A Forever Christmas

By JJ Flowers

A Forever Christmas is an earlier work of bestselling author JJ Flowers (writing as Jennifer Horsman.) A Forever Christmas weaves old fashion holiday music and magic into a heartwarming story that ultimately sings with the joy of true love.

Christmas during the Victorian era England was a magical time...
The brilliant Dr. James Balfour agrees to a desperate plot to seduce the beautiful and gifted classical pianist Catherine Harrington before Christmas day, promising her grandmother that Harrington Hall will be once again filled with the sound of her music by Christmas Eve. Once upon a time, Catherine was warm, vivacious and full of life, but, ever since she her beloved husband died in a riding accident and left her to care for their invalid son Daniel, she is seen as colder than a Northern winter. Christmas is no longer celebrated in Harrington Hall; Catherine no longer fills her house with music until...

A fencing accident forces Catherine to accept the iconoclastic young doctor James Balfour as a houseguest through the holidays. A most unwanted guest. Catherine discovers she has absolutely no recourse against the handsome doctor’s arrogant manners and outrageous flirtations. What’s worse is his determination to cure her son. Even more alarming, how easily he begins to melt the icy fortress surrounding her heart.

“This short and wonderful novel never fails to get me in the holiday spirit.”
Queen Elizabeth

“I know my classics and A Forever Christmas is set become a classic...”
Charles Dickens

“I set this book on my night table in mid-December and then, allow myself to read just one chapter until Christmas Eve. It is my favorite part of the season.”
Mary Stanford

• Language: English
• Publisher: JJ Flowers
• Release date: Mar 15, 2021

JJ Flowers

I was born and raised in San Francisco, California. I moved south to finish my college degree at the University of California at Irvine. Here I fell instantly and madly in love with one of my professors, who I finally convinced to marry me. While most of my life force was sucked up by a steady stream of kids, dogs and cats, I managed to write a few books.I currently live in Laguna Beach, California. Things I love: life, the ocean, good books, Ashtanga yoga, redwood forests, most people, all animals, long walks and stormy nights. In addition to historical romance novels, I write children's novels and non-fiction, plays and screenplays.Now, about e-publishing: I am a voracious reader,(favorite authors: Toni Morrison, JM Coetzee, David Mitchell, Joyce Carol Oates and Margaret Atwood) and between my friends and I, we have sony readers, kindles, nooks, and quite a few Ipads. Ebooks are an amazing development in the ancient art of reading and writing. I wanted to be a part of it. Fortunately, historical romances never go out of date or fashion.I am currently working on a novel.I love hearing from readers--contact me at [e-mail]!

Book preview

Prologue

London, England, 1869

Dr. James Balfour’s thoughts loomed darker and more menacing than the misty night as he turned his prized stallion into Hyde Park. He felt the full effects of half a bottle of Scotch, and yet drink had in no way diminished the despair threatening to pull him under. Desperate to escape the brutal disappointment of the day, he set his spurs to the beast's side.

The great horse leaped into a gallop.

James leaned forward, feeling the flex and stretch of the huge muscles beneath him and thrilling to the speed of his flight, his long cape billowing behind him like a dark sail. As the cold night flew past him in a rush of blurred images, it seemed to snatch away his bitter thoughts: his anger toward the antiquated doctors at London's Academy of Medicine and Science, the futile months spent petitioning them and all for naught, the absurd rigidity of the English class system and the bigotry it bred, the bigotry that reduced all his accomplishments to the invective, Your petition has been denied...

An old woman emerged in the fog like an apparition.

With a startled curse, James drew back hard on the reins, tilting his weight to the left. The horse narrowly missed the bent and diminutive form. Pulling the beast up, he turned him around in a hard, fast circle as he took stock of the situation.

My heavens, Madame! I almost killed you! James stared at the impish figure smiling up at him. It seemed so unlikely, this old woman standing in the deserted park in the dark middle of the night. The horse snorted angrily as James swung off to make certain that the woman was indeed unhurt.

As he approached, the lady looked him up and down as if taking stock. You are a handsome devil.

I beg your pardon?

She ignored the confusion on the handsome face, nodding to herself as she took in his unconventionally tall frame and broad shoulders, a lean hardness that was the result of the rigors of his riding and his famous swordsmanship, no doubt. His olive skin and long hair created a foreign and somehow dangerous air about him, lending credibility to his reputation for arrogance, bold unconventionality, and brashness. His eyes were intelligent—he was said to be a brilliant doctor and diagnostician—but they also reflected his Scottish wit and sense of mischief. She believed all the stories about him now: that women melted like butter in the pan, that these conquests were legendary.

You're perfect, she announced.

Checking his agitated horse, James spoke to the creature as if to a child, but the beast kept dancing in agitation, tossing his head with frightened neighs. His gaze returned to the old woman. If by that you mean I emerged unscathed by this near disaster... His voice trailed off as the peculiarities of the old woman accumulated and magnified. She appeared to be a lady, her tiny stature clothed in soft blue velvet, the very color of a summer twilight. The skirts of her cloak spread over a neat circle of expensive crinoline. Gray hair peeked from her matching cap, on which a colorful peacock feather stood impossibly at attention.

