The Virgin Who Vindicated Lord Darlington Read online

  The Marchioness of Darlington’s bedchamber.

  A bedchamber that had remained locked since the marchioness had met her mysterious and untimely end there. A bedchamber no one had dared enter since her death, on orders of the Marquess of Darlington.

  If you disobey me in this, you will be sent away from the castle immediately.

  It wasn’t a loud noise, only a faint scratching. Cecilia wasn’t certain why she’d noticed it at all, unless it was that one didn’t expect to hear such a sound from an empty bedchamber. She huddled into a ball, drew her knees up to her chest, and tugged the coverlet over her head. She squeezed her eyes closed, blocked her ears with her fingers, and ordered herself to go to sleep.

  It didn’t work.

  No sooner had she closed her eyes than she was awake again, every muscle in her body pulling tight. That sound—

  Yes, there it was again!

  There was no mistaking that distinctive scratching, as if something had been locked behind a wooden door, and was clawing feebly to be let out.

  Something, or someone.

  Chapter Six

  It was nothing. Of course, it was nothing, just a figment of her imagination—

  Scratch, scratch, scratch.

  A disturbingly clear, persistent, and distinctive figment, but a figment, nonetheless. She wasn’t going to let a figment frighten her off, was she?

  Cecilia swallowed, then eased the coverlet aside, and paused by the bed. A shudder rolled over her and goosebumps chased up and down her arms, but she took a breath, rushed across the room, and pressed her ear bravely against the door.

  She didn’t believe in ghosts, no matter if all of Edenbridge swore they’d seen the Marchioness of Darlington’s phantom floating through the woods behind Darlington Castle, here to wreak vengeance on the husband who’d sent her to an early grave.

  It was a rumor, nothing more.

  Cecilia liked the idea of ghosts as much as any avid reader of gothic romance, but she was skeptical as to their actual existence. Mrs. Briggs had stoutly declared the ghostly gossip utter nonsense, and dismissed it with a scornful wave of her hand. But now here was this peculiar scratching sound, coming from the marchioness’s abandoned bedchamber. If it wasn’t a ghost, what was it?

  Mrs. Briggs had mentioned poachers were wandering about the castle grounds, but surely they wouldn’t dare venture inside the castle? Even if they were bold enough, how would they get into Lady Darlington’s bedchamber?

  But if they had somehow managed to get inside…

  Some say as he smothered her with a pillow…buried her poor bones in the castle walls…he’s the Murderous Marquess, sure as I’m standing here.

  Cecilia’s stomach lurched as she recalled the hateful things the villagers had said about Lord Darlington, that first day she’d arrived in Edenbridge. If one of them did manage to sneak into the castle, there was no telling what they might do, or how far they might go to see his lordship punished.

  She thought of the pretty pink bed with its silk hangings just two doors down, of Isabella sleeping with her little hand curled under her cheek, and Cecilia’s throat closed.

  She turned back to the door with her teeth caught in her lower lip. Perhaps she’d just try it, so she could reassure herself it was indeed locked. She grasped the door latch, the wrought iron slick against her damp palms.

  It wasn’t locked. It gave way under her hand, and opened with a creak almost as if someone had tugged on the latch from the other side, encouraging her to enter. Cecilia hesitated, her knuckles white.

  This wasn’t like the accident with the coal scuttle this morning. Lord Darlington had chosen to overlook that, but if she entered the marchioness’s bedchamber, it wouldn’t be an accident. She would be intentionally disobeying his direct order. He’d dismiss her for that, and for good reason.

  If he caught her.

  He and Lord Haslemere had gone out tonight. A peek inside Lady Darlington’s bedchamber was the work of a moment only. She’d be in and out before they returned.

  Wasn’t this, after all, why Lady Clifford had sent her here? To sneak into locked bedchambers, peer into dark corners, and uncover Lord Darlington’s secrets? She wouldn’t get another chance like this one. Whatever oversight had led to the door being unlocked would doubtless be corrected by tomorrow.

