlands down into the valley it traversed. If they could get to the other side before more snow fell, they would reach Linville Manor safely.

The coach lurched. With a sickening drop of his stomach, Robert watched the vehicle in front of him slither toward the rough edge of the road. The horses neighed shrilly and the driver applied his long whip sending the team forward.

The harness traces snapped and the horses plunged away from the skating carriage. It hit the snow-covered verge, teetered, then toppled, accompanied by the driver’s ribald swearing and screeching from within the carriage.

The vehicle came to rest tilted and half on its side in the drainage ditch.

Robert leaped from his horse, clambered aboard the listing coach, and opened the upper door.

Warm bricks and blankets lay strewn about the interior. Petite Augusta sat tipped across the seat against the side of the carriage, her blonde hair in disarray and her dress bunched at her knees. Fear distorted her pretty face. Save me, Robert! Hysteria laced her wispy voice. Her companion

Reviews for Snowed in for Christmas

[Nancy · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This book has a very happy ending and I am so glad I took the time to read it... I hope if you read this review it will entice to you read it too.