The old woman's extraordinary presence in a chilly winter's night in the middle of Hyde Park seem to transformed his anger at the academy to the contemplation, however brief, of the strange mysteries of fate.

One never knew what the future held, did one?

James shook his head as if to clear it. Damn, he must have drunk more than he realized.

Are you quite all right, Madame?

She nodded smartly. Indeed I am!

The impish quality about her struck him, as if a bubble of mirth were caught in her throat. He abruptly caught sight of two footmen waiting on the side in the darker canopy of an enormous elm, shrouded, all of it, in fog.  Ah, you are escorted, I see. He nodded, as if it were just the thing. No further assistance from him would be needed. He turned back to his mount and started to lift a booted foot in the stirrup.

I was told I might find you here.

Were you now? he asked, the Scottish lilt to his voice replacing his slight French accent, which appeared whenever he saw humor in a situation. For he had left his two colleagues even more drunk than he back at the Firefox Inn, and no one alive knew he was here.

Yes, she replied, nodding again as she stared. Now Catherine does not particularly care about appearances, but I don't know many women who could resist a second look. Even her. The ice queen, they call her and for good reason, too. She shook her head. That’s the problem. Catherine. Her heart is covered in a frost as cold as the North Sea winter. Her husband's death, you see. She loved him madly... A puzzled look came over the lady’s face. Though, if truth were told, no one could ever figure out why.

The old woman was addled, James realized.

It just keeps getting worse; she keeps getting worse. There's no more music at the manor. Young Daniel is lost and becoming more lost each day. And the wonderful Christmas Eve festivities have all but disappeared. Something must be done. I need you to do it.

With a lift of his brow, James considered this nonsensical speech. She was obviously a victim of senile dementia, a not uncommon affliction of the very old. What to do?

He looked to her footmen for help. The mist, this interminable London fog, billowed in clouds all around them. The two footmen waiting in the shadows seemed to have disappeared in the fog.

Now, she said in an unmistakably aristocratic voice, a familiar voice to all who knew her. She used this voice when rearranging people's lives, which she was famous for doing. Catherine more than any other. Here's what I'm going to offer you for the favor. I understand you are seeking a position at the academy. Please allow me to introduce myself. I am Madame Isabel Harrington.

Not... not the mother of one Sir Walter Percival Harrington?

The old woman nodded. The very one.

Why this is extraordinary! James's dark eyes searched the surrounding area as if someone might step forward to explain the ruse. And surely, it was a ruse. Why, Madame, just today your son—

I know all about it. My son—a good man but too stuffy by half—denied you a position at the academy, a position anyone with half a simpleton's wits could see you deserve. You were the Sorbonne's most outstanding student, were you not? Recommended by the great surgeons Laplace, Rush and von Baer! All your highly innovative research, too; why I happen to know that if given the chance you will become one of England's greatest surgeons.

This is all very flattering, Madame, but—

You know why you were denied?

James straightened; his tone changed. I believe it had everything to do with my heritage. My Scottish father was damning enough, but then my dear French mother—

That didn't help, I admit it, but even more than that, those old stuffed shirts at the academy are afraid.

Afraid?

All your methods, you see. Most controversial. She whispered, The dissection of cadavers, for one. Your treatises on the church and science, for another. Too stuck in their ways, they are. Those old men are just not ready for you, there it is. You have to make them and... She paused, leaning forward to whisper, I am prepared to assist you. I still exercise considerable influence over my son, a few others as well. I believe I could change his mind if you agree to participate in the... ah, intrigue of my design to save my granddaughter and Daniel. Besides, I suspect, I am quite certain, you will find yourself very much in love with Catherine as the ice begins to melt.

Love? James questioned before chuckling as if it were a completely novel prospect, and it was, at least in his life. Once upon a time he had fallen in love as frequently as he visited a barbershop, but after about the twelfth time, he began to have difficulty maintaining the pretense. After the twentieth time, he gave the idea up entirely. There was a world of difference between the poets’ true love and base infatuation, or more bluntly, a healthy appetite for the fairer sex.

As the old woman explained the most unlikely intrigue in detail, James Balfour fervently wished he had not drunk so much. The fencing regional finals are to be held at Harrington Manor? he questioned after she was done. Well, yes I had heard but—

She elaborated further.

Madame, I can scarcely believe such an outrageous proposition is coming from a Lady of your stature!

The old woman assured him it was.

Only later did he wonder if he imagined the whole unlikely scenario, utterly fantastic and one surely borne of his desperation. As the old woman finally led him to agree to her terms, she added the last. I neglected to mention one last thing.

Yes? He had mounted and turned his horse around. What is it?

The deed must be done by Christmas.

"Christmas? My