  Cecilia pushed the door wider, wincing as the iron hinges squealed in rusty protest. She took a cautious step into the room, her heart beating madly, Lord Darlington’s warning never to enter his late wife’s bedchamber echoing in her head.

  A blast of freezing cold air sliced through her as she paused on the threshold, and she gathered her night rail closer, shivering. She hadn’t thought the bedchamber would be warm—a fire hadn’t been laid here in months—but it was much colder than she’d expected. Cold enough she could see her breath freeze in the air as soon as it left her lips.

  Had someone inadvertently left a window open? Cecilia peered at the row of windows on the other side of the room, but the heavy silk drapes drawn across them were still, not a breath of fresh air stirring them. The room smelled stale as well, in a way it wouldn’t if the windows had been left ajar.

  As her eyes adjusted to the gloom, she noticed the room didn’t look quite as abandoned as she would have expected. The furniture wasn’t draped with dust cloths, for one, and there wasn’t the musty, stale scent in the air one would expect from a chamber that had been sealed for so long. It was…strange.

  Gooseflesh that had nothing to do with the cold made Cecilia’s skin prickle. Her shoulders instinctively jerked up to her ears to protect her neck, because God knew if ever a ghostly, skeletal hand were going to choke the life out of her it would happen here, and now—

  Scratch, scratch, scratch…

  “Oh!” Cecilia gasped, all thoughts of cold and ghosts and skeletons fleeing her head. That haunting sound was back, much louder this time, and it was coming from an alcove in one corner of the room. It looked like a dressing room. The door was slightly ajar, and she could just make out a massive clothes press situated against one wall. She eyed it warily, her instincts urging her to turn and flee back to the safety of her bed.

  Well, how absurd. Was she really so fainthearted as that? No, she wouldn’t give into such shameful cowardice. What did she suppose was inside there? A ghost, or a dead marchioness’s moldering skeleton? It was a clothes press, for pity’s sake, not a crypt.

  She steeled her spine, crept forward, and eased the door of the clothes press open a crack with one finger. A little wider, then a little—

  “Heaven and earth!” Cecilia stumbled backward, a scream rising to her lips as something darted out the door. It scrambled over her bare feet and vanished into the bedchamber beyond, its claws scrabbling over the floorboards.

  “What in the world?” Cecilia patted her chest to calm her frantic breathing. Her first horrified thought was that it had been a rat—

  No, that wasn’t true. Her first thought was it had been a ghost, a very small one with four clawed feet. Her second was it was a rat, but if it was a rat, it was a giant one, indeed. That wasn’t precisely a comforting thought, giant rats not being the sort of thing she wished to encounter in a dark room, but before she could fall into a panic over it, another thought occurred to her.

  She tiptoed back into the bedchamber. There could only be one explanation for scratching claws and a dark, furry, darting thing—

  “Ah, ha. Just as I thought. Where did you come from?”

  A black cat was sitting right in the center of the thick Aubusson carpet spread across the floor, calmly licking its paw. It looked up when Cecilia spoke, regarded her for a moment with disinterested green eyes, then went back to its grooming, as cool as you please.

  Cecilia couldn’t recall ever having been so summarily dismissed in her entire life. “I beg your pardon, madam, but if it weren’t f
or me, you’d still be trapped inside that clothes press.” Because of course, that’s what the noise had been—the cat scratching on the door to escape. “I believe I deserve your gratitude. At the very least, you could introduce yourself.”

  The cat lowered its paw to the floor, abandoning its toilette to consider Cecilia. This mollified her somewhat, as the cat’s sleek, shiny black fur indicated a preoccupation with cleanliness.

  “How did you get in here, madam?” Cecilia wasn’t certain how she knew the cat was a madam rather than a sir, but she did, perhaps because the cat’s regal air reminded her of Lady Clifford.

  Cecilia perched on the edge of the bed and stared at the furry creature, at a loss as to how to proceed. “Well? What am I meant to do with you?”

  The cat seemed to consider this for a moment, its green eyes gleaming, and then, to Cecilia’s surprise, she padded daintily over the carpet, leapt up onto the bed, and settled herself on Cecilia’s lap without so much as a by your leave.

