if she’d just crept from her grave, and she was staring up at me, and she…she raised her hand and pointed her finger at me! It was a threat, Mama! She wants me gone from this castle.”
Another gasp arose from the servants crowding the doorway, and Amy slapped a hand over her mouth. Lord Darlington strode to the window, jerked the drapes open and peered down into the grounds below. “There’s no one there now.”
Mrs. Honeywell threw her hands up in the air. Servant, nightmare, or ghost, she was having none of it. “How could an apparition threaten you, you silly girl? It was certainly a nightmare. If she were truly there, then where has she gone?”
Miss Honeywell cast a wild look at the window, the coverlet clutched to her chest. “Oh, I don’t know! I ran back to my bed, and…and pulled the pillow over my head!”
Amy let out a terrified squeak. Lord Darlington turned at the sound to find all of them standing in the doorway, witnessing the lurid scene, and his face darkened. “Return to your beds at once. As you can see, Miss Honeywell is perfectly safe now.”
Lord Haslemere remained where he was, his arms crossed over his chest, but the servants shuffled out and began to make their way back to their bedchambers. Cecilia followed along after them, but she took care to be the last one out the door. She left it open a crack, and lingered in the hallway to listen, with her eye pressed against the narrow gap.
“Safe!” Miss Honeywell rose to her knees in the middle of the bed and pointed one shaking finger at Lord Darlington. “You wicked, wicked man!”
Mrs. Honeywell gasped. “Fanny! How dare you address Lord Darlington in such a way? Beg his pardon at once!”
But Miss Honeywell, who was well beyond rational thought by this point, didn’t beg Lord Darlington’s pardon. “Darlington Castle is haunted, just as everyone in London says it is! The late Lady Darlington roams the grounds, seeking her revenge on you for her death. You really are the Murderous Marquess!”
“Murderer or not, he’s still a marquess!” Mrs. Honeywell cried.
“I don’t care if he’s a duke! I’m leaving Darlington Castle tomorrow morning, Mama. I want to go home.”
“Leaving! But you’re to be married at the end of the week!”
“What, and get murdered, and end up haunting a dreary castle for the rest of my days? No, Mama. I won’t do it!”
Mrs. Honeywell, who saw her dream of becoming mother to a marchioness dissolving before her eyes, rushed to the bed and shook her daughter until her teeth rattled in her head. “You’d throw away the chance to become a marchioness over a ghost? God in heaven, that I should be cursed with such a fool for a daughter!”
Mrs. Honeywell was now as hysterical as Miss Honeywell, and she might have shaken her daughter into unconsciousness if Lord Darlington hadn’t intervened, and dragged her away from the bed. “Release your daughter at once, madam.”
“What duke would have you now, you selfish, ungrateful girl!” Mrs. Honeywell had quite lost control of herself, and was spitting and scratching to get free. “You’ll be lucky to get a lowly viscount if you jilt a marquess!”
“I don’t care! I’ll marry a farmer if I have to!” Tears were once again leaking from Miss Honeywell’s eyes, and she buried her face in her hands.
Mrs. Honeywell gave up trying to reason with her daughter, and turned to clutch desperately at Lord Darlington. “My daughter is a bit…distraught, my lord, and doesn’t know what she’s saying. She’ll come to her senses by morning—”
“No.” Lord Darlington plucked his shirt out of Mrs. Honeywell’s grasp.
“No? But my lord, I promise you—”
“Forgive me, Mrs. Honeywell, but I’ve no wish to marry a lady who doesn’t wish to marry me, nor do I want a wife who believes I’m a murderer.” He turned to offer Miss Honeywell a stiff bow. “I release you from our betrothal, Miss Honeywell.”
If any specters still lingered near Darlington Castle, Mrs. Honeywell’s deafening shriek would have sent them all scurrying. “I warn you, Lord Darlington, I won’t have every malicious tongue in London wagging about my daughter jilting a marquess. Either you marry her, or I’ll put it about you jilted her. It will be your reputation left in tatters, not hers!”
Lord Darlington let out a harsh, bitter laugh. “Do what you will. I don’t give a bloody damn.”
Mrs. Honeywell gasped at the curse. “How dare you?”
“Far more easily than you’d