Regency Beauty: Beneath the Major's Scars / Behind the Rake's Wicked Wager. Sarah Mallory

      SARAH MALLORY was born in the West Country and now lives on the beautiful Yorkshire moors. She has been writing for more than three decades–mainly historical romances set in the Georgian and Regency period. She has won several awards for her writing, most recently the Romantic Novelists’ Association RoNA Rose Award in 2012 (for The Dangerous Lord Darrington) and 2013 (for Beneath the Major’s Scars).

Prologue

       Cornwall—1808

      The room was very quiet. The screams and cries, the frantic exertions of the past twelve hours were over. The bloodied cloths and the tiny, lifeless body had been removed and the girl lay between clean sheets, only the glow of firelight illuminating the room. Through the window a single star twinkled in the night sky. She did not seek it out, she had no energy for such conscious effort, but it was in her