  “What, you mean to say I’m to pet you?” Cecilia reached out to stroke the cat’s silky head, and within seconds it began a loud, contented purring. “Yes, it’s all very well for you, isn’t it? Lord Darlington isn’t going to dismiss you for being in here.”

  But she sighed and gave in, scratching behind the cat’s ears, soothed by the rumbling purr vibrating against her legs. She couldn’t leave the cat in the marchioness’s bedchamber. What if it got trapped in the clothes press and took up that infernal scratching again? It wouldn’t do any harm to bring the troublesome little creature into her room tonight, then take her outside tomorrow morning.

  Her mind made up, Cecilia tried to gather the cat against her chest, but before she could get her arms around it, it leapt from her lap and prowled to the dressing room door, which was still cracked open.

  Cecilia let out a weary sigh. Of course, Darlington Castle would have a haunted cat. “Very well, then. Let’s get it over with, shall we? What do you want? You want me to go in there again?”

  At this point Cecilia wouldn’t have been surprised if the cat answered her, but thankfully it didn’t. That is, not in words. It indulged in a lazy stretch, but didn’t move from its place by the door. It stared at her expectantly, until at last Cecilia gave in. “Well, if we’re meant to be partners in this, I suppose I’d better name you, hadn’t I?”

  She considered calling the cat Amanda, which was Lady Clifford’s given name, but in Cecilia’s fond opinion there could only ever be one Amanda, and so she discarded it in favor of an extravagant name worthy of any swooning gothic heroine.

  “I’ll call you Seraphina. Come along then, Seraphina, and be quick about it, will you? If Lord Darlington catches us in here, he’ll have both our heads.”

  * * * *

  “Cold out tonight.” Haslemere crossed the study to the fireplace and thrust his hands out toward the blaze. “It would have been much pleasanter if your ghost had appeared in the spring or summer, Darlington.”

  “Or hadn’t appeared at all.” Gideon poured a generous measure of port into a tumbler and handed it to Haslemere. “Here, this will warm you more quickly than the fire.”

  Haslemere took the tumbler and dropped into a chair, his expression thoughtful. “I don’t deny Darlington Castle is the first place a ghost would choose to haunt, but I believe we can conclude the White Lady is a figment of Edenbridge’s imagination.”

  “I never suspected otherwise.” Gideon’s lips twisted into something meant to resemble a smile. “It seems my neighbors aren’t pleased with the idea of my marrying again. What better way to chase off my betrothed than with a haunting?”

  Haslemere grunted. “Bloody nonsense. Why can’t they just leave you in peace?”

  “Because they think I’m a murderer.” Gideon sipped at his port. “A murderer must be punished, one way or another.”

  “More bloody nonsense. This is why I detest small villages, Darlington—willful ignorance and malicious gossip. I can’t think why you’d stay here at all. Once you’re married, you should bring your bride to London.”

  Gideon stared down into his glass. “Most of London thinks I’m a murderer too, Haslemere. You may be the only person in England who doesn’t.”

  “Miss Honeywell doesn’t think so,” Haslemere reminded him. “No one with any sense does.”

  The thought of his betrothed should have cheered Gideon, but the faint spark of hope he’d felt while he remained in London seemed to have been swallowed by the shadows lurking in every corner of Darlington Castle. A marriage wouldn’t undo what had happened between these walls. It wouldn’t make him forget.

  But the alternative was even grimmer. He couldn’t remain in this desolate castle alone forever. He owed Isabella better than that, and even putting his niece aside, he had an obligation to his title. He couldn’t remain here, in this dismal place. “Perhaps you’re right, Haslemere. Perhaps we’d be better off in the London townhouse.”

  “You can’t be worse off than you are here. It’s something to think about, anyway.” Haslemere rose to his feet. “I’m off to bed. We can have another look in the woods tomorrow night, if you like. There’s no ghost, but someone else may be out there.”

  Gideon nodded. “Good night, Haslemere, and thank you.”

