As Stuart Haley grew older, year by year, he worried more and more about the security of his famous cattle fortune. He had raised his daughters in the lap of luxury—they wanted for nothing—and all three girls had matured into lovely young women. But as he aged, Stuart craved the security that only a proper heir could provide. The two older daughters had fallen in love and left him—Stuart’s only chance was that his youngest daughter, Charmaine, marry a local man and carry on in the family tradition. But that was not going to be easy. Independent and brash, Charmaine Haley had a life of her own, far away in Boston. It would be up to her father to make her return to a Kansas so incredible that life in the north would pale in comparison. A masked ball, on par with the greatest of fairy tales, would be the event of a lifetime. But to succumb to passion from behind a mask could be a cruel twist of fate—leading Charmaine back through the torment of old mistakes she thought she had left behind forever. Could the specter of true love be only old pain in disguise?