  Gideon remained in his study for a while after Haslemere left, sipping his port and staring out the window at the thickening shadows falling over the grounds. It had become his habit to avoid his bed. Being there only reminded him how elusive sleep had become.

  But it was late, and the day had only grown more wearisome after his abrupt awakening this morning. He finished off the last of his port and set the tumbler on the windowsill. He was just turning away from the window when he caught a flicker of movement from the corner of his eye and jerked back around, his heart quickening. “What the devil?”

  It was a light near the tree line, faint but unmistakable. He tracked it as it moved steadily closer, toward the rose walk and the castle courtyard.

  Mrs. Brigg’s mysterious lantern light.

  He watched, breath held, as the light wound around the edge of the wood, flickering as it passed through the trees. Someone was out there, and whoever they were, they were cunning enough to have eluded him and Haslemere.

  Gideon followed the movement of the light as far as the rose walk, but as it neared the wall surrounding the kitchen garden, it vanished. He squinted into the darkness, but it was gone as quickly as it had appeared, swallowed by the gloom.

  He ran from his study into the entrance hall, then darted through the doorway into the courtyard beyond and found…nothing. The light and whoever had been carrying it were gone, vanished into the air as if they were…

  A ghost.

  A chill rushed through Gideon, helped along by the biting February wind. He didn’t give the wild stories about the White Lady any credit, but what he didn’t know was how far one of the villagers might go to make him believe his castle truly was haunted.

  He stood in the courtyard, the wind tearing at his cloak as he peered into the black night. By the time he gave up the vigil and went back through the arched doorway and into the long, narrow entrance hall his hands and feet were numb from the cold and his eyes tearing from the relentless assault of the wind.

  The house was dark and silent, but Gideon couldn’t shake the uneasy feeling gnawing at him as he mounted the stairs to the second floor. He started down the hallway, intending to have a quick look into Isabella’s room before he retired, just to reassure himself she was slumbering peacefully, but he hadn’t gone two steps before he froze, his heart leaping into his throat.

  He’d heard a squeak, like the sound of footsteps creeping across the floorboards, faint but unmistakable, coming from a bedchamber he’d forbidden his servants to enter, one that should be still and shrouded in silence. A locked bedchamber, sealed up as tight as a tomb for more than a year now,
with a connecting door into the sitting room where his young niece was now sleeping, vulnerable and defenseless.

  Cassandra’s bedchamber.

  Panic and fury surged through him, weakening his knees for an instant before instinct took over. His heartbeat thundered in his chest and his ragged breaths roared in his ears as he crashed through the door, the force of his attack causing it to shudder in its frame before it flew open, slamming back against the inside wall. The wrought iron lock, weakened from centuries of use, wrenched loose from the stonework and hit the floor with a heavy thud.

  Later, he’d recall she’d made a sound, a shocked gasp or a hoarse cry, but at the time he didn’t hear it, because the sight that met his eyes as he loomed in the doorway drove every other thought from his head.

  She was dressed in a white gown, her face as pale and stark as the villagers claimed it was. If he’d been in a rational state of mind, he might have recalled they also claimed her hair was a ghostly silvery-white, and nothing at all like the dark mahogany locks crowning this apparition’s head.

  But Gideon was far beyond rational thought, and so, when the apparition turned to flee from him in a whirl of white skirts, he did what any man half crazed with shock and fear would do.

  He leapt after her.

  It wasn’t much of a chase. Gideon caught a fold of her gown, jerked her backward against his chest and wrapped an arm around her shoulders to hold her still. “What do you want?” he bit out. “How dare you enter my home and threaten my family?”

  She gasped again, her slender body rigid with shock, but she didn’t speak. Her back was heaving against his chest, but some moments passed before Gideon realized she was so terrified she was fighting for breath, each lungful tearing in painful rasps from her throat.

  If the situation had been different, he might have felt some compassion for her, some softening of his heart, but if the last year had taught him anything, it was that he wasn’t the man he’d always believed himself to be. The rumors and gossip and ugliness had turned him into the monster everyone thought him, because he felt nothing but rage.